Lee Yi Shyan at the Launch of SPH Search & Directory Engine Rednano.SG

Speech by Mr Lee Yi Shyan, Minister of State for Trade and Industry, at launch of SPH Search & Directory Engine Rednano.sg at Red Dot Design Museum on 18 March 2008, 4.00pm.

Your Excellency, Ms Janne Julsrud, Norway’s Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary

Mr Alan Chan, CEO, SPH

Ms Elsie Chua, Chairman, SPH Search

Mr Paul Jansen, CEO, SPH Search

Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,

Thank you for inviting me to be part of this happy occasion.

Introduction: Trends in the Cyber World

We live in a world of information explosion. Before I came, I went to the internet and try to figure out exactly how I can quantify this information explosion. One article said that “over 1,000,000 new books were published and more than 100,000,000 scientific papers released every year, with billions of websites at your Google tips[1]”.

Long gone are the times when Leonardo da Vinci was cited as one of the last persons who was aware of all the main knowledge available in his time. Since then, the amount of data, information and knowledge has exploded exponentially, stretching the capacity of our human brains.

Exactly how much information do we produce? Another study[2] by the University of California at Berkeley done in 2003 said that the world's total yearly production of print, film, optical, and magnetic content would require roughly 1.5 billion gigabytes (or 1.5 million terabytes) of storage. This was the equivalent to 250 megabytes per person for each man, woman, and child on earth. This was of course, in 2003.I would personally multiply this by a factor of 8 to 10 given how storage prices have slided in recent years.

While information has been created at exponential speed, the way our human brains process information may not have changed very much, from the time when we were hunters-gatherers, if one believes in the evolution theory.

In the vast universe of data and information, we need these effective tools for filtering, indexing, searching, retrieving and processing information. Information that does not help in decision-making, in making our lives easier, in making complexities simpler, is not useful. What we need are ways to process and digest data in the way that we could organize and distil the information to knowledge and insights.

Search Engines Tailored for the Local Context

This perhaps explains why good search engines such as Google and Yahoo have become so valuable. I’m sure every one of us here has used these search sites.

I remembered once, I was hard-pressed for time to fill out an electronic application form. The last piece of information I needed was my photo. In moments like this, it was very hard to find a passport photo, so I just went on the internet and type “images of Lee Yi Shyan”. Luckily, all the photos that came up were boardroom photos. That was very useful.

On another occasion, I went on to Baidu.com and typed “Lee Yi Shyan” to see what came out of it. It presented me a very good listing of the provinces and cities I visited then. That was because each time after my visit, the local media would report that so-and-so had been here and met with the mayor or governor. So it becomes a very effective archive if I were to use it in that way.

These search companies compared to many global brick-and-mortar corporations, these new internet phenomenon are distinctive in being relatively asset-light while commanding substantial valuations. With total asset value of less than one-tenth of giant companies like Exxon Mobil and GE, knowledge-based companies such as Google and Yahoo generate market capitalizations that are almost a-third that of these traditional giants.

But even as Google becomes a household name, country-specific search engines are emerging as credible competitors to global giants like Google and Yahoo in many places around the world. I mentioned the example of Baidu.com in China, there is the Guruji.com in India and Naver.com in South Korea.

Baidu has been extremely successful in China, beating even Google to become the top search engine used by Chinese netizens to look for local information. In fact, just two months ago, it was reported that Baidu had a 60% market share in China's search engine usage, which was more than double Google’s 26%.

A “Uniquely Singapore” Search Engine

Likewise, one could validly argue that there is room for a “Uniquely Singapore” search engine in the global cyberspace. While we have effective tools for worldwide searches, the main value proposition for a localized search engine would lie in its precision and accuracy of its searches, delivering even more accurate fits between the questions and answers.

Through its better understanding of the local context, culture and colloquialisms, Singapore’s local search engine can produce more relevant, helpful and value-added search results. It can also go 'one-up' on foreign search engines by addressing and plugging the gaps in search results on Singapore which are missing in other search engines.

On one hand, it is about providing Singaporeans with a ready tool to discover and access useful local online content. On the other, it will help netizens all over the world to find relevant and useful online information on Singapore, be it for tourism, business, cultural understanding or any purpose where local information is useful.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I would like to applaud SPH Search in having the foresight to come up with the Singapore search engine, which will help us to search for the proverbial “Uniquely Singapore” needle in a haystack.

Thank you once again, for inviting me to be part of this occasion.

[1] 7 Tips to Deal with TMI (Too Much Information) http://www.thethinkingblog.com/2007/10/7-tips-to-deal-with-tmi-too-much.html

[2] by Peter Lyman of University of California at Berkeley “How much information 2003?”.