Procter & Gamble, in partnership with the Singapore Economic Development Board, has established its first digital innovation center in Singapore alongside guest-of-honor, S Iswaran, Minister for Trade and Industry, announcing an investment of over US$100 million over the next five years to support this E-Center.
The E-Center – P&G’s first outside the United States of America – will be pivotal to its undertaking of end-to-end digital innovation across three core areas: Supply Chain Management, e-Analytics and e-Business.
In the area of Supply Chain Management, termed “i-Supply”, the E-Center will focus on transforming P&G’s supply chain end-to-end, enabling greater accuracy, visibility and more efficient processes.
The e-Business unit aims to translate digital strategies into scalable plans for the region, and to leverage new digital channels to innovate and improve business models.
Through its focus on e-Analytics, the E-Center will also leverage predictive analytics and big data to optimize product distribution and marketing strategy.
With the launch, P&G will be training 40 employees in the first year to take on digital-related roles in these three capability areas. Through the E-Center, P&G will also expand its partnerships with local Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and start-ups to strengthen digital capabilities and co-develop new digital solutions.
“We are pleased that P&G has chosen to establish its first E-Center outside of the US, in Singapore. Through digital innovation in supply chain management, e-Analytics and e-Business, the center will drive transformation of P&G’s operations in the region. This will in turn create new jobs in fields such as data analytics that are aligned with Singapore’s efforts to strengthen our digital capabilities” said Chairman of the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB), Dr. Beh Swan Gin.
To bolster the inauguration of the E-Center, P&G also hosted the second edition of its leadership development program - P&G Leadership College – for SMEs in collaboration with SPRING Singapore.
First established in 2014 as part of the Partnerships for Capability Transformation (PACT) initiative, the P&G Leadership College aims to foster mutually beneficial collaborations between large organizations and SMEs through projects involving knowledge transfer, capability upgrading, co-innovation and test-bedding of innovative solutions. The half-day training program this year saw over 30 business leaders in attendance. They gained access to skills and insights around digital and e-commerce from speakers of leading tech companies such as Ematic Solutions, Google, NTUC Fairprice and Uber.
Ted Tan, Deputy Chief Executive, SPRING Singapore, said “P&G’s continuing efforts in the leadership development program to upgrade the management capabilities of local SMEs is commendable. We encourage SME leaders to learn from successful organizations like P&G in enhancing their capabilities. We hope that the sharing of knowledge and experience at this year’s program will result in business model transformation and the pioneering of more innovative digital solutions to help Singapore SMEs be regionally or globally competitive.”
P&G Asia Pacific President, Magesvaran Suranjan, said: “As we mark our 30th year in Singapore, we are proud to reaffirm our long-standing commitment to the country with the establishment of our first E-Center. We have deep ties to Singapore and the local community, and our partnerships with various enterprises and institutions here have been instrumental to our success in the region. We are delighted to be able to contribute to building Singapore’s digital innovation capabilities through our E-Center and, in parallel, our 2nd Leadership College to equip SMEs with relevant skills and knowledge required to tap burgeoning opportunities in the e-Commerce and digital space.”