SINGAPORE’S small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) will get access to subsidised artificial intelligence (AI) tools and tailor-made solutions under a new partnership with institutes of higher learning.
The Association of Small & Medium Enterprises (Asme), Institute of Technical Education (ITE), Nanyang Polytechnic and Singapore Polytechnic have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) through which smaller businesses can increase their use of AI tools.
Under the MOU inked at the AI Festival Asia 2025 on Friday (Jan 17), ITE students from the Higher Nitec in AI Applications course will work with SMEs to develop AI-tailored solutions, thus helping to support the growth of these businesses and also enhancing the students’ employability, said Asme in a statement.
The two polytechnics will offer their applied AI programmes, providing SMEs with subsidised access to AI tools and resources.
The two-day AI Festival Asia 2025, ending on Friday, set out to empower SMEs to leverage AI and stay ahead in the competitive landscape.
On Thursday, Asme president Ang Yuit said: “We have more initiatives on collaboration coming up this year, which will be announced in due time.”
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Leong Der Yao, assistant chief executive at the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) noted at the event that companies can tap the Productivity Solutions Grant for some 400 pre-approved digital solutions, of which about a fifth include AI capabilities. About 3,000 SMEs have taken up these tools so far.
He noted, however, that AI adoption among SMEs has stayed relatively low. Only about 4 per cent of SMEs have so far adopted AI; among larger companies, the figure is about 40 per cent. Singapore must make sustained efforts to close this adoption gap, he added, outlining IMDA’s support for this.
For instance, the updated GenAI Sandbox 2.0 programme launched last December offers generative AI tools that SMEs can implement.
“We introduced new solutions such as in marketing and sales, customer engagement and human resource operations, and we strongly encourage SMEs to seize the opportunities to explore how GenAI can transform their business,” said Leong.
The updated programme follows the success of the first GenAI Sandbox, launched by IMDA and Enterprise Singapore in February 2024. More than 150 companies took part in the first phase, and nearly 80 per cent of them continued to use AI solutions after the three-month trial period.
