The Global Safety Division will focus on growing and developing the company’s expertise in public safety, an area which has attracted a great deal of attention and investment by governments around the world. The new division will devise global business strategy, develop new technologies and solutions and provide training and technical support for subsidiaries and partners worldwide. Mr. Tan Boon Chin, Managing Director of the Regional Competency Centre for Public Safety in NEC Asia Pacific Pte Ltd, has been appointed to lead the new division.
NEC is known globally for its biometrics identity technologies, which have been provided to a wide range of customers in 30 countries around the world. This includes solutions for immigration control, national identification, law enforcement, urban surveillance, cyber security, and emergency and disaster management. One of NEC’s primary missions is to realize a rich and innovative Smart Society by utilizing ICT technologies in the areas of security and smart energy solutions.
Mr. Takayuki Morita, Senior Vice President of NEC says: “The new Division is introducing global markets to the message of ‘Safer Cities’. We are fully convinced that safety and security are the bedrock for a city’s development, growth and renewal. We firmly believe in utilizing technology to safeguard lives and property, and in the process, creating a society where people are able to live, work and play in safety and comfort, while co-existing in harmony with the environment.
The new division was established in Singapore in order to conveniently access important markets, to capitalize on the business experience and capabilities of the public safety team, and to further enhance its capabilities, as Singapore is an open ground for attracting global talent.
The solutions delivered in the region span across various domains, such as national ID, automated border control, finance, biometric security, critical facilities, transportation, food safety and cyber security. NEC aims to optimize its global development, sales, and marketing efforts with the establishment of the new division. Members of the new division will be based in Singapore, Tokyo and other major metropolitan areas of the world.
Singapore is a trusted hub for Asia’s mission critical data and ICT infrastructure, and this makes us an ideal location for companies to develop new security-related products and services,” said Mr. Jayson Goh, Executive Director of Infocomms and Media, Singapore Economic Development Board. “I am happy that NEC has chosen to orchestrate the international growth of their Global Safety Division from Singapore. This is a strong validation of Singapore’s status as a Global-Asia Hub for Asian companies seeking to penetrate international markets.
One of the projects that the Global Safety Division will be involved in is the recently announced Singapore Safe City Test Bed project, where NEC Asia Pacific was appointed as leader of one of the four consortia managing the test beds. The project is spearheaded by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) to promote the Safety and Security industry in Singapore.
Working through its regional team, the Division will fully support this project by building an end-to-end inter-agency collaboration infrastructure that can help a wide range of government agencies to integrate and analyze data collected from various networks. Through the innovative use of technologies, multiple agencies can understand and correlate information from various sources and optimize the resources used to handle this information.
In December 2012, NEC announced the signing of a partnership agreement with INTERPOL to provide the world police body with vital assistance in developing core elements of the Digital Crime Centre being established within the INTERPOL Global Complex for Innovation in Singapore. The Global Safety Division’s Cyber Security team will also contribute to the development of technologies and solutions, training and investigation support as part of this partnership.
Governments around the world are expected to invest approximately 0.5 percent of GDP into safer city projects by 2017, and the contribution of technologies towards the development of safer city projects is expected to amount to 80-85 billion dollars by 2020 (source: Frost & Sullivan marketing reports).
With the establishment of the Global Safety Division, NEC will continue to promote the expansion of business and to contribute to the public safety of cities worldwide.
