RADM(NS) Lui addressing the audience at the NIA 2008 Gala Dinner.

Awards for the Most Innovative Infocomm Product/Service went to Advanced Network Technology Laboratories (ANTlabs) and BuzzCity. YCH Group and Land Transport Authority (LTA) won for Most Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology, which recognises private and public organisations that adopt infocomm technologies to enhance effectiveness and efficiency.

A new category was introduced this year, for Most Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology by Small and Medium Enterprises. The inaugural award was presented to Pictureworks.

The biennial awards, jointly organised by the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) and the Singapore Infocomm Technology Federation (SiTF), were presented at the NIA 2008 Gala Dinner on 14 October 2008, by RADM(NS) Lui Tuck Yew, Senior Minister of State for Education and Information, Communications and the Arts.

Winners of this year’s National Infocomm Awards take to the stage together with RADM(NS) Lui (centre), RADM(NS) Ronnie Tay, Chief Executive Officer of IDA (extreme left), Ms Tan Yen Yen, Chairman of SiTF (second from left), and Mr Pek Yew Chai, immediate past chairman of SiTF (extreme right).

Nominees for the awards were judged on the innovative harnessing of infocomm technologies, or development of infocomm products and services,
as well as business strategy, business impact, and regional or
international presence.

The awards this year saw a wide range of impressive submissions from both the infocomm industry and user organisations from sectors such as real estate, retail, transportation and even Traditional Chinese Medicine or TCM.  Even a philanthropic organisation showed how infocomm transformed its operations and processes. Also making a strong showing were young, promising entrepreneurs harnessing innovation to develop products and services which are ready to go-to-market worldwide.

The submissions drew high praise from the judges, who were drawn from infocomm professionals, users, and past NIA winners. They admired the diversity of the companies and organisations that took part, the varied
areas of infocomm that they worked with, as well as the enthusiasm of
the presentations.

“I’m very impressed with the diversity of the solutions and I hope it will continue that way. It’s not just everyone going into digital security because it’s the hot topic,” noted Mr Eddie Chau, who chaired the evaluation committee responsible for judging the Most Innovative Infocomm Product Technology. Mr Chau, who is also Chief Executive Officer of Brandtology, observed that judging being a close thing, because of the high quality of all the entries. “We kept debating,” he smiled. “The discussion became quite heated sometimes. All of them were very good.”

Mr Robert Chew, Chairman of the Information Technology Standards Committee, Singapore Standards Council, who chaired the evaluation committee for the Most Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology, admitted to having doubts before the judges started work. “Prior to judging, I was wondering if such a competition could produce innovative submissions year after year,” he confessed. “I must say, post judging, that the answer is a clear ‘yes’. This certainly speaks volumes about the innovativeness and capabilities of our infocomm industry.”

Click here for the complete listing of the NIA 2008 Winners and
Merit Recipients.

“LTA is more than just ERP (Electronic Road Pricing),” stressed Mrs Rosina Howe-Teo, Chief Innovation Officer & Group Director, Innovation and Infocomm Technology, Land Transport Authority (LTA, www.lta.gov.sg).

Indeed, the statutory board spearheads overall improvements to the land transport system through integrated planning, development and management of land transport policies and infrastructure. In pursuit of giving road users easier traffic flow, LTA has invested heavily in technology for traffic management.

BG(NS) Yam Ah Mee, Chief Executive of LTA (left), receiving the award from RADM(NS) Lui Tuck Yew for the Most Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology in the Public Sector.

Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) is the integration of many massive systems, like computerised traffic lights, Expressway Monitoring and Advisory System (EMAS), monitoring of traffic at expressway tunnels and junctions, and a parking information system that tells motorists of available parking spaces – as well as the ERP system, of course.

ITS deploys various technologies, including infocomm to give motorists a “closer link” to the driving infrastructure, giving them real time information of road and even parking conditions, in order to optimise the available road space. One example of their innovativeness is the Parking Guidance System, which was launched in April this year at the Marina Centre area. The idea is to tell drivers how many parking spots are available in the nearest car park, to reduce circulation as drivers go from one car park
to another.

“We have garnered a lot of positive feedback,” said Mrs Howe-Teo of the system. “We have seen such systems overseas, but they are not as precise as ours. Our system goes down to the exact number of parking spots.”

For ITS, LTA won this year’s National Infocomm Award for the Most Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology (Public Sector). “This award is very significant to LTA because it gives recognition to many years of hard work, putting together systems that are not visible to the public. But the integration of these systems has brought new value to the public, because all the information from various sources of ITS system are now integrated and translated into very user-friendly information to the public,” said Mrs Howe-Teo.

Indeed, ITS has created annual savings of S$40 million for the country – from time saving and the avoidance of jams despite a growing vehicle population, and from overcoming spatial constraints that restrict road-building.

Mrs Howe-Teo promises more technological innovation down the road. “The next thing will be when we offer this in navigational guides on mobile phones, Internet and PDAs,” she said.

Size is not an issue when it comes to the innovative use of infocomm technology. This is clearly seen in this year’s National Infocomm Award winners for the Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology in the private sector.

Pictureworks www.pictureworks.com.sg a Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) in the digital imaging solutions space, received the inaugural award for the Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology (Private Sector – SME), while regional logistics player YCH Group (www.ych.com) won for Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology (Private Sector – General).

The SME category was introduced to complement IDA’s efforts to promote the innovative adoption of infocomm among SMEs to achieve business gains and productivity. “Some surveys suggest that SME take up of technology is low, apart from basic solutions,” said Mr Robert Chew, who chaired the evaluation committee for the award.

However, the NIA submissions turned up many companies in the SME space who were using technology to boost their processes, and to differentiate themselves from the competition. “We see SMEs using technology for end-to-end systems,” he observed. “The solutions and applications they produced were done within a very short time frame and in a very cost effective manner. These are, to me, very encouraging.”

Mr Cheong Chia Chou (left) of Pictureworks receives the inaugural award for the Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology (Private Sector – SME) from RADM(NS) Lui Tuck Yew.

Winning the award was equally encouraging for Mr Cheong Chia Chou, Chief Executive Officer of Pictureworks. “As an SME, the infocomm award is more important because we are small, with limited resources,” he explained. “When we have to compete internationally, we are at a disadvantage. With awards like this, we can tell people that we are different.”

Long before Wi-fi cameras caught on, Pictureworks created PictureAnywhere, a high-quality instant photo system which allows clients like theme parks and entertainment outlets to take customers’ pictures, and collect the prints “on the spot” at a digital printing terminal. PictureAnywhere offers both wired and wireless configurations, and is scalable. It uses infocomm technology to perform backend operations like image processing and identification.

At the other end of the scale is YCH Group, whose RFID-Enabled High Performance Supply Chain Nerve Centre connects the group’s operations throughout the region.

YCH Group Chairman and CEO Dr Robert Yap (centre) receives the award for the Innovative Use of Infocomm Technology (Private Sector – General).

YCH’s avowed mission is to build a logistics superhighway. “A lot of people only look at logistics as a physical flow,” said James Loo, Chief Information Officer, YCH Group. But the supply chain also requires the flow of information - of inventory numbers and related data. “With RFID tracking, we get visibility.”

YCH’s S$5 million RFID system not only offers visibility along the supply chain, it has reduced errors by cutting down the need for human data entry. This has notched up manpower savings of 30 per cent, and a 40 per cent reduction in checking because of disruption to warehousing activities. In fact, it has performed with 100 per cent accuracy, and cut turnaround time by 20 per cent, to just 105 minutes from order to feed-to-line.

BuzzCity (www.buzzcity.com) created, well, a buzz at the National Infocomm Awards (NIA) and ANTlabs (www.antlabs.com) showed that hard work in R&D do pay off, when both companies won awards for the Most Innovative Infocomm Product/Service at this year’s NIA.

Mr Ang of ANTlabs (left) receives the NIA trophy from RADM(NS) Lui Tuck Yew.

Mr Ang Kwang Tat, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of ANTlabs (Advanced Network Technology Laboratories), said that although his company is “cash flow positive”, it ploughs its profits back into innovation. ANTlabs, founded in 1999, puts a whopping 20 per cent of its annual revenue and 50 per cent of its manpower into R&D.

This commitment led to the development of Securite, a full-featured network security solution that protects computer users from all the wiles cyber crooks use to steal confidential information during online transactions – phishing, spyware, crimeware, keylogging and hacking.

Individual consumers remain the top target for these Internet tricksters, since, unlike corporations, they cannot afford sophisticated security software. Whereas traditional anti-virus solutions use detection to identify known malware, Securite, which is installed in the end user's PC, checks the credentials of websites accessed to ensure that they are legitimate.

“We see a lot of things happening in the financial world. It has a lot to do with confidence,” said Mr Ang, noting that the Internet shares this vulnerability of confidence. “Today, if someone finds a way to compromise computer security, no one will use the computer for their online transactions. We hope our innovation will encourage transactions with the value going to the end user.”

The team from BuzzCity celebrates at the NIA.

BuzzCity got its award for myGamma, a social networking website aimed primarily at mobile users. myGamma is a means to reach the “unwired” Internet audience – who do not have computers, and who access Internet through their mobile phones, which are cheaper than computers.

My Gamma brings people into cyberspace from countries where mobile penetration is far greater than that of computers, like India, South Africa and Indonesia. “Members write to tell us that myGamma has opened a new world to them with new friends, opportunities and possibilities. Many of these users -- from across four continents -- are experiencing the Internet for the first time,” said Dr Lai Kok Fung, BuzzCity’s CEO. myGamma is currently the largest wireless community in the world, and, Dr Lai expects it to catch on in Europe and the US. “Even in the more developed markets, we are seeing users who prefer mobile phones to computers for accessing the Internet.”

Last month, South African media giant Naspers invested US$10 million in BuzzCity to help extend myGamma’s market share.

Besides creating a global network for the unwired, the mobile community of myGamma also offers merchants a unified platform for advertising and marketing, with advertising, merchant and publisher programmes. While the marketing possibilities are exciting, what is important for BuzzCity is
the members.

“We started the company in 1999 and saw the dotcom boom and bust. We made spreadsheets and bold predictions. Somewhere along the way, we were swept away by all the talk of making it big and forgot the reasons we started the company in the first place,” recalled Dr Lai.

“Fortunately, we’ve rediscovered the joy and raw excitement of coming face to face with the people who use our services daily. And here is the most mysterious lesson of all: when we stop requiring life to progress according to my spreadsheet, the spreadsheet begins to take care of itself.”