Singapore’s Healthcare Market to Benefit From M&A, Venture Financing

Call it the art of the deal.

Industry pundits expect Singapore’s healthcare market to benefit significantly from venture financing and mergers/acquisitions as the country ramps up medical device development in the coming years. Not surprisingly, focus areas will include artificial intelligence, big data, and telemedicine. 

“Majority of M&As and venture financing in Singapore’s healthtech sector are mostly focused on artificial intelligence (AI), big data and telemedicine. While M&A’s will continue to remain higher in value, venture financing is expected to grow at a faster pace,” said Vinita Sippy, a medical devices analyst at GlobalData. 

A growing awareness of healthcare,a  research-centric ecosystem, a favorable regulatory scenario under the Smart Nation initiative, and the increased need for digital consultations amidst the COVID-19 pandemic are currently driving investments in Singapore’s healthtech sector, according to GlobalData.
 
GlobalData’s report, “Singapore Healthcare, Regulatory and Reimbursement Landscape – CountryFocus,” reveals that total healthtech deals in Singapore were valued at more than $1 billion in 2020, with venture financing and M&A accounting for more than 75 percent of the deals value. Singapore government’s Smart Nation initiative is expected to further drive strategic collaborations in the field of healthtech.

“The collaboration between National Supercomputing Centre Singapore and National University Health System is expected to result in building a petabyte-scale edge supercomputing infrastructure, ‘Prescience.’ This investment will also support the national AI healthcare initiatives and allow clinical researchers to run complex healthcare models,” said Sippy. 
 
Driven by the increasing use of digital healthcare solutions, the Ministry of Health in Singapore developed a Healthcare Cybersecurity Essentials program under the Healthcare Services Act to safeguard the assets and data. This will help in preventing cybercrime and increase the sustainability of technology uptake in the country.