1. singapore today•Tuesday14July201526
Ms Veronica Tan (left) relishes her role in helping set the direction for the country’s info-communications sector, while Mr Melvin Ng sees a continuing
need for innovative solutions to optimise land use in Singapore. Photos: Koh Mui Fong
Working on a broader canvas
Singapore— Rightfromthebeginning,
Ms Veronica Tan’s involvement with
theInfocommDevelopmentAuthority
of Singapore (IDA) centred around a
big event.
“I joined IDA because of the Next
GenBroadbandNetwork(NGBN)Re-
quest for Proposals (RFPs),” she said.
“TheNGBNRFPsplayedasignificant
role in shaping the broadband land-
scape in Singapore. This was an ex-
citing initiative with great consumer
impact—bringingfibretoconsumers
in Singapore — and I wanted to play
an active role in this iconic project.”
Ms Tan is now deputy director of
theNextGenerationCapabilitiesPlat-
form.AftergraduatingfromNanyang
TechnologicalUniversitywithaBach-
elor of Electrical and Electronic Engi-
neeringin1998,shebecameanetwork
engineer in the telecommunications
industry. In 2008, she joined IDA as
a senior manager. She received her
Masters of Business Administration
fromtheManchesterBusinessSchool
in 2014.
Smart nation-building
Ms Tan currently works with IDA’s
Smart Nation platform team, devel-
oping big data and analytics capabili-
ties in support of data-driven decision
making. According to IDA’s website,
Smart Nation is about harnessing in-
focommtechnology,networksanddata
tostrengthencommunities,createop-
portunities and support better living.
Ms Tan explained: “A few years
ago, the concept of Smart Cities
emerged and IDA formed the Smart
Cities Programme Office to drive this
initiative. Smart Cities was nascent
in many cities then, and it was both a
privilege and an exciting opportunity
to shape and define this in the context
of Singapore’s environment. Big data
wasoneofthedevelopmentsidentified
to help cities become ‘smart’.”
Big data is the name given to data
that is too large, varied or moves too
quickly for traditional database soft-
waretoolstostore,manageoranalyse.
Newtechnologyhastobedevelopedin
ordertoextractvaluableinsightsfrom
bigdata,whichcanthenbeusedtoen-
hance decision-making. Besides look-
ingintotheuseofvisualisationtocom-
municate these insights, Ms Tan also
focusesonexploringbigdatatechnolo-
gies and analytical databases.
“Big data has often been described
as the new competitive advantage for
companies to outperform their peers.
Cities and nations can also do like-
Large-scale, nation-changing
projects are no sweat for
Veronica Tan and Melvin Ng
Melody Tan
today@mediacorp.com.sg
wise and enhance the way we oper-
ate and plan.”
Pioneering the future
ForMsTan,oneofthemostrewarding
aspectsof her jobis therarechanceto
beatrail-blazerwithateamofequally
dedicated individuals: “The work we
doheregivesustheopportunitytoex-
plore, evaluate and set the direction
for the industry or the country. I enjoy
working with colleagues who are pas-
sionateabouttheirworkandtechnolo-
gy, and getting the job done together.”
She foresees continual change
ahead forSingapore’s infocommland-
scape,whichhas“alwaysbeendynam-
ic and fast-changing”.
She said: “Singapore’s vision to
evolve into a Smart Nation will in-
crease this pace of change. Corre-
spondingly, our infocomm infrastruc-
ture and manpower need to be able
to keep pace with changes to remain
relevant. I hope that future engineers
will view our work as a cornerstone of
Singapore’s journey towards being a
Smart Nation.”
A rocky transformation
Like Ms Tan, 40-year-old Melvin Ng
was also attracted to his employer
because of a mega-sized project — in
fact, one of the largest ever undertak-
en in Singapore.
After receiving his Bachelor of En-
gineering(CivilEngineering)fromthe
University of Nottingham in 1999,
Mr Ng spent the next eight years in
the private sector before joining JTC
Corporation(JTC)in2007asaprinci-
pal engineer in the Product Planning
Department, Engineering Planning
Group. His job scope involved the
planning, implementation and man-
agement of the Jurong Rock Caverns
(JRC) project.
Herecounted:“IjoinedJTCmainly
because of the JRC project. With my
previous experience in underground
projects, I felt that I would be able to
grow professionally and contribute
to JTC’s transformational and dar-
ing endeavour of bringing JRC from
the drawing board to reality. Going
underground is not something every-
one will think of doing, but JTC has
dared to embark on such a daunt-
ing project in order to save valuable
above-ground land.”
Overcoming nature
Nowaseniorprojectmanager,MrNgis
still working on the JRC project, over-
seeing the planning, physical imple-
mentationandmanagementofPhase1.
The start of the project was naturally
challenging.
“I had to manage the technical as-
pects and feasibility studies for the
on-going underground works. This
included overseeing the various stag-
es of the drill and blast cycles in the
caverns, and managing the use of ex-
plosives, which are highly controlled,
on Jurong Island.”
The project’s planning and man-
agement was complicated by “the
lack of technical experience in the
infrastructure required for the pro-
cess flow within the facility”. Or as he
put it: “Working underground is very
much like going on a blind date. No
matter how prepared you may be, you
will never know what you are going to
face until you experience it.”
He added: “I had to learn on the job
andalsomakemanydifficultdecisions
duringthecourseoftheworkfromthe
planning stage. With the assistance
of an international team of specialists
and the contractor, hard work paid off
with the start of operations of the first
two caverns in the middle of 2014.”
Deep learning
The dynamic nature of the JRC pro-
ject meant it was far removed from
the desk-bound office job that many
Singaporeans are familiar with.
Said Mr Ng: “Apart from being
stationed on-site away from an office
setting, working deep underground
without any telecommunications and
dabbling with explosives, the most re-
wardingpartofmyjobsofarhasbeen
to undertake and manage the numer-
oustechnicalchallenges,suchasfight-
ingwateringressissuesduetogeolog-
ical and hydrogeological conditions.”
“Managing a team of international
specialists was also an eye opener for
me, as it brought new and different
experiences, perspectives and ideas
to the project when we were solving
the numerous technical challenges
encountered.”
He sees a continuing need for in-
novative solutions to optimise land
and create more industrial spaces in
Singapore, and predicts that as more
activities shift underground, Singa-
poreans will open up to working and
playing below sea level.
“Land may be scarce in Singapore,
butwithhumancreativityandingenu-
ity,JTCwillcontinuetofindnewways
to do more with less.”
This is the sixth part in an eight-part collaboration
between the Public Service Division and TODAY.
The work
we do here
gives us the
opportunity
to explore,
evaluate
and set the
direction for
the industry
or the country.
I enjoy
working with
colleagues
who are
passionate
about their
work and
technology,
and getting
the job done
together.
Ms Veronica Tan
deputy director,
Next Generation
Capabilities Platform,
IDA
Meeting Singapore’s engineering challenges