Grab announced today (May 23) the launch of its inaugural Artificial Intelligence Centre of Excellence (Al COE), with the support of Digital Industry Singapore.
Located in the company’s HQ at one-north, the centre aims to accelerate “AI-driven solutions that improve accessibility, boost productivity and growth, and contribute to smart nation building across Southeast Asia.”
Key focus areas of the Al COE include:
1. Al for Accessibility:
Grab is working to develop solutions that make digital services more accessible for underserved communities, including individuals with disabilities, the elderly and those less familiar with technology.
One of its key initiatives is a collaboration with the Singapore Association of the Visually Handicapped (SAVH), through which the AI COE is developing a Voice Assistant feature. This tool, built on OpenAI models, will allow visually impaired users to book Grab rides using voice commands, improving the accessibility of its services.
Currently, the feature is available exclusively to SAVH members as part of a pilot phase, with plans to expand its capabilities in the near future.
To optimise the Voice Assistant’s performance, Grab has fine-tuned it using 80,000 local voice samples and names of points of interest. This has improved its recognition accuracy for Singaporean accents and building names from 46% to 89%.
In June, Grab will further enhance the feature by introducing a voice donation initiative within its app, allowing Singapore users to contribute voice samples. This effort aims to make the Voice Assistant even more “intuitive and inclusive” for the broader community.
2. Al for Productivity and Growth:
Grab aims to empower employees, platform workers and small businesses to harness AI for smarter decision-making, innovation, and enhanced livelihoods.
In line with this, the AI COE is building a “specialised foundational model” trained on Grab’s data to offer hyper-personalised recommendations and improve experiences for all users.
In addition, it will scale solutions that improve productivity and drive growth for Grab’s driver-, delivery- and merchant-partners.
This includes its AI Driver Companion tool, which provides drivers with real-time booking, routing, and rewards recommendations, as well as its AI Merchant Assistant bot, which delivers proactive business insights, recommendations and operational support to fast-track small business growth.
Internally, the AI COE will also develop infrastructure and tools to support its employees in creative ideation and experimentation with AI technologies.
3. Al for Smarter Nations:
By leveraging real-world data, Grab is developing practical solutions—including Internet of Things (IoT) innovations in road hazard detection, urban planning, and flood monitoring—that improve daily life, support government initiatives and contribute to smart nation building.
For instance, Grab’s expanded partnership with PUB, Singapore’s National Water Agency, integrates IoT data and incident reports from Grab’s driver-partners with PUB’s flood monitoring system to provide real-time flood intelligence.
This collaboration enables accurate flood alerts to be communicated to driver-partners via the app, which will help in minimising traffic disruption during heavy rains. It will also support PUB in responding quickly to any reports of flooding incidents across Singapore.
More “high-value roles” at Grab
The establishment of Grab’s AI Centre of Excellence is also set to generate at least 50 high-value roles by 2025 across Product, Engineering, Data Science and Analytics.
These positions will enable Singaporeans to work on “transformative AI innovations that address Southeast Asia’s unique challenges and can potentially be exported to other international markets.”
“From Singapore, Grab is developing sophisticated AI solutions to create tangible value for users, empower businesses, and uplift communities across Southeast Asia’s 700 million people,” said Philbert Gomez, the Executive Director and Head of Digital Industry Singapore.
“These efforts will not only strengthen Grab’s capabilities but also help groom and attract talent, reinforcing Singapore’s position as a leading hub for innovation and AI talent.”
Currently, Grab is hiring for 49 roles in Singapore. You can check them out here.
- Read other articles we’ve written on Singaporean startups here.
Featured Image Credit: Bryan van der Beek/Bloomberg