Boosting Singapore's Business Hub Status Through A World-Class Professional Services Industry

Minister for Trade and Industry Gan Kim Yong (“Minister Gan”) launched the refreshed Professional Services¹ Industry Transformation Map (“ITM”) today at the Committee of Supply debate on 28 February 2023. The refreshed ITM will strengthen Singapore’s role as a leading business hub where company headquarters (HQs) and professional services firms originate, control and grow their businesses in Asia and the world.

ITM initiatives will be two-pronged. The first set of efforts will focus on HQs. EDB will continue attracting company HQ investments into Singapore. Additionally, and together with other agencies, it will support company HQs in developing and upgrading their corporate functions. For established companies with significant operations in Singapore and a clear mandate for new business creation, including HQs, EDB will partner them in creating new ventures with the aim of creating new revenue pathways outside the parent company’s existing core business.

The second area of focus will be on enhancing the competencies of professional services firms in Singapore. This will be done through driving digitalisation efforts by smaller professional services firms, developing talent with expertise in the sustainability and digital space, and supporting reskilling and redeployment.

Having a high-quality professional services sector will make Singapore more attractive as a place for globally-leading companies to site HQs. Singapore’s stability and pro-business environment has already attracted businesses from a range of industries, such as Schneider Electric and Samsonite, to establish regional HQs here. These regional HQs carry out various corporate functions including finance & accounting, legal, marketing, and supply chain management. Fashion and apparel companies VF Corporation and Nike Inc. have sourcing and procurement hubs in Singapore to support their regional supply chain management operations from Singapore. Functions like design, demand planning and product procurement offer a range of interesting and meaningful jobs for Singaporeans.

HQs also create demand for professional services. Top international professional services firms such as McKinsey, Kantar and Clifford Chance have expanded their businesses in Singapore, contributing to our vibrance as a centre for business and innovation.

Up to 2025, the ITM initiatives will put the sector on course to achieving value-added (VA) growth of 3% to 4% per annum² to S$27 billion³, with the creation of 3,800 additional PMET jobs per annum for locals.

Strengthening Singapore’s appeal to regional and global HQs

To drive the creation of new business ventures that are globally headquartered here, EDB will press on with our Corporate Venture Launchpad (CVL) Programme, which was implemented in 2021 to help companies innovate new products and services for global customers. Today, Singapore is home to close to 80 corporate ventures. In July 2022, EDB expanded the CVL Programme with an additional S$20 million to support a larger pool of companies and aims to work with companies on 20 to 30 projects over the next two years.

To help the existing base of HQs transform their corporate functions, EDB has launched the following tools:

• Future of Marketing Tool: An online questionnaire for marketing professionals to assess their company’s level of marketing sophistication, this tool identifies resources, including government programmes, and actionable steps that can be taken to transform their marketing function. 
• In-house Finance & Accounting Corporate and Individual Self-Assessment Questionnaires: These online self-assessment tools measure Finance & Accounting sophistication at a company, functional, and individual level. The results are presented in a report card that also recommends resources that help finance and accounting leaders improve their performance, and help individual finance and accounting professionals with career development and upskilling.

Driving digitalisation in professional services SMEs to boost productivity 

The Government will strongly promote the adoption of technology tools to help small and medium sized professional services firms become more efficient and perform higher value work. 

Initiatives include roadmaps for firms in the legal and accountancy subsectors to uplift their productivity by adopting digital solutions and training employees to use them effectively.⁴

Professional Services SMEs operating across all subsectors can also apply for various grants, including the Productivity Solutions Grant and Enterprise Development Grant. They can also obtain advice and support through platforms such as IMDA’s Chief Technology Officer-as-a-Service (“CTO-as-a-Service”), which provides solutions and customised advice for eligible professional services firms. See Annex A below for further details.

“Digital is a crucial enabler for our Professional Services sector to remain relevant and do well in the global digital economy. As part of ITM 2025, the Government will continue to support our Professional Services firms in their digitalisation journey. In particular, we will support SMEs to adopt trusted digital solutions to boost productivity and grow their businesses,” said Mr Tan Kiat How, Senior Minister of State for Communications and Information and National Development, and FEC Modern Services Co-Chair.

Building Capabilities in Growth Areas; Reskilling and Redeployment

Upskilling initiatives will be a key focus to ensure Singaporeans working in the corporate HQs of global companies and in professional services firms have the necessary skillsets to take on roles in growth areas, such as the Green and Digital Economies.

The demand for sustainability-related expertise in professional services is expected to increase due to global regulatory developments and stakeholder pressure for businesses to address climate change. Efforts to build expertise in sustainability include:

• Partnering consulting and engineering services firms to set up regional sustainability Centres of Excellence (“CoEs”) to develop talent and working with key companies to build in-house capabilities in sustainability.
• Building design firms’ capabilities and domain knowledge in sustainability through Design Singapore’s Good Design Research Initiative.

To meet the demand for digital talent in the professional services sector, EDB is partnering with consulting firms to place and train individuals into in-demand roles in cybersecurity, IT audit and more. For further details on upskilling efforts, see Annex B.

We will support the reskilling and redeployment of workers in the professional services sector through the following efforts:

• Conducting studies to identify emerging and at-risk roles in the Professional Services sector.
• Reskilling at-risk workers through Career Conversion Programmes.
• Accelerating job redesign at firms.
• Redeploying employees into new roles. 

For further details on these initiatives supporting reskilling and redeployment, see Annex C.

¹ The professional services sector comprises company headquarters and a diverse range of PS firms including those providing accountancy, advertising, architecture and engineering services, consulting, design and legal services.

² The PS sector tends to grow in sync with the overall economy as growth of the PS sector is dependent on the demand for services by businesses. It is expected that actual growth of the PS sector will closely track that of GDP growth.

³ From S$23 billion in 2020.

⁴ The Technology Innovation Roadmap for the legal subsector was developed by the Ministry of Law in collaboration with industry stakeholders, and aims to promote innovation, technology adoption and development in Singapore’s legal industry up to 2030. It identifies technologies that will impact and change legal services, and presents recommendations to support the development and adoption of such technologies by law firms and in-house legal teams.

The Industry Development Plan, developed by the Singapore Accountancy Commission and the Infocomm Media Development Authority for the accountancy subsector, provides SMEs with a step-by-step guide to identify suitable digital solutions and corresponding training programmes to equip employees with the right skillsets at each stage of their digitalisation journey