Welcome to the sixth issue of our e-newsletter.

Here, we hope to share with you the latest information about our Growing Enterprises With Technology Upgrade (GET-Up) initiative. It aims to help you make the most of the advisory and financial assistance schemes that we have tailored for local enterprises in the manufacturing sector.

To encourage innovation and creativity, the law protects not only physical property, but also intellectual property (IP) of man. IP refers to the bundle of rights that inventors, authors and creators have in their works and inventions. For example, if you write a book, you have copyright in the contents of the book and have the right to charge for the reproduction or reuse of the content for a period of time. If you create a cure for cancer, you have the exclusive right to that invention for a limited period of time. Some IP, like copyright is protected by the law by the mere creation of the subject matter (like writing and publishing a book) but others like new inventions, you actually need to take extra steps to file a patent or patents before your invention is protected by the law. If your invention has been patented, then others cannot legally copy or use it without your prior consent.

The effective use of IP is increasingly important in today's competitive business environment. Managing and protecting IP rights are things that large corporations as well as small and medium businesses cannot afford to ignore in the global economy. Some basic uses for IP includes bringing in additional revenue streams, building up a company's brand name and strengthen its market position, used as collateral and overall increasing a company's competitiveness. Providing IP-related training programmes to companies teaches them how to better protect, manage and exploit their IP assets for maximum results.

In Singapore, if you are looking for more information about copyright, patents and other intellectual property (IP) issues, then the IP Academy is one place you should not miss. Launched in January 2003, the IP Academy is a non-profit organization that aims to be the focal point of education and research in the field of IP.

Associate Professor Loy Wee Loon, deputy director of the IP Academy, said that Academy runs a whole gamut of IP courses, starting with the certification ones like the Graduate Certificate in IP Law and Graduate Certificate in Patent Drafting & Interpretation. There are also shorter half-day to one-week courses covering topics like getting into franchising, valuation of IP, IP law issues for web developers and even country-specific IP laws like the USA, Indonesia and Japan. At the moment, the course fees are partially subsidised as there is funding for the first few years, she added. For more information about the IP Academy and its courses, go to www.ipacademy.edu.sg.

Another organization you can look to for more help and information is the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS), which is the main government agency that formulates and administers IP laws in Singapore. Its website is at www.ipos.gov.sg

The Institute for Infocomm Research (I²R) is another local research institute that has been involved in developing innovative RFID applications.When SARS hit Singapore and the world a year ago, one of the most crucial steps to control its spread was to be able to discover the people that had come into contact with the SARS infected patient. Making use RFID technology, I²R came up with an innovative solution for SARS contact tracing.

During the SARS period, visitors, patients and staff at various government hospitals were all issued with a RFID tag when they entered the building. When a person issued with the RFID tag comes within close proximity of another, the tags automatically exchange information with each other. This way, if a person that has been to the hospital contract SARS, the hospital can trace all the other people he or she has come into contact with at the hospital.

Michael Chia of I²R said RFID technology itself is not new and has been used in extensively in the tagging of animals and in anti-theft devices like those used by departmental stores. But RFID is receiving plenty of publicity recently, mainly due to the recent moves by leading US retailers like Wal-Mart who are making use of RFID tags to replace their older bar-code scanning technologies.

In Singapore, I²R started researching into RFID in the mid 90s when it worked with a local logistics provider to trial the use of RFID tags for the logistics industry. As a result of this project I²R developed its capabilities in RFID and has since continued to develop exciting applications using RFID. In an application called “Kiddy World” I²R showcased how it could create interactive toys with RFID. Each animal figure (cat, dog, cow, etc.) is fitted internally with a small RFID tag. The RFID reader is put into a bigger main toy. When the child moves the main toy near to the smaller animal figures, it reads the data stored in the RFID tag and speaks out the name of the animal and other information about it.

Another application that has emerged is the Microwave Guard, which is a credit-card sized device fitted with an RFID tag that can detect leakages and hazardous emissions when placed near a microwave oven.

In 2002, I²R together with IME collaborated with Japanese printing company Toppan to develop low cost RFID readers and tags. I²R’s expertise lay in coming up with the overall design and architecture of the RFID system while IME focuses on developing the IC for RFID tag by rendering expertise in radio frequency and low-power low-voltage integrated circuits design. As a result of the project, two local companies achieved RFID capabilities when IME and I2R shared the technology know-how with them to manufacture parts of the RFID tags and readers.

Measuring distances that are 80 times smaller than the diameter of your hair is beyond the ability of the naked human eye. What is needed are special sensors that can sense and measure the minute spaces with greater than pin-point accuracy. And to do it with automation. At the heart of these machines is a smaller machine called the X-Y positioner that moves back and fro, left and right, to enable the minute measurements to be made. Apart from making measurements and inspections in the electronics manufacturing business, the positioner can also be used for laser machining and even lithography.

A Singapore company, PBA Systems, is selling its own special X-Y positioner which works on cutting-edge technology. Called the Decoupled X-Y Positioner, it is different from most other positioners because the X-axis and Y-axis positioning arms are separate or “decoupled” instead of being stacked together, one on top of the other. The traditional stacked positioners are bulkier and less energy efficient. The decoupled positioner is more efficient, more accurate, requires less power and has overall better dynamics because the arms are easier to move as they are separated. For example, if the Y-axis remains the same and only the X-axis measurement changes, only the X-axis arm needs to move. In the stacked positioners, both arms have to move because they are fused together. In addition, having the arms decoupled means that the arms are lower, which in turn means the positioners can be designed lower and closer to the things being measured – leading to greater accuracy.

The technology behind such a cutting-edge machine is extremely difficult for a local company without extremely deep pockets and requires years of research. PBA Systems succeeded because it licensed the technology and know-how from the Singapore Institute of Manufacturing Technology ( SIMTech). Mr Leow Yong Peng, of SIMT ech is one of the three brains behind the decoupled positioner technology. The transfer of know-how to local companies is part of the mantra of the A*STAR research institutes that aim to help local companies move up the technology value chain and become global players. “In the past, our local manufacturing companies would buy these X-Y positioners from overseas companies, but now we have a local brand that we can call our own,” said Mr Robert Lee , Acting Deputy Executive Director (Industry). Apart from helping companies like PBA to globalise, it also offers a cheaper and equally, if not, better alternative to local manufacturing companies.