The diminutive island state of Singapore is already establishing itself as one of the major global hubs for the development of distributed ledger technology (DLT) applications. This can be seen in the investment and activity in the space, not only through public raises like ICOs but by corporations and government departments. The government has boosted optimism by indicating that it will have progressive policy towards the technology while creating a regulatory environment that is clear and stable.

Projects Central

First off, Singapore is already home to some seriously high-profile blockchain projects. OmiseGo (OMG), Qtum (QTUM), VeChain (VEN) and Zilliqa (ZIL) are all Singapore based projects. All four are also in the top-30 blockchain projects globally by market capitailsation, according to CoinMarketCap, all coming in at a value of US$ 1 billion or more at the time of writing.

OmiseGo, based across Singapore, Japan and Thailand, is a 'decentralized network that facilitates self-sovereign financial services across geographies, asset classes and applications'. It is an evolution of a more traditional payments system called Omise which is already rolled out across Asia. OmiseGo will leverage Ethereum's coming scaling developments like Plasma.

VeChain is a standalone public blockchain platform that focuses on global enterprise level applications such as supply chain. It aims to link blockchain technology to the real world by providing a governance structure, economic model and IoT integration.

Qtum and Zilliqa are both whitepapers that have moved on to various levels of test net deployment. Their aims are to be highly scalable, open, permissionless distributed blockchains. They are looking to displace Ethereum as the go-to smart contracts platform.

Other well known projects include TenX, a card-based payments platform allowing payment across multiple crypto-currencies and Kyber Network, a decentralised exchange - both of whom are valued in the hundreds of millions.

And even the babies of the bunch, Qlink, aiming to build the world’s first decentralized mobile network, XinFin Network, a trade and finance marketplace platform, and Electrify Asia, a peer-to-peer electricity trading platform, are all still commanding around US$ 50 million capitalisations.

Corporate Clout

Beyond ICO projects, some big corporate investment is also happening in this space. Notably, IBM has a Blockchain Innovation Center in Singapore, which was opened in Jul 2016. IBM is also invested in KYCK! a blockchain solution that provides video conferencing and encrypted document submission capabilities for KYC on-boarding processes. The platform will offer enhanced identification validation through a trusted blockchain-based business network that will potentially include banking and governmental entities.

Additionally, Singapore Airlines is set to become the first airline to tokenise its loyalty program with the 'KrisFlyer' program set to be released onto the blockchain in August 2018. This will enable more flexibility for customers in the way they can spend their air miles as well as offering a potential solution to the company's issues surrounding deferred revenue loss associated with as yet unspent air miles.

Singapore Power, the local grid operator, has announced it's intentions by hiring an entire team to focus on blockchain applications in energy, while the majority of the local banks are also heavily researching the technology.

Government Stance

A lot of this action has been encouraged and even incentivised by a government that seems open-minded to the benefits of distributed ledger technologies. They have begun demonstrating this stance already, with groundbreaking central bank-commissioned projects and have been working with the leading vendors of private blockchain solution for business, like R3 and IBM, on projects since late 2016.

On January 9, 2018, Singapore’s Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said that “the country’s laws do not make any distinction between transactions conducted using fiat currency, cryptocurrency or other novel ways of transmitting value.”

The most skeptical noises coming from the Singapore government surround concern about consumer risk, including repeated warnings of scams and market volatility. This seems a reasonable approach given what we have seen in the past few years.

Based on quite predictable historical behavior, whatever Singapore's stance will end up being relative to blockchain and crypto-currencies, it is likely that it will be clear, understandable, stable and well regulated. These are conditions that business thrives in.

Authorities Leading the Way

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), the nation’s central bank and main regulatory body, has spoken highly about the scope and future of cryptocurrencies and its potential role in international fund transactions.

MAS is implementing a blockchain-oriented long-term project – Project Ubin. In the first stage of this project, MAS has introduced a tokenized version of the Singapore dollar. The token is available on an Ethereum-based Blockchain. The project now aims to create a functional alternative to the country’s interbank payments network via Blockchain technology and to allow for testing with other central banks worldwide in the real-time gross settlement [RTGS] system.

At the end of March 2018, Singapore's Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) launched a challenge that will reward successful blockchain projects with funding. IMDA said the challenge aims to boost blockchain innovation as part of a wider goal of the digital transformation in the city state.

They are looking for distributed ledger technology that can either streamline business operations or that more broadly envisions changes in social interactions, such as within public services.

The IMDA said participants that are shortlisted will have six months to develop either a minimum viable product or proof-of-concept. Winning projects will receive S$50,000 (US$38,000) for the enterprise section or S$100,000 (US$76,000) for the transformation category.

Conclusion

All-in-all it appears Singapore is positioning itself strategically in an area of technology that could play a significant part in the next iteration of the internet and, as such, in business and society as a whole.