Anthropic opens a Singapore office, its fifth in Asia Pacific, and signs an AI safety MOU with Singapore's government
We’ve opened an office in Singapore—our fifth in the Asia-Pacific region. We’ve also signed an MOU with the Government of Singapore on AI safety and responsible adoption. You can read more about our new office here:
Context
A frontier lab is formalizing safety testing and adoption work with one of Asia's most active AI governments, and Singapore is already one of Claude's heaviest user markets.
Anthropic announced on October 14 that it has opened an office in Singapore, its fifth in the Asia Pacific region, and signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Singapore's Ministry of Digital Development and Information. According to Anthropic, the MOU covers AI safety, security and model evaluation, research on AI adoption and its impact, and responsible adoption across the public and private sectors. Anthropic says its work with Singapore dates to 2023, when it joined the Generative AI Evaluation Sandbox run by the Infocomm Media Development Authority and the AI Verify Foundation.
Deep dive
Anthropic's announcement says the MOU was signed on the sidelines of Singapore International Cyber Week by Kai Fong Chng, Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Digital Development and Information, and Anthropic cofounder Ben Mann. Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo and Michael Sellitto, Anthropic's Head of APAC Policy, witnessed the signing.
Under the agreement, Anthropic says it plans technical exchanges with Singapore's AI safety, security and assurance institutions on model evaluation, testing standards and incident response. It also says it will look for ways to strengthen AI skills, help small and medium sized businesses adopt AI, support the government's goal of building AI capability among public officers, and share research and data, including from the Anthropic Economic Index.
Anthropic gives several usage figures. It says Singapore ranks second of 121 countries in Claude.ai usage relative to population, at nearly six times what its size alone would predict. It says more than 1,500 engineers and technical staff at GovTech Singapore have adopted Claude Code, that DBS and the sovereign fund GIC use Claude, and that Grab's BriX sales assistant, powered by Claude, saves Grab's sales teams about 40,000 hours every quarter. These are Anthropic's own figures and have not been independently verified here.
Dale Finlay, Anthropic's General Manager of ASEAN, said the company is committed to Singapore for the long term. Anthropic also says it hosted a Builder Summit in Singapore with more than 300 developers, and that the new office is hiring.
What to expect next
Watch for the first concrete outputs of the MOU, such as joint model evaluations, testing standards or incident response work with Singapore's AI safety institutions, and whether Anthropic shares Economic Index data with the government as it says it plans to.
Also watch whether other frontier labs sign similar agreements in Southeast Asia, and how fast Anthropic grows its local team now that the Singapore office is open and hiring.