(SINGAPORE) Singapore’s entrepreneurship drive may have finally taken root in all things digital.

While the local expansion of foreign multinationals such as Electronic Arts and Lucasfilm tend to hog the headlines, a new market study shows thecountry’s nascent interactive digital media (IDM) sector is in fact rife with local talent.

According to Deloitte Consulting, local firms make up 79 per cent of the local IDM industry and foreign companies accounted for the remaining 21 per cent.

This study, which polled 130 companies across the sector on their performance from 2007 to 2008, is one of the first few attempts to take a snapshot of a fledging industry which only came under the government spotlight in the last fewyears.

The Deloitte report revealed that there are around 585 IDM-related companies in Singapore and they added 1,500 jobs in 2008 to bring their combined employment tally to nearly 7,400.

Start-ups make up 19 per cent of IDM companieshere while small and mid-sized enterprises account for the lion’s share at 67 per cent. Large companies accounted for the rest, the survey showed.

The sector’s headcount boost is in line with its sizzling growth during the year, with itsvalue-add growing at a rate of 25 per cent to $798 million at the end of 2008. The IDM industry’s revenue also grew at a similar pace from an estimated $1 billion in 2007 to $1.3 billion in 2008.

‘This strong growth can be explained by intenseinvestments, R&D (research and development) and localisation in Singapore over the 2007 to 2008 period,’ according to the Deloitte report.

‘Such high growth suggests that Singapore is heading in the right direction,’ the firm said.

During the year, the Media Development Authority of Singapore (MDA), which manages a $500 million war chest from the National Research Foundation, invested heavily to boost R&D in the IDM space.

These included allocating $40 million in seedfunding to support digital media start-ups as well as introducing a scheme to co-finance the creation of new computer games.

MDA also roped in partners such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to set up gaming labs and rallied investorsand distributors to set aside more money to fund local productions.

Sister agencies such as the Economic Development Board weighed in by wooing foreign media giants to plant their development operations here.

Last year, the governmentwent a step further to zone out a piece of land in Buona Vista to play host to media and gaming companies.

Called Mediapolis, the 19-hectare premises could eventually house dozens of new buildings for accommodating production houses, gamedevelopers and post- production companies when fully-completed in 2020.

‘In order to further monetise R&D-based innovation, Singapore should seek to promote greater technical standardisation, further collaboration within the IDM ecosystem andprovide customised funding to meet innovative companies’ needs based on their life cycle,’ Deloitte said.

Source : The Business Times
Author : Winston Chai