Why Singapore’s prime minister gave DBS and Grab a shout-out during the country’s budget speech

Singapore Prime Minister Lawrence Wong name-dropped two of the country’s largest companies during his budget address on Thursday, citing them as role models as the Southeast Asian country embraces artificial intelligence as a way to future-proof its economy. 

The country is setting up a new AI council, helmed by Wong himself, to oversee the development and execution of “national AI missions” in four key areas: advanced manufacturing, connectivity, finance and healthcare. 

“Harnessed well, AI will be a strategic advantage for Singapore,” Wong said during his Feb. 12 budget address. “It can help us overcome our structural constraints—our limited natural resources, rapidly ageing population and tight labor market.”

In his budget brief, Wong announced several other AI initiatives, including increased tax deductions and allowances for companies looking to adopt AI, and the construction of a new AI park in the country’s one-north business district. He also promised to give Singaporeans that take AI training courses six months of free access to premium AI services.

Singapore’s prime minister also called on companies to adopt AI “comprehensively”, and pointed to two leading Southeast Asia 500 firms as examples. “A few leading companies like DBS and Grab are already moving decisively on AI transformation,” he said. Both DBS and Grab, No. 7 and No. 128 on the Fortune Southeast Asia 500 respectively, are early adopters of AI.

How is Grab using AI?

Grab, Southeast Asia’s leading ride-hailing platform, has integrated AI across its different services, including deliveries and finance. For example, Grab uses AI to automate menu translations in its food delivery app, allowing customers to easily access restaurant menus, even when traveling abroad.

During an earnings briefing with analysts on Feb. 12, Grab chief operating officer Alex Hungate added that the company’s in-house AI model now dispatches vehicles for 90% of ride-hailing requests. 

Grab is also investing in autonomous vehicles. Last year, the firm inked strategic partnerships with firms like U.S.-based May Mobility and China-based Momenta to advance combined R&D efforts towards autonomous driving technology, as well as Chinese robotaxi firm WeRide for an autonomous shuttle service in Singapore. Grab also acquired Infermove, a startup developing autonomous delivery robots, in January.

The company is also evaluating new roles for drivers who may be affected by the spread of AVs, including remote safety drivers, data labelers, and LiDAR maintenance staff.

Grab reported its first full-year net profit on Feb. 12, at $268 million, on top of $3.4 billion in annual revenue. Yet the firm forecast around $4.1 billion in revenue for the coming year, coming in below expectations. Shares in Grab, which are traded on the NASDAQ, are down 15.9% for the year so far.

How is DBS using AI?

DBS, Southeast Asia’s largest bank by assets, is also working to integrate AI into its workflow and customer experience. CEO Tan Su Shan is a long proponent of integrating AI into the business, at times admitting that even she has used AI for emergency research ahead of meetings with clients. 

The bank has also developed an AI “co-pilot” for customer service officers, and has also set up “DBS-GPT,” a platform to help employees draft content and summarize information. 

“We invest deeply in our staff—upskilling our people to use AI confidently and reskilling them for new roles in the AI era,” Tan tells Fortune. While DBS equips all employees with basic AI skills, it’s identified more than 11,000 individuals in jobs that could use AI to be more effective for role-specific training sessions.

The bank is also moving workers to new roles like AI evaluators, who test and evaluate the bank’s new AI initiatives, as well as agent monitoring monitors, who scan chat logs between customers and the bank’s AI chatbot, DBS Joy, for possible hallucinations.

On Feb. 9, DBS announced a record 22.9 billion Singapore dollars ($18.3 billion) in total income for 2025, a record for the bank. Yet net profit fell by 3% to hit 11 billion Singapore dollars ($8.7 billion). DBS shares are down by 2.3% for the week; the bank is now up by just 1.2% for the year thus far.

Singapore as an AI nation

The Southeast Asian country of Singapore has long been bullish on artificial intelligence, putting out an AI strategy as early as November 2019, a month after establishing a National AI Office under its Smart Nation and Digital Government Group (SNDGG), which sits within the Prime Minister’s Office. The office’s goal was introduce AI across various sectors of society, including transport and logistics, healthcare, education and national security.

Singapore has since built a strong foundation for an AI-driven economy. The government worked with over 60 global tech firms like Google and Microsoft to set up AI centers of excellence around the country. 

As part of its 2026 budget, Singapore’s government also plans to launch a new “Champions of AI” program to provide enterprise transformation and training support to firms aspiring to incorporate AI in their business. Workers in non-tech sectors can also access the “TechSkills Accelerator” program, which has been expanded to allow mid-career workers to transition into tech roles, including those in the emerging AI sector.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com