Please use the case study attached to answer the following questions:
- Why is digitalization important in the delivery of public services?
- What challenges did LTA face during the transition of vehicle services from counter to digital? How did the team respond to resistance to change?
- " Digital transformation is more about people than technology." In the context of OneMotoring, to what extent do you agree with this statement?
- What are some lessons on change management that can be drawn from LTA's experience with the digitalization of vehicle services?
- Considering perspectives from both the government and citizens, what factors would define the next generation of vehicle services? What other digital services would be useful to motorists?
Below are a few requirements for the format:
- This should be typed and at least two double-spaced pages, using a font size of 12 points.
- APA format.
- Start by writing down your question number (e.g., Q1); no need to retype each question. Support your arguments with facts from the case or elsewhere. Feel free to use a bullet format wherever appropriate. Please remember that simple reports without innovative solutions, ideas, and suggestions will not get full credit.
SMU082
This case was written by Professor Lily Kong, Associate Professor Orlando Woods, and Dr Cheah Sin Mei at the Singapore Management University and Professor Tim Bunnell at the National University of Singapore. The case was prepared solely to provide material for class discussion. The authors do not intend to illustrate either effective or ineffective handling of a managerial situation. The authors may have disguised certain names and other identifying information to protect confidentiality. Copyright © 2022, Singapore Management University Version: 2022-09-22
ONEMOTORING: DRIVING THE DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION OF VEHICLE SERVICES IN SINGAPORE
Singapore is a nation where we can create possibilities for ourselves beyond what we imagined
possible.
– Lee Hsien Loong, Prime Minister of Singapore1
For more than two decades since the soft launch of the OneMotoring portal in 2000, the one-stop
gateway to vehicle-related services in Singapore had been an integral resource for the motoring
community. From real-time traffic updates to renewing road tax, paying transport-related fees, and
supporting the entire lifecycle of vehicle ownership, the portal offered more than a hundred digital
services delivered by the Land Transport Authority (LTA), the government agency overseeing land
transport in the country.
These public e-service delivery efforts were a continuation of the Singapore Government’s national
computerisation journey that began as early as the 1980s. LTA was among the forerunners in the
digital transformation of public services. More recently, Singapore’s achievements as a Smart City
and in city mobility attested to its success in digitalisation. The city-state was named the leading
Smart City thrice from 2019 to 2021.2
It was no surprise that owing to its success, the government had to meet rising citizen expectations
over the years. This fact was acknowledged by Alvin Chia, Group Director of Vehicle Services Group
at LTA, who noted, “Expectation of public services has heightened tremendously.”
Back in the 2000s, LTA had battled its fair share of challenges commonly encountered by agencies
embarking on a digital transformation journey. Users’ lack of computer literacy, the loss of human
touch in service delivery, the difficulty in authenticating user digital identity, and workforce
transition were among the common pertinent issues. Through stakeholder engagement, work
redesign, employee retraining, leveraging government-wide shared services, and active partnership
with multiple entities, LTA had succeeded in surmounting those obstacles.
While the portal has been serving and meeting most of the motorists’ needs, LTA is not resting on
its laurels. Moving ahead with times, LTA sees opportunities to push the envelope further to serve
motorists better. LTA has in its pipeline a new round of system upgrade. Efforts are underway to
1 Smart Nation Singapore, “Transforming SG Through Tech”, https://www.smartnation.gov.sg/about-smart-nation/transforming- singapore, accessed March 2022. 2 Smart Nation Singapore, “Achievements”, https://www.smartnation.gov.sg/about-smart-nation/our-journey/achievements, accessed
March 2022.
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evaluate the adoption of newer technologies, such as microservices and agile methodology, which
would enable quicker delivery of services and policy changes. With so many digital possibilities
presented by technological advancements, how is LTA reimagining the delivery of vehicle services
from the future of mobility perspective? How would the system cope with rapid policy changes to
accommodate the arrival of new vehicle technologies such as electric vehicles? What new digital
services might motorists in Singapore look forward to in the next few years?
Urban Mobility in Singapore, A Smart City
Singapore has been recognised as the world’s leading smart city over three consecutive years from
2019 to 2021. 3 According to the Smart City Index published by Institute of Management
Development (IMD) and the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD), the city-state
was ranked top among more than a hundred cities on how technology was used to improve the lives
of its residents (refer to Exhibit 1 for the rankings). Singapore also performed well in the mobility
domain, one of the five key elements of a smart city.4 The Deloitte City Mobility Index 2020 placed
Singapore as the global leader in integrated mobility, accessibility, and infrastructure investment, in
addition to being a top performer in several areas including the management of congestion.5
Perennial traffic congestion in metropolitan cities has been a major urban transportation issue that
has marred travel experience for commuters. With the rare exception of a few cites, tackling traffic
congestion remains a challenge. Even though Singapore has been well-regarded internationally as an
exemplar of employing innovative approaches towards road traffic management,6 the city-state
continues to face challenges, with greater demand for seamless and efficient mobility by a growing
population. Rising affluence in the city-state has also led to higher demand for private car ownership,
even as the small island struggles with land constraints and a high population density.7 Left to its
own devices, unregulated increase in private vehicle usage would undoubtedly exacerbate traffic
congestion.
Singapore’s approach to addressing these challenges has entailed a balance between vehicle
population control and road usage restrictions, on the one hand, and improving public transport on
the other. The balance has in part been achieved by schemes such as Vehicle Quota System (VQS),
Additional Registration Fee (ARF) and Electronic Road Pricing (ERP). Implemented in 1990, the
VQS was a bidding system for a Certificate of Entitlement (COE), which was the right to own a
vehicle in Singapore for ten years.8 Prior to the purchase of a new vehicle, buyers would have to bid
3 Smart Nation Singapore, “Achievements”, https://www.smartnation.gov.sg/about-smart-nation/our-journey/achievements, accessed
March 2022. 4 The five elements defined by the IMD-SUTD Smart City Index were health and safety, mobility, activities, opportunities, and
governance. IMD, “Smart City Observatory”, https://www.imd.org/smart-city-observatory/home/, accessed March 2022. 5 Deloitte, “Deloitte City Mobility Index 2020”, https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/insights/us/articles/4331_Deloitte-City- Mobility-Index/Singapore_GlobalCityMobility_WEB.pdf, accessed March 2022. 6 Wolfgang Ketter and Mary Loane, “How Road Pricing is Tackling Congestion and Pollution in Cities Like London and Singapore”,
World Economic Forum, December 21, 2021, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/12/how-road-pricing-is-tackling-congestion-and- pollution-in-cities/, accessed March 2022. 7 Singapore occupied a land area of 720 square kilometres. In 2021, Singapore’s population density was one of the highest in the world
at 7,485 residents per square kilometre. Department of Statistics (Singapore), “Population and Population Structure”, https://www.singstat.gov.sg/find-data/search-by-theme/population/population-and-population-structure/latest-data, accessed March
2022. 8 Marsita Omar and Nor-Afidah Abd Rahman, “Certificate of Entitlement”, Singapore Infopedia, June 2019, https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/infopedia/articles/SIP_1005_2006-04-07.html, accessed March 2022.
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for a COE under a quota set quarterly. Upon registration, successful bidders would have to pay ARF,
a tax that could cost up to twice as much as the vehicle’s open market value. Road congestion has
been managed using ERP since 1998 (and its predecessor, the Area Licensing Scheme introduced in
1975), in which motorists had to pay a toll for passing through gantries located in high-traffic areas.
Taken together, VQS, ARF, and ERP have been effective policy instruments moderating the
relentless growth of the vehicle population and have played a part in ensuring smooth traffic flows.9
Land Transport Authority
Inception
The Land Transport Authority (LTA) was established as a statutory board under the Ministry of
Transport in September 1995.10 Formed from the merger of four public entities – the Registry of
Vehicles (ROV), the Land Transportation Division of the Ministry of Communications, the Roads
and Transportation Division of the Public Works Department, and the Mass Rapid Transit
Corporation11 – LTA’s role is primarily to spearhead the development of the country’s land transport.
From its early mission of building a world-class transport system, the authority has progressed to set
its sights on “connecting people and places, [and] enhancing travel experiences”.12
Mobility Initiatives
Embarking on the computerisation journey as early as the 1980s, LTA was one of the forerunners of
public service digital transformation. The public sector’s digital transformation efforts had been
organised around a successive series of IT masterplans (refer to Exhibit 2 for a list of masterplans).
Additionally, national and sectoral level land transport initiatives were rolled out progressively with
the common goal of accelerating the transformation of Singapore’s mobility landscape.
In 2014, the Smart Nation initiative was launched by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who
envisioned Singapore as “a nation where people live meaningful and fulfilled lives, enabled
seamlessly by technology, offering exciting opportunities for all”.13 The initiative represented a
significant move that would herald the next phase of urban transformation for Singapore. One of the
eight Strategic National Projects identified by the initiative was Smart Urban Mobility, in which the
deployment of digital technologies would support the country’s vision of a ‘Car-Lite Singapore’.14
9 Chng, Samuel, Charles Abraham, Mathew P. White, and Stephen Skippon, “To Drive or Not to Drive? A Qualitative Comparison of
Car Ownership and Transport Experiences in London and Singapore”, Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives 2 (2019):
100030. 10 Tan Lay Yuen, “Land Transport Authority”, Singapore Infopedia, 2016,
https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/infopedia/articles/SIP_862_2005-01-22.html, accessed March 2022. 11 Ibid. 12 LTA, “Mission, Vision & Shared Values”,
https://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltagov/en/who_we_are/our_organisation/mission_vision_values.html, accessed March 2022. 13 Prime Minister Office, “PM Lee Hsien Loong at the Smart Nation Launch”, November 24, 2014, https://www.pmo.gov.sg/Newsroom/transcript-prime-minister-lee-hsien-loongs-speech-smart-nation-launch-24-november, accessed
March 2022. 14 Centre for Liveable Cities (Singapore), “Creating Liveable Cities Through Car-Lite Urban Mobility”, 2016, https://www.clc.gov.sg/docs/default-source/books/carlite-urban-mobility-finalreport.pdf, accessed March 2022.
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Introduced in the same year as the Smart Nation programme was the Smart Mobility 2030 strategic
plan. It was jointly developed by LTA and the Intelligent Transportation Society of Singapore, an
organisation representing the local transport industry. Building on the strong foundation of an
Intelligent Transport System15, the plan sought to provide guidance to the transport sector to develop
information services that would enhance the land travelling experience of diverse commuter groups.16
Vehicle Services
The early pursuit of computerisation in the 1980s saw LTA going into automation of routine, labour-
intensive tasks to improve productivity and efficiency. One of the early adopters of technology to
undergo reform was vehicle registration and licensing.
Within LTA, the Vehicle Services Group (VSG) was responsible for the registration and licensing
of vehicles since taking over the function from its predecessor, ROV. VSG served the full spectrum
of motorists’ needs from the point of registration to the deregistration of vehicles, including cars,
motorcycles, taxis, buses, and goods vehicles as well as power-assisted bicycles and e-scooters. Over
the years, VSG had grown and expanded the services it provided, supported by its various subgroups
including the Vehicle Service Operations, Vehicle Service Development, Vehicle Engineering,
Foreign Vehicle Permits & Customer Service, and Investigations & Intelligence.17
LTA’s digitalisation journey unfolded in the backdrop of the broader ‘Whole-of-Government’
transformation efforts. Drawing lessons from the past 50 years of transformation, senior government
officers acknowledged that the public sector must remain relevant to the needs and sentiments of
citizens.18 The digitalisation of vehicle services supported that narrative, as Alvin Chia, Group
Director of VSG articulated,
We see ourselves aligned with what the public sector is gearing towards – a Smart City. Because
transport is an integral piece of our daily life, we want to make our vehicle services smarter,
easier to use, and more convenient for the public.
Prior to computerisation, the only service channel was the counters at LTA’s Customer Service
Centre at Sin Ming Drive. Amid the quieter residential and industrial estates in the surrounding area
was the hustle and bustle at the Customer Service Centre. The large number of walk-ins, more than
a thousand visitors daily, made a compelling case for automation and self-service.
OneMotoring Portal
15 Intelligent Transport Systems was the collective term for technologies used to gather data on traffic-related information. Land Transport Authority, “Intelligent Transport Systems”,
https://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltagov/en/getting_around/driving_in_singapore/intelligent_transport_systems.html, accessed March
2022. 16 Chin Kian Keong and Grace Ong, “Smart Mobility 2030 – ITS Strategic Plan for Singapore”, Land Transport Authority, November
2015, https://esci-ksp.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/J15Nov_p04Chin_SmartMobility2030.pdf, accessed March 2022. 17 Singapore Government Directory, “Land Transport Authority, Vehicle Services Group”, https://www.sgdi.gov.sg/ministries/mot/statutory-boards/lta/departments/vs, accessed March 2022. 18 Ang Hak Seng and Sueann Soon, “Transformation in the Singapore Public Service: Emerging Stronger from the Pandemic”, Civil
Service College, June 30, 2021, https://www.csc.gov.sg/articles/transformation-in-the-singapore-public-service-emerging-stronger-from- the-pandemic, accessed March 2020
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The first generation of the vehicle registration & licensing system, named the Motor Vehicle Project
(MVP), was launched in the 1980s. The MVP primarily served motor dealers, who acted as
intermediaries for motorists. The dealers would typically handle the complex paperwork involved in
the registration and licensing process and personally submit the required documents to LTA on behalf
of the vehicle owners. Upon confirmation of the registration, the vehicle owner would be issued with
a log card and a road tax disc. Two decades later, the MVP was replaced by the Vehicle Registration
& Licensing System (VRLS) and a public-facing website – OneMotoring.lta.gov.sg.
Calibrated Transition
Soft-launched in 2000, the OneMotoring portal was introduced to the public as a one-stop service
gateway catering to the varying needs of the motoring community. With a third of the road journeys
made by private cars19 and more than one million vehicles on the road20, motorists represented a
sizeable segment of road users in Singapore.
Taking a calibrated and incremental approach of converting over-the-counter services to e- services
on the portal, VSG phased the portal development over a few years. Chia described,
We were very mindful from the onset that this is going to be a mammoth task because people are
so used to the manual way. The resistance to change and the resistance to adopt technologies are
very real concerns. So, we were mindful that we must do this [transformation] incrementally.
In 2001, OneMotoring started offering enquiry services such as road tax payable and vehicle
rebates.21 A year later, transactional services, including bidding for COE and renewing road tax,
were available on the portal. The portal also began accepting e-payment such as direct debit.
Following this, LTA developed a new system to replace MVP, which was unable to support modern
internet-enabled services due to its archaic system architecture. A suite of
[email protected] was officially launched in 2006. Motorists, in addition to motor
dealers, could go online instead of making trips to the Customer Service Centre for a wide variety of
services.
Apart from the hundred-odd e-services that covered enquiries, transactions, and e-payments, the
public and motor dealers could register, transfer and deregister their vehicles at their convenience
and in the comfort of home or office. In addition to more commonly utilised services such as road
tax renewal, payment of fees and fines, motorists could also access real-time traffic updates via
traffic.smart22, an interactive map that displayed the locations of accidents, vehicle breakdowns,
roadworks, flash floods, toll gantries, speed cameras, and traffic speed of major roads. When the use
of smartphones became more prevalent, the portal added mobile services.
19 Deloitte, “Deloitte City Mobility Index 2020”, https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/insights/us/articles/4331_Deloitte-City-
Mobility-Index/Singapore_GlobalCityMobility_WEB.pdf, accessed March 2022. 20 Smart Nation Singapore, “Smart Transport Initiatives”, https://www.smartnation.gov.sg/initiatives/transport, accessed March 2022. 21 Gary Pan, Foo See Liang and Tan ShongYe, “Governing a Digital Business Ecosystem: Lessons from ONEMOTORING Portal”,
Accountancy Business and the Public Interest, 13 (2014): 22. 22 OneMotoring Portal, “traffic.smart”, https://onemotoring.lta.gov.sg/content/onemotoring/home/driving/traffic_information/traffic- smart.html, accessed March 2022.
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Stakeholder Engagement
As with any digital transformation, change management played a critical role in driving successful
outcomes. As such, a progressive approach in overcoming a culture of resistance to technology
adoption among multiple stakeholder groups became an imperative for VSG. Chia shared,
We took a lot of pain and effort on change management because this involved all stakeholders,
not only those within LTA. Every stakeholder must come along with us [on this transformation
journey].
Staff Transition Recognising that employees were among the most important stakeholder groups, Alanna Fung,
Director of Vehicle Services Operations, highlighted how getting staff to buy into the digital
transformation was crucial,
With digitalisation, we did not have to operate so many counters. Of course, our staff were
concerned if they would lose their jobs. So, the management held many sessions with them,
explaining the need for change and how they can still play a role after we close the counters as
there is back room work to be done. That helped to get our staff to be with us in this transition to
digitalisation.
Chia acknowledged the impact of digitalisation on people and jobs, “Displacement of people is
always the number one concern for many organisations that go through the process of digitalisation”.
VSG managed this predicament through the redesign of work and a careful analysis of the profiles
of its 300-over staff. Senior officers near retirement were given the reassurance of no layoffs. They
continued to work until they reached the official retirement age of 62.23 Middle-aged officers were
retrained, reskilled, and redeployed to become Service Ambassadors stationed at the electronic lobby
of the Customer Service Centre. Similar to the scene at a bank lobby, members of the public were
greeted and assisted by Service Ambassadors armed with handheld devices such as iPads.
Transition of Motor Dealers Motor dealers were among the first group of users who underwent the transition in 2006. Ng Lay
Choo, Director of Vehicle Service Development, recalled the challenges during the transition period
of one and a half years,
We went through a very difficult journey with them. We started the transition process many
months ahead of the rollout, and conducted training sessions, going through screen-by-screen,
teaching them what to do. When we first cut off counter services after rolling out the e-services,
they rushed to our counters asking us for help. This was because they were not familiar with the
Internet, and some of them did not know how to use a mouse! Some had just bought their
computers and did not know how to access a URL [a website address] while others did not know
how to key in their password.
23 From 1999 to 2021, the official retirement age in Singapore was 62 years old. Faris Mokhtar, “Retirement and Re-employment Ages
to be Raised by 3 Years, CPF Contribution Rates for Older Workers to Go Up”, TODAY, November 26, 2021,
https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/govt-raise-retirement-age-65-and-re-employment-age-70-2030-cpf-contribution-rates-older, accessed April 2022.
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To facilitate the transition, the VSG team painstakingly rendered assistance to individual dealers who
needed help. A mobile IT support team was formed to visit the dealers’ offices and offer help to set
up the latter’s computers, as well as to troubleshoot and resolve technical issues. Through a high
degree of handholding, the team also provided one-on-one system walkthrough for the dealers, who
were mostly sole proprietors consumed by the day-to-day running of a ‘one-person show’ business.
Public Expectations Digitisation had not only changed the way LTA delivered its services, but also altered the nature of
interactions between the government and members of the public. With the replacement of counter
services and the loss of the ‘human touch’ element of customer experience, the public’s mindset
about the way the agency rendered assistance to motorists would need to be addressed. Said Diane
Chow, Director of Foreign Vehicle Permits & Customer Services,
As we move to the digital realm and encourage people to self-serve, the human interaction is
taken away and that is most challenging when it comes to dealing with members of the public. It
is not a matter of whether they know how to use the digital services, but whether they want to use
it. So, when given a choice, people who enjoy face-to-face interactions would still visit us. Many
people have told us that they like to come to Sin Ming to chat with our staff because they are so
friendly and seem to know everything under the sky about private vehicles.
Chow also highlighted that Service Ambassadors took the opportunity to socialise the advantages of
transacting online to visitors who dropped by the Customer Service Centre. To increase buy-in to the
digital platform, the message focused on convenience. Drawing attention away from counter service
by appointment, motorists could also access the OneMotoring portal from their mobile phones or via
mobile apps (AXS m-station and SingPost) and kiosks (AXS and SAM) located island-wide for their
transactions.24
In addition to convenience, the design of the portal was guided by principles of simplicity and user-
friendliness. Specifically, a transaction would not require the user to navigate many web pages and
would take no longer than five minutes. Motorists would also find their personalised dashboard
useful in displaying their vehicle-related information at a glance. Another practical feature was
electronic notification deposited in their dashboard with an SMS sent to alert the recipient25. In the
move towards paperless automation, reminders and status updates were pushed to the mobile phones
of users, thus replacing the mailing of hardcopy letters. Along the way, in response to public feedback,
the contents of the messages were simplified. Doing away with the need to log on to the portal to
retrieve the e-letter sent to the user’s OneMotoring dashboard, the SMS message would indicate the
action required – whether the road tax was due, or the vehicle was due for inspection, or if insurance
was needed.
Understanding that adapting to change can take time, LTA provided a six-month period for vehicle
owners to familiarise themselves with the e-notifications, while allowing them to opt out and
continue receiving hardcopy letters. “It was a very considered and deliberate move to win people
over”, Chia admitted. Again, he emphasised the importance of having a comprehensive stakeholder
24 AXS m-station (mobile app) and kiosk came under the AXS Network of payment services. SAM (self-service automated machines)
were kiosks operated by SingPost, a local postal service provider. 25 Short Message Service (SMS) was a text messaging service for mobile phone users.
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engagement strategy to manage the transition, and he regarded it as the biggest lesson learned. To
him, “no one should be left behind in the digitalisation journey”.
Collaborative Partners
Behind the scenes that underpinned the massive effort to deliver the portal was a partner ecosystem
that LTA had established with multiple government bodies and commercial entities, such as the
Immigration & Checkpoints Authority, Netrust, and SingPost (refer to Exhibit 3 for an overview of
the backend vehicle registration and licensing system).
Internally within LTA, a whole community had been rallied around the portal – IT engineers, internal
auditors, procurement officers, revenue collection officers, and traffic enforcement officers.
Externally, LTA worked closely with more than a dozen agencies. Among them were the
Government Technology Agency (as a technology advisor), Cyber Security Agency (as a
cybersecurity consultant), Singapore Customs (on the open market value of vehicles) and
enforcement agencies including the Singapore Police Force (on investigating traffic offences) and
National Environment Agency (on vehicular emissions).
Harnessing Shared Technologies
As a government agency, the opportunity to ride on central digital infrastructure was priceless. LTA
realised these common services were immensely beneficial in the early 2000s, when it was struggling
with a missing piece of the technology – user authentication.
Singpass and Corppass, the national authentication systems, were the resolution to this problem and
were quickly adopted by the OneMotoring portal. Singpass and Corppass are the digital identity of
Singapore citizens or residents over 15 years old and corporate entities to allow each individual/entity
to access government and private sector services. Along with MyInfo (a service that auto-populates
profile information upon the user’s authorisation)26, which was launched subsequently in 2016, Chia
considered these common government services one of the breakthroughs that LTA had been waiting
for.
Moving Forward
Pursuing Improvements
Serving the vast motoring community for over one decade since 2006, the VRLS was due for a
refresh. Chia revealed, “We are reaching yet another milestone of redeveloping it. At the same time,
we will also consider new technologies that can help us strengthen and future-proof our system”.
The impetus for overhauling the existing system came from citizens’ expectations of government
systems to be highly responsive to policy changes. Chia further explained, “One of the common
26 MyInfo was a digital government service that pre-filled online forms with the personal data of Singapore citizens and residents.
GovTech Singapore, “Myinfo – A “Tell Us Once” Service that facilitates Online Transactions for Individuals”, https://www.developer.tech.gov.sg/products/categories/digital-identity/myinfo/overview.html, accessed April 2022.
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challenges many public agencies faced is responsiveness – when a policy change was made quickly,
our systems may need three to six months to be upgraded, and this is not widely accepted by the
public”. He reckoned that technologies that supported agile software development, such as
microservices, would be of tremendous help towards a quicker pace of releasing new system features.
The plan for system revamp was considered alongside the exploration of innovative ways to solve
two long-tail problems. Firstly, about 5% of all transactions remained non-digital, either because the
motorists were not eligible for Singpass or the transactions required the sighting of physical
documents. Secondly, despite e-payments being on the rise in Singapore, a small number of people
insisted on paying by cash or cheque.
Reimagining New Possibilities
Chia envisaged a scenario in which a buyer would walk into a car showroom, sign the purchase
agreement, and the motor traders would complete the deal with car financing and motor insurance.
With the push of a button to register the new vehicle, all information would be updated into the new
system on the fly. Given the viability of technology to achieve the intended objective, his team was
also exploring popular emerging technologies to replace the existing monolithic, legacy mainframe
system. Containerised microservices, a Cloud hosting platform, and agile development methodology
were some examples that would enable faster deployment and reap significant cost savings.
In a separate scenario, Chia could foresee the challenges and opportunities accompanying the
electrification of motor vehicles. In fulfilling the broader vision of having all vehicles on the road to
run on cleaner energy by 2040, the government had started making a push for motorists to adopt
electric vehicles (EVs) in 2021.27 To support this push for EV, LTA would have to build up new
capabilities and expertise to handle multi-faceted areas, for example, planning for the EV charging
systems and perhaps even EV batteries. “There will certainly be a lot of learning and adapting in this
effort to transform the land transport sector”, Chia shared.
Notwithstanding prevailing uncertainties, LTA would continue to pursue the digital journey. Chow
noted, “I don’t think we will ever say: ‘We are there’. Digitalisation never ends. We will always be
journeying along”.
27 Tessa Oh, “Singapore's Electric Vehicle Journey in 2021: What Are The Key Developments?”, The Straits Times, December 29, 2021, https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/transport/singapores-electric-vehicle-journey-in-2021, accessed April 2022.
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EXHIBIT 1: IMD-SUTD SMART CITY INDEX RANKING
Ranking 2021 2020 2019
1 Singapore Singapore Singapore
2 Zurich Helsinki Zurich
3 Oslo Zurich Oslo
4 Taipei Auckland Geneva
5 Lausanne Oslo Copenhagen
6 Helsinki Copenhagen Auckland
7 Copenhagen Geneva Taipei
8 Geneva Taipei Helsinki
9 Auckland Amsterdam Bilbao
10 Bilbao New York Dusseldorf
Source: IMD Business School, www.imd.org, accessed March 2022.
EXHIBIT 2: TIMELINE OF SINGAPORE’S E-GOVERNMENT MASTERPLANS
Source: Government Technology Agency (Singapore), “eGov Masterplans”, January 1, 2016,
https://www.tech.gov.sg/media/corporate-publications/egov-masterplans, accessed March 2022.
Smart Nation Singapore, “Milestones of Singapore’s Smart Nation Story”, https://www.smartnation.gov.sg/about-
smart-nation/our-journey/milestones, accessed March 2022.
For the exclusive use of C. Cuesta, 2024.
This document is authorized for use only by Camila Cuesta in SM6021-Summer 2024 taught by POUYAN ESMAEIL ZADEH, Florida International University from Apr 2024 to Oct 2024.
SMU-22-0018 OneMotoring
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EXHIBIT 3: VEHICLE REGISTRATION AND LICENSING SYSTEM
Source: LTA
For the exclusive use of C. Cuesta, 2024.
This document is authorized for use only by Camila Cuesta in SM6021-Summer 2024 taught by POUYAN ESMAEIL ZADEH, Florida International University from Apr 2024 to Oct 2024.