The Data Innovation Challenge is a platform launched by the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore to connect enterprises, data providers, data scientists, and ICT companies. It aims to crowdsource analytics solutions for business challenges by making real-world datasets available. Nearly 9,000 datasets across industries like healthcare, transport, and manufacturing will be accessible at launch. Newton Circus was selected to develop, organize and manage the Challenge to connect ecosystem players and catalyze data analytics innovations.

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January 2014
MEDIA FACTSHEET
Data Innovation Challenge
Background
1. At Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), we are working towards
helping build Singapore as a Smart Nation, leading the world in the use of Data
and Analytics to improve businesses and people's lives.
Data Innovation Challenge
2. The Data Innovation Challenge is a platform for Enterprises to crowd-source and
develop analytics solutions to complex data-driven commercial challenges. Lead
User organisations and data providers will offer specific business challenges and
corresponding datasets to data scientists to develop analytics models and the
ICT industry to build prototypes of analytics solutions. It offers key stakeholders
the following :
• User Enterprises - a nimble process that taps critical analytics resources
beyond their organisation to unlock new insights to grow their businesses.
• Data Providers – business collaborations to identify new business models for
data monetization.
• Data scientists – a platform offering real world problem discovery and
unlocking diverse data sets to showcase their analytics skillsets.
• Students, academia and researchers – opportunities to be engaged in solving
real business challenges.
• ICT companies including smaller local enterprises, service providers and
start-ups – opportunities to build market-validated analytics products.
3. The Data Innovation Challenge aims to connect User Enterprises1
with data
providers, data scientists, ICT companies, research institutes and IHLs to
develop prototypes, proof-of-concepts to discover value of data for their
businesses and also to test out working models on the user enterprises’ business
challenges. It provides a platform where data providers and Lead User
organisations can contribute data and allow participants who can include a mix of
data scientists, students and businesses to extract value for the development of
ideas, new data models and prototypes.
1 Including Singapore and MNC companies

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4. This challenge is unique in that Government is bringing together cross sector,
cross geographic, public and private datasets. As a start, we have data sets from
the Health Promotion Board, National Environment Agency, Land Transport
Authority, Metro Parking, Smart, United World College, BuuK and others. Our
user enterprises that are onboard today such as DSM Engineering Plastics, will
also contribute their data sets. We expect more data sets to be contributed as the
challenge continues over the course of a year.
5. In addition, Government through partnership with Newton Circus is also putting in
efforts to make available more private data sets from enterprise users and data
providers that are across different sectors and geographic location that can be
accessible during the Data Innovation Challenge. There will be approximately a
volume of almost 9,000 data sets at launch and a variety of datasets that cuts
across healthcare, transport, media and advertising, retail, manufacturing and
logistics, across the Asia Pacific.
6. The Data Innovation Challenge contains key components of continual activities to
achieve its objective as listed below:
Data Marketplace:
a) The Data Innovation Challenge provides a data-marketplace of
real world datasets. Real world datasets are defined as a collection of
data which include attributes and variables such as statistics unique to
an industry sector or focus area (e.g. traffic data of all major roads in
Singapore during peak hour). These datasets are contributed by the
industry, government and research institutes for data scientists to
extract value for the development of ideas, new data models and
prototypes.
Competition Platforms:
b) The challenge will host online collaboration and secure
competition platforms for data scientists based locally and globally to
collaborate and compete. This secured online competition platform will
allow data scientists to develop ideas, concepts, data models based on
real-life problem statements and datasets.
Consultation and workshops:
c) Conduct guided consultation and workshops to help User
Enterprises refine their business challenges for their respective
business analytics competitions to be launched in the later part of the
year.
Platforms for collaboration:
d) There will be facilitated workshops, hackathons and industry
networking sessions to encourage collaboration amongst global lead
users/organisations, data science talents and infocomm industry
vendors, to crowd source ideas, develop prototypes for potential

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commercialisation, and at the same time, learn and discover the value
of analytics.
Outcome
7. The Data Innovation Challenge will help towards growing the critical mass of
global analytics specialist capacity, vibrant industry ecosystem through
innovation and entrepreurship, as well as increase the regional market
coverage of sophisticated analytics-related projects to help to position
Singapore to be a thought leader and global data and analytics hub
particularly in the Finance Services Industry, Healthcare, Manufacturing and
Supply Chain, Advertising and Marketing. The first user enterprise on board
is DSM Engineering Plastics from the life science materials engineering
industry.
IDA’s partner in the management of the Data Innovation Challenge
8. A “Management of Data Innovation Challenge Call for Proposal (CFP)” was
issued by IDA on 16 November 2012 to identify potential industry player(s) to
develop, organise and manage the challenge. The CFP closed in February
2013 and IDA has since evaluated and awarded industry player, Newton
Circus, to develop, organise and manage the Data Innovation Challenge to
connect the different ecosystem players to catalyse DA innovations and
increase use of data analytics in various industry sectors.
For media clarifications, please contact:
Miss Zohria Nunis
Assistant Manager, Corporate & Marketing Communication
Tel: +65 6211 3874
Fax: +65 6211 2227
Email: zohria_nunis@ida.gov.sg