How Singapore Is Reviving Its Business Events Industry by Operating Like a Tech Startup

The events industry has been shaken to its core. The future is not going be the same. It’ll be hybrid. 

Just like every other country, Singapore is gearing up for this new normal. But the approach it is taking is pretty much like what you would typically see in a tech startup - an agile methodology! 

To prepare for the new normal, Singapore is running a series of pilot business events. 

Each pilot event is pretty much a sprint. New events formats are imagined and put to reality. New/enhanced digital solutions are trialled. And with each pilot, the threshold for the number of physical attendance is increased. 

After a pilot event, there is the retrospective. What worked. What didn’t. The learnings are shared with the whole industry. 

And then comes the next iteration - the next pilot event. All the way until confidence is back for all stakeholders - more importantly the attendees at events. 

And the industry emerges stronger!

As simple as this! ??

Behind the scenes, there is a whole lot of work involved!  

At the base of it is a great public and private partnership, with Government agencies working hand-in-hand as true partners with the industry. 

IMDA, through its Open Innovation Platform, is being a champion in getting companies to cross pollinate and partner to bring about new innovative tech solutions. 

During the current pilot event at Geo Connect Asia, we are seeing different tech companies coming together to create a seamless and safe environment through digital tools that puts into place safety management measures. 

Trakomatic leveraged on their Facial Recognition tech to build a touchless kiosk that checks people in through either face or QR code tickets, and also records temperature.

Viatick leveraged on their Bluetooth IoT tech to build a whole new platform that uses bluetooth tokens to enable contact tracing and proximity alarms. 

GlobalSignIn (my own company) provided the registration platform and integrated with the newly created APIs. 

Trakomatic & Viatick have today collaborated to build this digital enabler that is called the Safe Events Tool. Any other registration platform can integrate with it. Real-time safety compliance dashboard and reports are made available.

The current pilot event is made possible by the organiser, Montgomery, who is being one of the trailblazers with the willingness to experiment and re-imagine new formats for events, that the industry can then also learn from. 

And piecing it all together, and really the driving force behind, is the Singapore Tourism Board. 

Expect more iterations to come all the way leading to the much-anticipated World Economic Forum's (WEF) Special Annual Meeting that will take place in August in Singapore. 

It’s been truly a humble experience to be part of this whole process, where the end goal is something bigger - playing our part to help economies emerge stronger!?