L-R: Irving Tan (Cisco); Chng Kai Fong (EDB); Miyuki Suzuki (Cisco) and Bee Kheng Tay (Cisco)

Credit: Cisco

Cisco has launched a cyber security centre of excellence in Singapore together with a new co-innovation centre, the first in Southeast Asia.

Both facilities are designed to spur further digital innovation and development in line with Singapore’s focus on digital innovation.

To achieve this, the networking vendor plans to leverage its ecosystem of partners and alliances through closer collaboration and innovation to tackle challenges unique to the region.

The launch of its co-innovation centre – the 14th globally – is a major effort in that direction, bringing together customers, industry partners, start-ups, application developers, accelerators, government organisations and universities.

“Cisco’s co-innovation centre and cyber security centre of excellence will not only build new digital capabilities in Singapore for the Asia Pacific region, but also provide opportunities for Singaporeans to work with the best minds in Cisco and its partners to create new and innovative solutions that enable and secure digital transformation in different industries,” said Chng Kai Fong, managing director of Singapore’s Economic Development Board.

“We welcome global technology leaders like Cisco to deepen their presence in our ecosystem and we look forward to a fruitful partnership with Cisco,” added Chng, who inaugurated the launch of both centres at the firm’s new Mapletree Business City office.

Furthermore, highlighting the need for continued cyber security investment, a recent Cisco study, ‘ready, steady, unsure – technology perspective into Asia Pacific’s readiness for digital transformation’, found that cyber security and the Internet of Things (IoT) are top of mind for business leaders.

To illustrate this, the report found that 65 per cent of leaders in APAC consider cyber security paramount to succeed in digital transformation, particularly in financial services, which came in at 80 per cent.

Furthermore, 85 per cent of companies regionally have adopted the technology and 42 per cent indicated they had made security upgrades due to a breach.

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“At Cisco, we build the bridge between hope and possibility,” said Irving Tan, senior vice president and chief of operations at Cisco. “This is only possible when innovative technology and imaginative people come together around a common purpose.

“Innovation no longer happens behind the closed doors of research and development labs, but in open ecosystems.

“By fostering local and global partnerships, Cisco is leading innovation in cutting edge technology solutions that will create a better future for the region.”

Cisco has strong regional partnerships and global alliances such as that with Interpol, as well as the cyber security agency of Singapore, and with the government of Indonesia, which was the first country in Southeast Asia to be part of the vendor’s country digital acceleration (CDA) program.

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The firm is also playing an active role in ICE71 ‘innovation cyber security ecosystem at Block71’, the region’s first cyber security startup hub in partnership with Singtel Innov8 and NUS Enterprise.

“Singapore joins our global network of co-Innovation centres, with the mandate to identify, collaborate and co-engineer innovative solutions beyond Cisco’s traditional offerings that move the dial for our customers and partners,” added David Ward, senior vice president engineering, CTO and chief architect at Cisco.

“Singapore is a world-leader in innovation, and we are excited to work with local government, start-ups, partners and customers to extend that spirit of innovation and drive new, digital solutions that improve economic and social conditions.”

The co-innovation centre aims to provide physical and virtual laboratories for proof of concept development, experimentation and testing.

Furthermore, the centre’s customer innovation rooms, which offer a space to co-create and prototype new solutions, will be located within the vendor’s new office 80,000 square foot office space at Mapletree Business City II.

Content retrieved from: https://sg.channelasia.tech/article/657819/innovation-key-cisco-unveils-centre-excellence-singapore/.