Driving global collaborations in innovation

GLOBAL INNOVATION ALLIANCE

Enterprise Singapore (EnterpriseSG) believes strongly in global collaboration to drive the exchange of ideas, resources and talent. This was why the Global Innovation Alliance (GIA) was launched in 2017. The GIA is currently running in 15 cities worldwide, providing SMEs and startups with in-market acceleration support to many markets.

EnterpriseSG works with GIA partners to organize acceleration programs – activities such as workshops and business-matching sessions—to connect Singapore startups and SMEs to the innovation ecosystem in the market. Participants can leverage the GIA partner networks to seek potential partners to test-bed and commercialize their solutions in the market, or co-innovate solutions with suitable counterparts.

The Philippines

In the Philippines, EnterpriseSG has worked closely with Plug and Play in Manila since December 2020 to help Singapore startups to understand the Manila market and provide a soft-landing into the market. Last year, Plug & Play organized two demandled programs and two runs of GIA Manila Acceleration Programs, involving over 20 participating startups. One of the successful partnerships facilitated by Plug and Play was FilPass, a tamper-proof technology solutions provider, with f(dev), the innovation arm of Filinvest Development Corporation. The partnership enabled Filinvest’s staff to fully adopt a work-fromanywhere setup through FilPass’ digital identification and authentication system.

The third run of the GIA Manila Acceleration Program concluded successfully in July 2022. Seven Singapore startups have been introduced to a total of 296 potential leads, including venture capital, conglomerates and corporates, and government. These leads allow startups to access business opportunities and forge innovation partnerships

A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was also signed in December 2021 to partner Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation agency, to strengthen cooperation in co-innovation and joint R&D to enhance enterprise competitiveness and facilitate go-to-market partnerships in emerging technologies. As part of the MOU, a UK-Singapore Collaborative R&D Call was launched in January 2022. This call aims to develop and fund eligible innovation projects between Singapore and UK enterprises in areas such as advanced manufacturing and materials, agrifood tech, mobility and transport, health and life sciences, and cybersecurity.