Sarawak Digital Economy Corporation, Kintone formalise partnership to boost digital adoption among Malaysia’s SMEs

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  • The Sarawak Digital Economy Blueprint 2030 and business development are fueled by association.
  • Collaboration supports Sarawak’s perception for a tech-driven, green circular economy

Left to Right: Shingo Hiraki, first secretary, Telecommunication & IT, Embassy of Japan in Malaysia;.Tsubasa Nakazawa, managing director Kintone Southeast Asia Sdn Bhd; Amar Mohamad Morshidi Abdul Ghani, chairman of SDEC

Sarawak Digital Economy Corporation ( SDEC ) and Kintone Southeast Asia Sdn Bhd ( Kintone ) have joined forces to drive Sarawak’s digital future. In an effort to advance Sarawak’s modern economy through the use of cutting-edge technologies, the two businesses recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding. This collaboration is in line with Sarawak’s desire for a round, green economy based on technological advancement and responsible growth.

To support Sarawak’s small and medium-sized enterprises ( SMEs ) in their digital transformation journey, SDEC and Kintone successfully co-hosted the inaugural SME Digital Transformation Seminar in Kuching, Sarawak, on 18 February. The seminar made a major step forward in providing Sarawak’s small and medium-sized businesses with the resources, expertise, and tools necessary to grow their businesses and stay competitive in an increasingly electric world.

Sarawak’s attempts to digitalize have attracted more attention, and the state government is actively investing in digital equipment. The partnership between SDEC and Kintone is in line with the growing need for versatile, available options for local organizations and supports the goals set out in the Sarawak Digital Economy Blueprint 2030.

SMEs account for approximately 97 % of all businesses in Malaysia, making them the backbone of the nation’s economy. ” Kintone’s no-code platform simplifies sophisticated process techniques, enabling SMEs across industries—including hospitality, building, and retail—to develop user-friendly custom programs tailored to their needs at a fraction of the cost. This reduces the stress of high-cost IT investments that many small companies struggle to maintain, according to Tsubasa Nakazawa, Kintone Southeast Asia’s managing director.

” Our final goal is to help businesses of all sizes connect this answer, transform their business processes, and promote flexible growth,” said the company. Kintone now serves over 37, 000 customers worldwide, empowering businesses, government agencies, and communities to improve productivity, engagement, and performance. This action reflects our broader commitment to supporting SMEs across Sarawak, Borneo, and Malaysia as a whole”, he added.

The SDEC by Kintone workshop brought up senior government officials, business leaders, and business owners, offering enterprises of all sizes an opportunity to understand how online tools can simplify operations and travel cost-efficient improvements—without requiring IT expertise. Attendees gained practical knowledge of how Kintone’s simple software aids organizations in managing workflows and enhancing collaboration at a reasonable pace. Additionally, the occasion provided networking opportunities for individuals to exchange ideas and link.

This workshop reinforced the shared idea that technology should be an innovator as Sarawak’s market continues to be shaped by modern change. Through practical demonstrations and expert-led discussions, participants witnessed firsthand how Kintone’s flexible platform can streamline workflows, reduce operational bottlenecks, and empower businesses to adapt to a rapidly digitising world.

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India AI: As DeepSeek and ChatGPT surge, is Delhi falling behind?

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19 hours before
Nikhil Inamdar, BBC News
Getty Images The image shows circuit boards and electronic components with a saffron India map in the middle. Getty Images

China’s DeepSeek has caused ripples through the technology sector by collapsing the price for developing relational artificial intelligence uses two years after ChatGPT took the world by surprise.

However, as the global battle for AI power gains momentum, India appears to have fallen behind, especially when it comes to developing its own basic language model for things like chatbots.

A homemade version of DeepSeek, according to the state, is not far away. It provides companies, institutions, and researchers with the thousands of premium chips required to create it in less than ten months.

Recently, a burst of international AI leaders have been promoting India’s features.

After initially being unfavorable, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman this month stated that India may be playing a significant part in the AI trend. The state is then OpenAI’s next largest industry by consumers.

Others like Microsoft have put serious money on the table – committing$ 3bn ( £2.4bn ) for cloud and AI infrastructure. Nvidia’s Jensen Huang also spoke of India’s “unmatched” professional expertise as a key to unlocking its future possible.

There is enough entrepreneurial activity in the pipeline with 200 companies working on conceptual AI.

Without fundamental structural adjustments to education, research, and state coverage, India risks falling behind, according to authorities, despite having the necessary ingredients for success.

According to tech researcher Prasanto Roy, China and the US now have a “four to five time head start,” having heavily invested in research and education and developed AI for use in military applications, law police, and significant language models.

India is still far behind the two nations in some important areas, despite being in the top five globally on Stanford’s Artificial Vibrancy Index, which ranks nations based on metrics like patents, money, plan, and analysis.

China and the US were granted 60 % and 20 % of the world’s total AI patents between 2010 and 2022 respectively. India got less than half a cent.

Additionally, India’s AI companies received a small portion of the secret funding that US and Chinese firms received in 2023.

India’s state-funded AI vision, nevertheless, is worth a inconsequential$ 1bn compared with the astounding$ 500bn the US has earmarked for Stargate- a plan to build enormous AI system in the US- or China’s reported$ 137bn effort to become an AI hub by 2030.

Getty Images The image shows Narendra Modi, India's prime minister, on the podium speaking at the AI Action Summit in Paris in February 2025. There's also a big screen live streaming his speech right behind the stage where he is standing. Getty Images

While DeepSeek’s victory has demonstrated that Artificial models can be built on older, less costly chips- something India you get relief from- lack of “patient” or long-term capital from either industry or government is a major problem, says Jaspreet Bindra, founder of a consultancy that builds AI literacy in organisations.

” Despite what has been said, there was much more capital behind it than what was known about DeepSeek developing a model with$ 5.6 million,” the source said.

Lack of high-quality India-specific datasets required for training AI models in regional languages such as Hindi, Marathi or Tamil is another problem, especially given India’s language diversity.

But for all its issues, India punches far above its weight on talent – with 15 % of the world’s AI workers coming from the country.

The issue though, as Stanford’s AI talent migration research shows, is that more and more of them are choosing to leave the country.

According to Mr. Bindra, “foundational AI innovations typically come from deep R&D in universities and corporate research labs.”

And India lacks a supporting research environment, with few deep-tech breakthroughs emerging from its academic and corporate sectors.

The enormous success of India’s payments revolution was due to strong government-industry-academia collaboration- a similar model, he says, needs to be replicated for the AI push.

Millions of people can now transact digitally in India using the unified payment interface ( UPI), a government-developed digital payment system, with the click of a button or QR code.

Getty Images The picture shows the hand of a man using his mobile phone to scan a QR code and make a digital payment. Getty Images

Bengaluru’s$ 200bn outsourcing industry, home to millions of coders, should have ideally been at the forefront of India’s AI ambitions. However, IT companies have never really switched from developing basic consumer AI technologies to developing cheap service-based work.

” It’s a huge gap which they left to the startups to fill”, says Mr Roy.

He’s not sure whether startups and government missions can finish this work quickly enough, adding that the minster’s 10-month schedule was a knee-jerk reaction to DeepSeek’s unanticipated rise.

For the next few years at least, he continues,” I don’t believe India will be able to produce anything like DeepSeek.” It is a viewpoint that many people also hold.

India can, however, continue to build and tweak applications upon existing open source platforms like DeepSeek” to leapfrog our own AI progress”, Bhavish Agarwal, founder of one of India’s earliest AI startups Krutrim, recently wrote on X.

However, according to experts, developing a foundational model will be necessary in the long run to achieve strategic autonomy in the sector and lessen import dependencies and threats of sanctions.

India will also need to develop its hardware and computational resources to run these models, which would require the production of semiconductors, something that hasn’t yet begun.

Before the US and China’s differences are significant, much of this will need to be put in place.

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3 ‘lucky draw’ scammers nabbed

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PUBLISHED: 19 Feb 2025 at 04: 00

The Police Cyber Taskforce announces the arrest of two Chinese ringleaders of a call centre scam based in the border town of Poipet in Cambodia. POLICE PHOTO
The Police Cyber Taskforce makes the imprisonment of two Chinese instigators of a call center con ring operation based in Poipet, Cambodia, on the frontier. POLICE PHOTO

Three Chinese defendants were detained yesterday for running Luckking Co, a business that enticed customers to enter lucky draws and therefore accessed their personal information.

The Metropolitan Police Bureau’s assistant director, Pol Maj Gen Theeradet Thumsuthee, stated that the business had its headquarters in the Sermsub Building on Ratchadaphisek Road in Bangkok’s Huai Khwang city. It stole money and personal information from around 88, 000 individuals, subsequently sold the info to call fraud groups, Pol Maj Gen Theeradet said.

He named two of the Foreign offenders as Ye Wanyou, 29, and Li Weijie, 30. On February 5, both were detained at a walled enclosure complex close to Ratchadaphisek Road.

According to Pol Maj Gen Theeradet, they were suspected of operating a telephone fraud group in Poipet, Cambodia, and smuggling citizens out of Thailand through Tak’s Mae Sot area. Zhang Hongxiang, the second suspect, was named. He was detained monday at the Sermsub Building.

Meanwhile, the Central Investigation Bureau ( CIB ) said yesterday that six Thais– four women and two men– and four Chinese men were arrested during operations against a Chinese-run investment scam gang in Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Prachin Buri, Sa Kaeo, Samut Prakan, Samut Sakhon and Samut Songkhram that began last week and continued into Monday.

The arrested defendants were identified as Atchara, 27, Porntip, 44, Nopawit, 31, Chonlathee, 21, Pantharee, 26, Supawadee, 39, Gao, 35, Xiong, 30, Mao, 46 and Zhou, 44.

They were charged with open scams, computer violence, money laundering and unlawful council.

They were one of 32 offenders in the case, according to CIB director Pol Lt. Gen. Jirabhop Bhuridej’s statement from yesterday. The group comprised 10 Thai masters of animal accounts, two Chinese phone scammers and 20 others who were suspected of wealth laundering– 14 Chinese, five Koreans and one Thai.

According to Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop, the crew dragged patients away from them through social press by first putting forth virtual projects that require tapping “likes.” Once they had made the necessary investment and had been promised results of 30 to 50 %, they were invited to do so. They initially received the profits before being told they had nothing more to say. According to the authorities, the group had Thai proxies who owned the properties and who had set up about 10 top companies.

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DeepSeek ‘shared user data’ with TikTok owner ByteDance

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DeepSeek, a Chinese AI company, has been accused of sharing customer data with TikTok’s Chinese owner.

“We confirmed DeepSeek communicating with ByteDance,” the South Korean data protection regulator told Yonhap News Agency.

The country had already removed DeepSeek from app stores over the weekend over data protection concerns.

The Chinese app caused shockwaves in the AI world in January, wiping billions off global stock markets over claims its new model was trained at a much lower cost than US rivals such as ChatGPT.

Since then, multiple countries have warned that user data may not be properly protected, and in February a US cybersecurity company alleged potential data sharing between DeepSeek and ByteDance.

DeepSeek’s visible overnight success led to its ascendancy in the UK, US, and many other countries around the world, but it now ranks far below ChatGPT in the UK positions.

It had been downloaded more than a million days in South Korea before being pulled from Apple and Google’s App Stores on Saturday night.

Existing users can still use the software through a web browser and entry it.

The Personal Information Protection Commission, a body overseeing information transfers, stated to South Korean newspaper Yonhap News Agency that it was still” confirming what information was transferred and how much” despite the existence of a connection between DeepSeek and ByteDance.

Critics of the Chinese state have long argued its National Intelligence Law allows the government to access any data it wants from Chinese companies.

However, ByteDance, headquartered in Beijing, is owned by a number of global investors – and others say the same law allows for the protection of private companies and personal data.

One of the arguments that the US Supreme Court upheld was that ByteDance’s subsidiary, TikTok, was concerned about customer information being sent to China.

The US ban is on hold until 5 April as President Donald Trump attempts to broker a resolution.

Cybersecurity company Security Scorecard published a blog on DeepSeek on 10 February which suggested “multiple direct references to ByteDance-owned” services.

” These recommendations suggest strong integration with ByteDance’s analysis and performance tracking infrastructure”, it said in its assessment of DeepSeek’s Android software.

Security Scorecard expressed concern that along with privacy risks, DeepSeek “user behaviour and device metadata]are ] likely sent to ByteDance servers”.

Additionally, it discovered that information was “being transmitted to regions connected to Chinese state-owned companies.”

On Monday, South Korea’s PIPC said it “found out traffic generated by third-party data transfers and insufficient transparency in DeepSeek’s privacy policy”.

It acknowledged that DeepSeek had broken North Korean privacy regulations and that it was cooperating with the controller.

However, the regulation advised users to “exercise caution and avoiding personal info entering into the chatbot.”

South Korea has previously acted to outlaw DeepSeek from government products, joining Australia and Taiwan in this regard.

The BBC has contacted the PIPC, ByteDance and DeepSeek’s family business, High Flyer, for a reply.

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Risking Trump wrath, Ukraine bombs US oil project in Russia – Asia Times

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Ukraine carried out a large-scale drone strike against the&nbsp, partially US-owned Caspian Pipeline Consortium’s ( CPC ) pumping station in Russia’s Krasnodar region early Monday ( February 17 ) morning.

Some were hitherto conscious of this job, let alone that it continued operating without any difficulties amidst the NATO-Russian substitute conflict in Ukraine and the West’s anti-Russian punishment, but it’s one of America’s most important regional opportunities. This bold strike, thus, risks incurring Donald Trump’s fury.

Dmitry Medvedev, the former Russian leader and Security Council deputy president, made a&nbsp, a long Telegram post  on February 18 in which he claimed Zelensky was aware of the US connection to the CPC but that the large-scale drone strike was still carried out despite this.

In response to rumors that the US president will obstruct Ukraine’s peace with Russia, Medvedev claimed it was intended to be” a triple blow to American businesses, the oil business, and Trump personally.”

If Ukraine consents to Trump’s proposed US rights of its crucial material resources, Volodymyr Zelensky, president of Ukraine, revealed that the country’s Volodymyr Zelensky is upset about Trump’s attempt to impose expectations on Ukraine that “would number to a higher discuss of Ukrainian GDP than compensation imposed on Germany at the Versailles Treaty.”

Russian MP Dmitry Belik&nbsp, speculated&nbsp, the day before Medvedev’s post that adversarial elements within the US “deep state” might have also cooked this provocation up with the UK to “get under ( Trump’s ) skin”.

Either way, the attack’s orchestrators likely also didn’t know that the CPC is integral to the energy security of America’s top ally, Israel, which received a significant amount of oil from the megaproject over the course of its last regional war against the&nbsp, Iran-led Resistance Axis.

Readers can learn more about that&nbsp, here, which analyzed data about Kazakhstan’s and even Russia’s oil exports to Israel during that 15-month-long conflict, which few were also hitherto aware of.

Given that Hamas and/or Hezbollah’s ceasefires are fragile, it is unlikely that Israel’s president will engage in any negotiations with Trump to ensure the CPC’s security in the event that the region turns back into conflict.

Trump might at least make a threat in the background to stop Ukraine from receiving financial and/or military aid unless it renounces its unilateral policy of attacking the Russian oil infrastructure.

The larger context of&nbsp, ongoing Russian-US peace talks over Ukraine&nbsp, could even lead to Moscow following suit by eschewing its own such attacks against that country’s energy infrastructure as&nbsp, the first step&nbsp, toward a possible ceasefire for facilitating the elections that could then&nbsp, lead to Zelensky’s replacement.

It, of course, remains to be seen exactly how Trump responds to Zelensky’s provocation, but it’s extremely unlikely that he’ll ignore it, especially considering how this also indirectly harms Israel.

Ukraine’s large-scale drone attack against the partially US-owned CPC will, therefore, probably end up being something it comes to regret. It would be premature to describe it as a game-changer, but it couldn’t have occurred at a worse time for Ukraine given the ongoing Russian-US talks over its future.

Given how detrimental it will foreseeably end up being for Ukraine’s interests at this crucial time in the conflict, those responsible for planning and approving the attack could even lose their jobs or worse.

This&nbsp, article&nbsp, was first published on Andrew Korybko’s Substack and is republished with kind permission. Become an Andrew Korybko Newsletter subscriber&nbsp, here.

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Multi-billion-baht scam gang busted

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Victims sucked in by an online employment give that “likes” them

Police arrest two scam suspects during multiple raids in provinces over the past week. (Police photo)
During numerous provincial raids over the past year, police have arrested two con suspects. ( Police photo )

Authorities have arrested&nbsp, 10 suspected people of a Thai-Chinese purchase fraud group raking in billions of ringgit during assaults in Bangkok and many regions.

The Central Investigation Bureau ( CIB ) said on Tuesday that six Thais- four women and two men- and four Chinese men were arrested during operations in Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Prachin Buri, Sa Kaeo, Samut Prakan, Samut Sakhon and Samut Songkhram that began last week and continued into Monday.

The arrested suspects were identified solely as Atchara, 27, Porntip, 44, Nopawit, 31, Chonlathee, 21, Pantharee, 26, Supawadee, 39, Gao, 35, Xiong, 30, Mao, 46 and Zhou, 44.

They were charged with open scams, computer violence, money laundering and unlawful council.

They were one of 32 offenders in the case, according to CIB Commissioner Pol Lt. Gen. Jirabhop Bhuridej on Tuesday. The group comprised 10 Thai masters of animal accounts, two Chinese phone scammers and 20 others who were suspected of wealth laundering- 14 Chinese, five Koreans and one Thai.

The group, according to Pol Lt Gen Jirabhop, initially offered online work that involves clicking “likes” before attempting to lure victims through social media. After making a profit from that task, they were invited to make an investment with promises of 30 to 50 % return. They just received promised arrives for a short while after signing up, and they only learned nothing more.

One victim reported a forgery complaint to the police in February of last year, which is when the investigation began.

Five of the ten suspects in custody were reportedly concerned for money laundering, according to Pol Maj Gen Athip Pongsiwapai, the head of the Technology Crime Suppression Division. Authorities had impounded assets held by them for 14 million ringgit for investigation, including land subject deeds, luxury watches and bags.

Four Chinese suspects, including Ms. Atchara, and four others, have denied bringing charges of common fraud, but have acknowledged that they exchanged crypto for money from Chinese businessmen.

According to Pol Maj Gen Athip, Ms. Atchara claimed that as part of the exchange service, she had begun laundering money for illegitimate Chinese businesses in 2023 and that her organization had received USDT stablecoins (tether ) worth 6.5 billion baht. The group converted and withdrew 2.9 billion ringgit, &nbsp, and spent the money buying components.

According to Pol Maj Gen Athip, the crew had Thai proxies who had established about 10 top companies that held the properties.

-&nbsp, Lucky draws -&nbsp,

Additionally, on Tuesday, authorities detained three Chinese people for operating Luckking Co, which invited customers to enter the wonderful draws and then extorted their personal information, according to Pol Maj Gen Theeradet Thumsuthee, deputy director of the Metropolitan Police Bureau.

The headquarters of the business was located in Bangkok’s Huai Khwang district’s Sermsub Building on Ratchadaphisek Road. It had stolen money and personal data from about 88, 000 people. According to Pol Maj Gen Theeradet, they sold the information to call scam gangs.

He named two of the Chinese suspects as Ye Wanyou, 29, and Li Weijie, 30. On February 5, both were detained at a gated housing complex close to Ratchadaphisek Road.

They were suspected of running a call scam gang in Poipet, Cambodia, &nbsp, and smuggling people out of Thailand through Mae Sot district of Tak, Pol Maj Gen Theeradet said.

The third suspect was identified as Zhang Hongxiang. He was detained on Tuesday at the Sermsub Building.

Bangkok police search Luckking Co in Huai Khwang district, Bangkok, on Tuesday. ( Police photo )

Bangkok police search Luckking Co in Huai Khwang district, Bangkok, on Tuesday. ( Police photo )

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Singapore does not condone businesses who use local ties to bypass US export controls on AI chips

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NOT IN SINGAPORE’S NATIONAL INTEREST TO Get “MADE USE OF”: BALAKRISHNAN&nbsp,

Assoc Prof Lim stated in response to Dr. Tan’s response that he had initially contacted the Ministry of Foreign Affairs ( MFA ) and asked if an MFA minister could respond to inquiries that” call for… &nbsp, a foreign policy approach.”

Assoc Prof Lim questioned whether the government was aware of such “imbalances” and whether they are “positive or bad for the national attention from a foreign policy perspective” because a little larger portion of Nvidia’s profit was billed to Singapore in comparison to &nbsp, physical deliveries to the nation.

Foreign Affairs Minister Vivian Balakrishnan reacted to this by stating that Singapore is the world headquarters for dozens of foreign businesses, and that its deal size is three days the GDP.

” These distinctive traits are standard for the distinctive part Singapore plays in the world economy,” said Dr. Balakrishnan.

” There’s nothing strange or unstable about that. The key to the puzzle is really whether these businesses and organizations are using Singapore to escape punitive export controls.

He continued, stating that it is not in the government’s federal interest to be “made use of,” but that Singapore is not officially obliged to impose punitive trade measures on other nations.

We won’t permit them to use our association to carry out deceptive or evasive trade practices to avoid unilateral export laws that apply to them. The point is, the onus is on that company and we will not countenance evasion, deception, false declarations or even misaccounting”, he said.

Dr. Balakrishnan added that Singapore will facilitate investigations and determine whether there is any cause for concern if a trading partner visits Singapore with concerns.

” We do that in order to protect our own national interests”, he said, adding that Singapore also has a need for AI chips.

The Biden administration’s final year of office and the release of the AI diffusion rule are now open for comment, so the situation is still evolving, he said.

Needless to say, we will continue to work with the main exporter to make sure we have enough of these advanced chips,” he said.

It is all the more important for us to play it straight in a world that is divided, fracturing, polarizing, and divided, he added, and to be fair, he said in Beijing and Washington. Everything that Minister Tan has said applies to all of our trading partners, in part because of this.

Then, nominated MP Mark Lee posed a query about the economic ramifications of Singapore’s inclusion in the new US AI export controls.

Dr. Tan noted that the new US administration has not made any comments on their policy or position regarding the new rule, and that it did not share specific requirements regarding the tiering requirements or what would be necessary for a nation to be upgraded to a higher tier.

” We are in consultation with industry players in Singapore to get feedback on the potential effects of the draft rules on their business activities,” he said. This will help us decide whether or not to take appropriate steps to support our companies. We are also working with the US to address their questions and understand how they approach the AI diffusion rule.

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Budget 2025: Parents having their third child or more to get up to S,000 in extra support

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Singaporean parents will receive up to S$ 16, 000 ( US$ 11, 900 ) more in financial support for each third child born on February 18 as part of a new program for large families, according to Prime Minister Lawrence Wong’s announcement on Tuesday ( Feb 18 ).

Speaking during his Budget 2025 speech in parliament, Mr Wong, who is also Finance Minister, said:” People with more babies usually worry about extra fees, because the requires grow with each extra baby”.

He added that the new Significant Families Scheme may assist married couples who have three or more children aspiration.

According to the National Population and Talent Division ( NPTD), which is under the control of the Prime Minister’s Office, this applies to parents who have remarried and are raising three or more children from previous marriages or current marriages. &nbsp,

According to NPTD, the government anticipates spending about S$ 80 million annually on the program. &nbsp,

Parents will be given a S$ 5, 000 Large Family MediSave award for each second and subsequent Singaporean born on Tuesday, according to Mr. Wong.

The offer will be credited into the family’s MediSave bill, and can be used to offset either her pregnancy and delivery costs, or family members ‘ medical bills.

LIFESG CREDITS

Parents will also be awarded S$ 1, 000 in LifeSG credits for each third and subsequent child between the ages of one and six, or a total of S$ 6, 000 over the course of six years, according to Mr. Wong.

The child’s Child Development Account trustee can access these credits through the LifeSG mobile app, as well as those provided by national servicemen, and they can also be used at any online or physical retailer that accepts payments via PayNow UEN QR or NETS QR.

Families that already have three or more children between Jan. 1, 2019 and Feb. 17, 2019, will also receive S$ 1, 000 annually for each eligible child until they reach the age of six, according to NPTD in a press release on Tuesday.

The LifeSG credits will be disbursed in September. A child’s eligibility will be determined on March 1 for the following years, and the funds will be distributed in April.

Finally, under the First Step grant, all third- and subsequent Singaporean children born on Tuesday will receive S$ 10, 000 in their Child Development Accounts. This is twice the original budget.

According to Mr. Wong, this can be used to pay for the child’s tuition and other medical expenses.

The government also wants to collaborate with business partners to offer” a broad range” of benefits and deals for large families, according to NPTD. Thirty businesses from various industries, including food and beverage, retail, and transportation, have signed on so far.

FEWER COUPLES HAVING BIG FAMILIES

The Singapore government has released a number of marriage and parenthood measures in recent years, including a suite of announcements for large families on Tuesday. &nbsp,

They include 10 additional weeks of paid time off for new parents starting on April 1 and six additional weeks starting the year after that.

The Baby Bonus was also increased in 2023 to encourage more children.

More than a third of married couples want three or more children, but fewer couples actually do so, according to NPTD surveys.

According to figures from the Department of Statistics, the proportion of married, female Singaporeans between the ages of 40 and 49 who have three or more children dropped from 24 percent in 2014 to 18 % in 2024.

In 2023, Singapore’s resident total fertility rate also dropped below 1.0 for the first time.

On Tuesday, Mr Wong also announced other one-off support measures in this space.

For each child under the age of 12 this year, families will receive S$ 500 in Child LifeSG credits. The credits will be distributed in July for those who were born this year between the ages of one and twelve, and in April 2026 for those who were born this year.

Singaporean children aged 13 to 16 will get S$ 500 in top-ups to their Edusave accounts, while those aged 17 to 20 will get an additional S$ 500 in their Post-Secondary Education accounts.

The families of about 455, 000 children are expected to&nbsp, benefit from the Child LifeSG credits and about 300, 000 students will benefit from the top-ups to their Edusave and Post-Secondary Education accounts.

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Budget 2025: S0 monthly allowance for mid-career workers taking up part-time courses

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SUPPORT FOR HIGHER LEARNING Schools

Mr. Wong praised the significance of higher education institutions in lifelong learning, and proposed that the Singapore Universities Trust be extended by ten years to support fundraising efforts by younger autonomous universities like the Singapore University of Social Sciences ( SUSS) and the Singapore Institute of Technology.

The trust was established in 2010 to support automatic universities in raising their endowment funds by offering related grants for donations over the course of 20 years.
 
Additionally, the government will help SUSS build a new town college. The government and the country’s sixth school, which is now run out of rented space, were previously reported to be in talks for a strategically located campus it could call its own.

On Tuesday, Mr. Wong stated,” This will help SUSS to promote lifelong learning and offer programs with a strong cultural emphasis at an visible location in the city for trainees of all ages.”

HELPING ENTERPRISES TO TRANSFORM THEIR Labor

To help companies train their labor, new and improved techniques will be introduced.

The SkillsFuture Workforce Development Grant does add to the present initiatives being managed by Workforce Singapore and SkillsFuture Singapore. The new grant will support work makeover actions by providing up to 70 % funding in addition to easing the application process for businesses.
 
The SkillsFuture Enterprise Credit program, which helps employers pay out-of-pocket costs for business and workplace conversion, may be revamped. Now, companies had paid upfront for personnel training and get insurance. According to Mr. Wong, some businesses are unaware of the scheme’s use and are also unaware of its use.

Companies can check their credit balance and instantly offset eligible workforce transition costs by repurchasing the scheme’s design, which will make it” an online wallet.”

Companies with at least three residing employees may receive an additional S$ 10, 000 in certificates, which are renewable for three years, starting in the second quarter of 2026. Existing funds, initially set to expire this June, will become extended until the fresh funds are made accessible.

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Budget 2025: S billion top-up to Changi Airport Development Fund among measures to grow Singapore economy

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SUPPORT FOR LOCAL

Mr. Wong also noted that comments on the Singapore Stock Exchange was unfavorable, yet for businesses that were primarily focused on Singapore or Southeast Asia. &nbsp,

The first set of procedures that Mr. Wong has accepted was created by an Equities Market Review Group, which was set up to work on this.

The suggestions include tax breaks for Singapore-based businesses and fund managers who decide to list and expand their economic activities there. &nbsp,

Additionally, a tax incentive may be implemented for fund managers who make significant investments in Singapore-listed securities. This is to encourage more investment in Singapore’s money markets. &nbsp,

Enterprises may even receive more help scaling up and competing on a global level. &nbsp,

To help organizations choose artificial intelligence options, up to S$ 150 million will be set off for a new Organization Compute Initiative. In accordance with this scheme, ready businesses will work with major cloud service providers to gain access to AI tools, computing power, as well as expert consulting services. &nbsp,

A plan will be extended to December 31, 2030 in order to encourage mergers and acquisitions, allowing Singapore companies to make a qualifying merger of the common stocks of another company to receive tax advantages. It was originally scheduled to expire on December 31 of this year.

Later this month, Singapore’s Economic Development Board will launch a Worldwide Founder Programme to encourage foreign entrepreneurs to establish and expand their businesses.

Mr. Wong also made note of the worldwide emergence of a secret credit market that provides creative financing options to businesses. But few of these secret record funds focus on Asia or Singapore-based companies. &nbsp,

In order to provide more funding options for high-growth local businesses, a fresh S$ 1 billion Personal Credit Growth Fund will be established. &nbsp,

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