October 7, 2025
Singapore – Artificial intelligence (AI) is key to strengthening Singapore's competitive advantage as a major financial hub as the company here seeks to serve a wider customer base in growing regions.
Apart from adopting AI in the work process, this includes continuous improvements to guardrails for risks related to technology, said Minister of Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo in an October 6 Media Door Stop interview.
Risk can come in the form of potentially expensive mistakes implemented by AI applications that make business recommendations.
“These types of risks are not specific to the use of AI in financial services (but what we've done in Singapore is to make companies more aware of these risks,” she added, citing recent governance frameworks and software toolkits, such as the Project Moonshot.
Launched in 2024, Project Moonshot allows app developers to address the safety and security challenges associated with large-scale language models that form the basis of many generative AI-driven solutions.
Developed by the AI Verify Foundation and InfoComm Media Development Authority, companies can also test whether applications can be “malfunctioned” by saying inappropriate things or producing violent content.
Generated AI Model Governance Framework was introduced in the same year by two institutions, identifying areas where it could enhance Gen AI governance, such as transparency about where and how content is generated. It is based on an existing framework released in 2019 that covers only traditional AI.
The government is not alone in these efforts, but is gathering feedback from businesses that will help to continuously improve these guardrails, Mrs Theo said.
She was talking to the media at the UBS office on Penang Road after a closure tour of the bank's AI and transformation factory, which was launched in November 2024.
There are 150 employees under this new division. It consists of technical experts such as programmers, data scientists, product managers and more.
Mrs. Teo saw a demonstration of the product the team is currently developing, including AI-powered tools that help employees spend less time checking their status management clients.
This will help dramatically reduce the time spent in boring processes, says Ruthhon, who heads the design of AI initiatives, such as the know-yourclient tool.
“I used to work in operations (with UBS), but was once part of that KYC (knowing clients) process,” said Hong, now the product owner of the agent products at UBS Group Operations and Technology Office. She joined AI and Transformation Factory in 2024.
“Now I have the opportunity to come out and use what we've experienced and put it into reality for efficiency.”
There are also employees who understand business processes, as well as data scientists and AI experts such as machine learning, which is important to the way the sector is competitive, Mrs. Teo said.
“They know the point of the problem, the opportunities for improvement, and acquire enough AI skills and knowledge to apply them to daily activities,” she added.
“In this way, I think we can strengthen the capabilities of the sector to use AI, and we will continue to push in this area.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ummtx9jx_ds
UBS's factory has been added to the list of more than 50 AI Centres of Excellence (COEs) established in Singapore, and the number continues to increase in various sectors, Mrs. Theo said.
She adds that more than 30 financial institutions have AI teams here, some of which have set up COEs that develop innovative solutions that apply to global businesses.
“This is a very good way to showcase the functionality here and also encourages the continued development of Singapore's AI ecosystem.”
