A timely $500m ICT carrot for SMEs

FOR every hyper-wired corporate behemoth in Singapore, there are probably 10 of their smaller brethren that are suspended in the turn of the millennium on technology adoption. The small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) is a paradoxical animal, nimble because of its size but lumbering in other ways, with important records kept on paper and everyday processes still done manually. Now, this animal is being nudged into this decade, with a slew of initiatives that the government will spend $500 million on over the next three years. These subsidies will cover three areas - tried-and-tested infocomm technology (ICT) innovations, experimental solutions and the use of high-speed connectivity.

It's easy to see why the government is setting its sights on SMEs. Apart from the fact that they are collectively the largest employers in Singapore, the improvements that these firms can make represent the low-hanging fruit of investment, with high marginal returns.

In the food and beverage sector, for example, great strides in productivity have been made with the use of mobile devices such as iPads and mechanised plate-clearing systems - hardly rocket science and well within reach for others in the sector.