Crypto ownership surges among youths

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Modern method: Pedestrians on Orchard Road in Singapore. Among the older generation of crypto users, 42.9% of them use crypto for P2P transactions, followed by 35.7% for online shopping and 17.2% for bill payments. — Bloomberg

SINGAPORE: More people in Singapore own cryptocurrencies and younger users among them are leading the way in using the asset for daily financial needs, such as online shopping and bill payments, a new study shows.

The number of Singapore residents who own cryptocurrencies is on the rise, with 26% of them owning digital assets in 2024, up from 24.4% in 2023.

Of those who hold crypto, a majority, or 52% of them, have paid for goods and services with it, and 67% of them plan to increase usage of crypto for payments in the future.

Gen Zs and millennials, or those aged between 16 and 44 years old as at 2025, lead in crypto ownership, with about 40% of them holding crypto.

Of this group of people, 41.1% of them use crypto for online shopping, 35.9% for bill payments and 27% for in-store retail goods.

While younger consumers use crypto to pay for retail goods and bills, the older generation – those aged 45 or older in 2025 – uses crypto more for peer-to-peer (P2P) transactions such as those made between friends and family.

Among the older generation of crypto users, 42.9% of them use crypto for P2P transactions, followed by 35.7% for online shopping and 17.2% for bill payments.

These were some of the findings from the study by Singapore-based crypto payments firm Triple-A, based on a survey of 1,006 residents in Singapore.

Singapore has seen a notable increase in crypto payments, with merchant services receiving nearly US$1bil (S$1.3bil) in crypto in the second quarter of 2024, much higher than any other quarter in the past two years, according to data from blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis.

A separate Chainalysis report in September 2024 noted a growing adoption of crypto as a payment method in Singapore.

“The combination of regulatory clarity and merchant adoption suggests that Singapore is positioning itself as a major hub for digital assets, which could eventually attract more global businesses and investors,” Chainalysis said.

AXS, in partnership with Triple-A, allows its app users to make top-ups or pay bills in digital currencies such as bitcoin, ethereum, USD coin and tether. Other merchants that have partnered Triple-A to offer the crypto payment option include fashion brand Charles & Keith on its eCommerce platform and Apple products reseller iStudio at its retail stores.

The findings from Triple-A also noted that 37% of respondents cited global acceptance as a key benefit of crypto payments.

Higher transaction speed (29%) and lower fees (20%) were also important factors, particularly for cross-border and time-sensitive transactions. But there are concerns about the crypto ecosystem.

The complexity involved in using crypto was the top challenge cited by 63% of respondents. For instance, users need to figure out the use of private keys, or passwords that allow them to access and manage their crypto funds.

Security concerns (60%) and lack of merchant acceptance (54%) were also factors of concern.

The crypto payments trend comes against a backdrop of a rising number of digital payment token (DPT) firms being licensed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), fuelling new roles in the growing Web3 industry.

Web3 companies are those that use blockchain technology to build products and services.

As at end-November 2024, MAS had issued a record 13 new DPT licences in 2024, raising the total number of DPT licensees from 16 to 29, a report from blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs released in December 2024 said.

Despite a global slowdown in hiring with mass layoffs in 2024, more than 75% of local Web3 companies want to expand their workforce in 2025 as they continue developing products and services for global and regional markets.

This is according to a report led by the Singapore FinTech Association (SFA), Web3 business account platform HQ.xyz as well as Web3 builder communities SG Builders and Superteam, which conducted surveys and case studies with 53 Web3 companies.

Of these companies, 60% are looking to expand their current workforce by half or more, the report said.

SFA, which facilitates collaboration between market participants and stakeholders in the fintech ecosystem, told The Straits Times that the hiring plans are driven by growing institutional adoption, ongoing technology improvements in blockchain, and the expansion of applications for Web3 technology.

Moves that increased institutional adoption of digital assets include the US Securities and Exchange Commission approving the first US spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds launched by Blackrock, Fidelity and others in January 2024.

A total of 2,433 individuals are currently employed in the local Web3 sector, excluding those working in Web3 roles in non-Web3 native firms.

These roles include those in partnerships, marketing strategy, and sales to help Web3 companies go to market with their solutions, said SFA.

Product managers as well as developers and software engineers are also key roles being hired.

“We also see jobs being created in the professional services sector that support Web3, which include legal, advisory, and consulting roles,” SFA said.

Companies also outlined what they hope to see improvements on as the acceptance of Web3 grows in Singapore. — The Straits Times/ANN

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Chip ambitions hinge on talent development

 

M’sia must overcome shortage of engineers, Ic designers

”There are an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 IC designers in the country, but the bulk of them work in multinational companies like Intel and Infineon. It is a challenge to coax these experienced personnel out of their comfort zones and venture into a startup. Hence, talent is concentrated in multinational corporations.”

PETALING JAYA: The country’s potential to be a key hub for advanced semiconductor manufacturing, packaging and fabrication hinges on talent.

Kenanga Research said in a report that talent remained an important concern, after taking into account the country’s strengths, including a well-developed infrastructure, pro-business policies and neutral stance in geopolitics.

The research house said during a meeting with the Malaysia Semiconductor Industry Association (MSIA), the question of how players can move up the value chain and how the government can pivot away from the typical tax incentive mindset to one of attracting and retaining talent was raised.

“Among the environmental, social and governance or ESG components, talent development is a constant concern for the semiconductor industry.

“Key findings from the Semiconductor Quarterly Pulse Survey (fourth quarter of 2024 or 4Q24) showed that talent – specifically a shortage of engineers and integrated circuit (IC) designers, and market competition remained the top challenges for the industry,” it said.

Additionally, data showed that 72% of companies were hiring engineers and technicians in 1Q25, a trend that has continued from previous quarters, indicating a continuous need for talent.

Data also showed that in 2022, the average monthly salary for employees within the electrical and electronics (E&E) industry was RM6,450.

However, only 0.3% of the E&E workforce held an advanced degree, indicating potential for further growth.

According to the research house, there are an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 IC designers in the country, but the bulk of them work in multinational companies like Intel and Infineon.

“It is a challenge to coax these experienced personnel out of their comfort zones and venture into a startup. Hence, talent is mostly concentrated in the already well-established multinational corporations,” Kenanga Research noted.

MSIA then said some steps must be taken to mitigate this.

These include setting up a university focused on Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM), facilitating the hiring of foreign STEM students studying in Malaysia, providing the right incentives to attract foreign talent and encouraging semiconductor players to intensify training.

“The government has earmarked about 10% of the RM25bil allocation to train and upskill 60,000 engineers by 2030 to support advanced manufacturing, research and development, and technological advancements in the semiconductor industry,” it noted.

Meanwhile, Kenanga Research said there were potential opportunities that could emerge in the industry for Malaysia.

There has been growing interest in expanding to Malaysia, especially from Chinese semiconductor firms which are looking to leverage on local infrastructure to facilitate global exports.

“Malaysia remains focused on driving economic growth by fostering a pro-business environment that attracts foreign investments.

“Moreover, Malaysia is actively pursuing high-value foreign direct investment while encouraging collaboration between the local private sector and the government to strengthen and develop a robust semiconductor ecosystem, particularly in advanced packaging,” it added.

To successfully do this, the country will focus on several key factors, including strengthening government incentives for IC design, improving supply chain resilience to support high-end semiconductor manufacturing, and attracting semiconductor fabrication investments.

To add to this, the country had committed US$250mil over 10 years in a strategic partnership with Arm Holdings plc recently to access chip design blueprints and training, aiming to transition from chip assembly and testing (back-end) to high-value semiconductor design and production.

With that, Kenanga Research reiterated the need for greater investments into the semiconductor supply chain to strengthen resilience and attract suppliers from key markets.

“While Malaysia has a strong semiconductor foundation, it must accelerate technological adoption, talent development and infrastructure investments to maintain its competitive edge in the rapidly evolving global market,” the research house said.

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Malaysia’s AI chip leap, Shot in the Arm for chip sector

How will US weaponize AI for its technological hegemony?

Tech war: Pelosi meets TSMC chief in Taiwan as US ramps up chip pressure on China

Trump seeks to toughen Biden’s chip controls over China failed as China make AI cheap, ubiquitous, not controlled by any one country or company and is available for everybody

 

Trump seeks to toughen Biden’s chip controls over China, and ask key allies match China curbs the US has placed on American chip-gear companies. How will Japan and Netherland response to that? Can China's chip industry overtake the US?

Your scenario is already ex-post. Biden wanted to starve China of technology. He had bullied Japan and Netherlands into submission. They dared not sell to China whatever machines and components that Biden forbade.

Biden’s problem was he did not know what China was cooking and what it has in the pipeline. China has a huge talent pool. It is an innovation powerhouse. Its developments were fast and numerous. Instead of being the hunter, he ended up playing catchup to China’s developments, to its frequent announcements of products and innovations. I suppose this is what his Commerce Secretary Raimondo meant when on the last days of her office, she called the whole exercise a Fool’s Errand.

But Biden was determined that US shall be the AI leader. Nvidia is the US bellwether of AI. He barred it from selling high-end AI chips to China. Trump was sold to the idea that AI dominance requires rising computing power, and large investments of money for large returns. So, with great fanfare, the bosses of Softbank, OpenAI, and Oracle, announced the establishment of a $500 billion AI fund that will ensure US leadership is unassailable.

But, lo and behold, along come DeepSeek. It spent only $5.6 million to teach its R1 model, a tiny fraction of the cost incurred by OpenAI’s o1. It achieves this through algorithm efficiency and innovation than relying on high-end chips. It made it open-source and even has mini “distilled” versions to allow researchers with limited computing power to use the model. It up-ended completely the thesis of ever rising computing power, big investments, and big returns. US attempt to dominate AI is curbed, in all likelihood, permanently.

Can China’s chip industry overtake the US?

This is not the point.

China’s purpose is democratic. Take DeepSeek’s open-source. It could make AI cheap, ubiquitous, not controlled by any one country or company, and is available for everybody.

This is not to say powerful AI chips are unimportant. Only that it is not the whole story.

China is one generation behind the US. Huawei Ascend 910C equals Nvidia’s last generation H100. Its 920 due in a year matches Blackwell, the latest Nvidia’s chip.

China is also catching up with production. Two the new SMIC fabs that will onstream this year and next each has capacity of 50,000 wafer per month, more than enough to meet its needs. Huawei plans to produce 100,000 910C and 300,000 910B chips this year.

Digitimes Asia reported that the yield in the manufacture of 910C has doubled from 20% to 40%, and is profitable. The aim is to increase it to 60% this year to match the industry norms. The yield for the older 910B is 50%.

• Why China has become a 'development oasis' for global businesses: Global Times editorial
• 

China welcomes more foreign businesses to invest and jointly write the story of mutually beneficial and win-win development.

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The big browser battle, Can artificial intelligence startups dethrone Google Chrome in the web browser wars?

IN the beginning – well in 1993, to be specific – there was Mosaic .And it was good, or at least good enough. By 1995, however, Mosaic’s time was on the wane, and Netscape was people’s browser of choice. Three years later, Internet Explorer had taken the lead – and seemed poised to hold it forever.

There were challengers, of course. By 2008, Firefox was making a run at winning over the Internet but managed to find only half the audience of Internet Explorer. That was the case until 2012, when they both were left in the dust by

Google’s Chrome.

Other competitors, like Safari, Opera ,and Edge (a rename of Internet Explorer), had a brief moment in the sun, but never came close to market dominance. Today,

Chrome is still firmly in charge, holding a 67% market share as of January 2025.

If history has taught us anything when it comes to web browsers, though, it’s that people’s allegiances to how they navigate the World Wide Web are far from absolute.

The oft-changing nature of web browser leadership was modelled visually by James Eagle, a content creator with a background in the financial services sector.

Emerging contenders

Change could be in the air once again. Artificial intelligence (AI) companies are starting to focus on the Web, which could herald yet another paradigm shift.

Recently, Ai-powered search engine Perplexity teased plans to launch its own web browser called Comet. In a post on X, the company said the browser was “coming soon” and invited people to sign up for a waitlist. It did not offer details on what would make the browser unique or offer any mockups or footage of Comet.

Perplexity has been growing fast, though. Last October, CEO Aravind Srinivas announced on X that the search engine was serving 100 million queries per week.

And in December, the company closed a Us$500mil (Rm2.2bil) funding round (with backers including Nvidia and Jeff Bezos), taking its valuation to Us$9bil (Rm40bil).

Perplexity isn’t the only AI company looking at the browser market. Last November, Openai was reported to be working on its own Ai-infused web browser.

That came roughly a month after the CHATGPT maker integrated web search into its popular chatbot, keeping users inside the app.

The CHATGPT web-search integration wasn’t perfect and, at the moment, falls short of the definition of a browser, but it was good enough to hook Inc. tech columnist Jason Aten, who wrote, “for most of the things I’ve searched for this past week, CHATGPT has been a superior experience”.

Google’s legal troubles

Google is hardly surrendering without a fight. Chrome is an important part of its business these days; however, it’s hard to determine exactly how much revenue the browser contributes, as Alphabet includes it in the same category as Android, Youtube, and search in its earnings reports. Google also uses

Chrome’s browsing history to help target ads.

Last September, Google very quietly added its Gemini AI into

Chrome, letting users access it by typing @gemini in the browser’s query bar before their chatbot question. It has since expanded the offerings, letting people create custom themes with AI, changing their search backgrounds, and doing a deeper dive into their search history. Soon, it says, users will be able to compare information across multiple tabs with an Ai-generated overview.

This could be an ideal time for startups to make a run at Google’s browser market dominance, as the company is busy dealing with other hurdles. Google is awaiting sentencing, expected by August, after it received a guilty verdict in a search monopoly suit. And the US Department of Justice has announced its hopes to break up the company, forcing Alphabet to sell Chrome. Even if that happens, though, it will likely be years before the appeals process runs its course.

A second case, meanwhile, regarding Alphabet’s advertising technology, is awaiting a verdict. And China has launched its own antitrust probe into Google, in response to tariffs. Both US cases, however, were brought by the Biden administration – and the Trump administration may be less enthusiastic about pursuing them. Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai recently attended Trump’s inauguration.

Regardless of what happens in those legal battles, though, well-funded competitors have

Chrome in their sights. And the status quo in web surfing could be about to change once again.

By CHRIS MORRIS, Tribune news serv

Diving into DeepSeek and AI for education; OpenAI targets higher education in the U.S. with ChatGPT rollout at California State University

Diving into DeepSeek and AI for education

OpenAI targets higher education in the U.S. with ChatGPT rollout at California State University

FILE PHOTO: OpenAI logo is seen in this illustration taken May 20, 2024. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

(Reuters) - Microsoft-backed OpenAI said on Tuesday it will roll out an education-specific version of its chatbot to about 500,000 students and faculty at California State University as it looks to expand its user base in the academic sector and counter competition from rivals like Alphabet .

The rollout will cover 23 campuses of the largest public university system in the United States, enabling students to access personalized tutoring and study guides through the chatbot, while the faculty will be able to use it for administrative tasks.

OpenAI has been looking to integrate ChatGPT into classrooms since 2023, even as initial concerns about its potential use for cheating and plagiarism had prompted some schools to consider bans.

Universities like the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Texas at Austin in the U.S., and the University of Oxford in the UK have already been using ChatGPT Enterprise, prompting OpenAI to launch ChatGPT Edu in May last year.

Rival Alphabet has already been expanding into the education sector, where it has announced a $120 million investment fund for AI education programs and plans to introduce its GenAI chatbot Gemini to teen students' school-issued Google accounts.

In November, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer opened London's first Google-funded AI university, which will provide older teens with access to resources in artificial intelligence and machine learning, as well as mentorship and expertise from Google's AI company, DeepMind.

(Reporting by Rishi Kant in Bengaluru; Editing by Tasim Zahid)

Related;

DeepSeek proves 'small yard, high fence' cannot hinder innovation: Global Times editorial

Using 20th-century geopolitical methods to address the technological revolution of the 21st century will only cause the US to miss valuable development opportunities. Whether it focuses on blockades and encirclements or seeks new ways to stand out from the competition will lead to entirely different outcomes.

The RISE, FALL, and RISE again of HUAWEI

Malaysia's experts urge for quick, clear rollout of 5G and MyDigital ID

Buiding the new 5G tower along Jalan Kuchai Lama in Kuala Lumpur

PETALING JAYA: Experts are calling for a clear digital direction and quick implementation for the rollout of the dual 5G network and the MyDigital ID programme, saying that any delay is unacceptable if Malaysia were to position itself as the choice for leading industries and as Asean chairman. Malaysia, said Federation of Malaysian Consumers Associations (Fomca) vice-president Datuk Indrani Thuraisingham, must have the proper infrastructure to support such targets.

“Since we are championing artificial intelligence (AI) development, setting up more data centres and other related fields, it is fair for the relevant authorities as well as stakeholders to prepare the right infrastructure to support these initiatives.

“It is unacceptable to delay it further as it could have an impact on our country’s economy,” she said in an interview yesterday.

Malaysia has secured billions of ringgit in investment in the past year from global tech firms seeking to build critical infrastructure to cater to growing demand for their cloud and AI services.

The Star also reported that while the number of digital nomads in the country has doubled, Internet connectivity remains a major concern for them.Other countries such as China, pointed out Indrani, have even achieved a breakthrough in satellite-to-ground laser communications that could pave the way for sixth-generation wireless technology – or 6G – and other applications, including remote sensing with ultra-high resolution and next generation satellite positioning technology.

“They have gone beyond 5G and we need to keep up with them,” she said.

On Jan 2, China’s Chang Guang Satellite Technology Co, which owns Jilin-1, the world’s largest sub-metre commercial remote sensing satellite constellation, announced that it had achieved a 100 gigabit per second ultra-high-speed image data transmission rate in testing last weekend.

In terms of consumer rights, Indrani said industry players must deliver what they had promised to customers.

“Some of the customers are already paying for 5G connectivity and they need to deliver it.

“In certain places, even in Selangor and Klang Valley, we cannot get proper connectivity, and some still get 4G networks,” she said, adding that there are also complaints of dropped calls.

Malaysia Cyber Consumer Association president Siraj Jalil said any delay in the rollout of a dual 5G network and MyDigital ID programme only reflected the preparedness of the relevant authorities.

“We need to look back at the objectives of the initiative and why it is still delayed,” he added.

“Since (MyDigital ID) will be our future digital identity and represents our position in the digital landscape, the government needs to be clear on it, especially to the stakeholders which is the rakyat,” he said.

Citing the postponement in the integration of the MyDigital ID with the MyJPJ app, he said such disruptions create a bad perception to the users.

“If we cannot integrate our ID into a multi digital system, like JPJ, it shows that is not being set up properly,” he said, adding that this should be fixed

In October last year, MyDigital ID Sdn Bhd CEO Mohd Mirza Mohd Noor had explained that the integration of MyDigital ID with the MyJPJ app was not cancelled but merely postponed.

The delay, he explained, should be looked at as part of an overall strategy to ensure the success of this feature and to improve the user experience.

Sharing her own personal experience, civil servant Siti Nor Mardiah, 33, said a few months ago, the 5G network completely stopped working on her phone.

“When I called my mobile service provider, they said 5G comes under DNB, and not them. As a solution, they told me to use 4G instead. It has been months and I am still using 4G.

“The same goes for my home Wi-Fi, the 5G doesn’t work for some reason (and) 2.4G works better,” she said.

“What baffles me is that this is the situation in Kuala Lumpur, now I can’t imagine how the network is in rural areas.”

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