A*STAR engages with enterprises and universities to tackle business and social issues. Fujitsu is one of these partners, providing high-performance computing (HPC) solutions. A*STAR has also collaborated with the Singapore Management University (SMU), which too has a long-term relationship with Fujitsu.
These three parties began a discussion on how they could contribute to solving urbanization issues. They came together to invest 54 million Singapore dollars to create the CoE which is designed to investigate and address the challenges frequently faced by highly urbanized cities.The CoE is also supported by the National Research Foundation(NRF).
In particular, the CoE identified two key areas to explore: Dynamic Mobility Management, which examines and improves the dynamics of commuter traffic in urban spaces, as well as managing crowds under extreme conditions; and Maritime and Port Optimization, which looks at the design of integrated logistics of shipments.
"Our three parties each made a commitment to exploring urban challenges, so it was a good fit," added Steven Miller, Dean of Information Systems at SMU. "The main challenge was in getting these three different types of organizations to work effectively together and to understand our respective responsibilities."
A*STAR, SMU and Fujitsu have different roles and cultures, which made the collaboration challenging at the beginning. However, as all shared the same goals and commitment, this united and motivated the CoE executives and employees. Also, they began to recognize and appreciate that each member brings different talents and expertise to the team.
"Fujitsu took the lead on the design of our Urban Computing Platform, as it has tremendous depth in advanced computing," continued Miller. "Then we all worked together on identifying what problems we should address and on communicating with external parties to understand the real-world user requirements." Fujitsu also brings its expertise in big data, mobility and HPC to the CoE. A*STAR contributes capabilities in big data, simulation technologies, and behavioral science. Furthermore, SMU's expertise includes Artificial Intelligence based methods and software systems for planning, scheduling and decision making.