Singapore is looking to exploit on artificial intelligence technology to empower simpler and more natural interactions with its egovernment services.

Directed by sector regulator Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), the new initiative would find the use of Microsoft’s “dialogs as a platform” pitch to research opportunities in developing the nation’s next-generation government services based on “conversational computing”.

New proof-of-theories would be constructed to incorporate conversational wisdom into public services, with efforts focused on making these more “anticipatory” and participating for the general people.

“Everybody anticipates reactive and personalised interactions in real-time. The recent quantum development of natural language processing means that ‘dialogues’ will be the new medium.”

“As everything around us becomes more digitised, dialogues as a platform is a brand new shift that uses the comprehension of human language to computers and computing, which can transform every sector.”

The applications seller included that its strategy here centred on using human language, artificial intelligence, and machine learning to enhance interactions and computing interfaces. Services could be transacted within a dialogue–be it text or spoken –rather than through the navigation of icons, webpages, or programs.

Under the deal with Microsoft, IDA would execute the proof of concept in three phases during which the chatbots would exploit on a database to answer simple questions from users of chosen egovernment services. They subsequently would be used to help users complete trades and easy tasks on government sites. At the closing third phase, the chatbots would have the capacities to react to user queries that are personalised.

The initiative also would evaluate support for multi- multiple user age groups and languages. The prototype analyzed and would be developed at Microsoft’s Centre of Excellence for digital transformation for business and authorities.