Singapore, April 23, 2025 – SC Ventures, Standard Chartered’s innovation, fintech investment and ventures arm, has successfully completed two engagements under its Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with a research institute under Singapore’s Agency for Science, Technology, and Research (A*STAR) — the A*STAR Institute of High Performance Computing (A*STAR IHPC). This collaboration advances the pursuit of innovative intellectual property, the practical use and limitations of Large Language Models (LLMs) and the research on Fairness in Generative AI systems.
Under the terms of the MoU, SC Ventures and A*STAR IHPC initiated and collaborated on research projects to create innovative intellectual property that connects scientific research and marketability. In the fast-evolving tech landscape, this collaboration paves the way for the development of solutions that meet the changing needs of consumers, businesses, banks, and SC Ventures’ portfolio.
The first project explored harnessing AI and GenAI to automate the complexity of mapping regulatory obligations to regulated enterprises. The project addressed the real-world challenge of regulatory change in the financial services sector by applying A*STAR IHPC’s scientific and academic expertise in GenAI. The project leveraged LLM and Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) capabilities to validate approaches for analysing regulatory changes and their business implications. The project achieved enhanced response quality, improved answer accuracy, and reduced biases. The successful project has created opportunities to explore more co-creation opportunities.
The second project, which also worked with Standard Chartered to research ‘Fairness in AI’. Recognising the importance of maintaining impartial and equitable AI systems — especially as data and societal values change — the partnership surveyed, established and qualified a range of fairness metrics. The successful research completion aims to ensure that AI and GenAI solutions remain trusted and transparent.
“We are truly excited about this opportunity to go deeper into the complex problems of RAG accuracy, processing on unstructured data, evaluating novel algorithms and learning about data pipelines, and their fairness in AI and GenAI solutions,” said Thorsten Neumann, Venture Technology Lead, SC Ventures.
Both SC Ventures and A*STAR IHPC will further investigate GenAI’s potential in the financial services industry to improve compliance, regulatory impact and ESG forensics.
“Fairness in AI is essential to ensure that technology benefits everyone equally. Collaborations with research institutions are imperative to uncover and address biases, fostering innovation and trust in AI systems,” said Dr Mohammed Rahim, Group Chief Data Officer, Standard Chartered.
This collaboration between SC Ventures and A*STAR IHPC not only signifies a leap forward in technological innovation but also highlights both organisations’ commitment to leveraging scientific research for commercial success.
“This milestone with SC Ventures exemplifies how research institutions and financial innovators can effectively tackle complex real-world challenges together. We look forward to deepening this partnership as we co-develop cutting-edge AI research into solutions for the financial services industry,” said Dr Rick Goh, Department Director of Computing & Intelligence, A*STAR IHPC.
For further information, please contact:
Chi-an Chang, PR & Comms Lead, SC Ventures
SC Ventures
SC Ventures is a business unit that provides a platform and catalyst for Standard Chartered to promote innovation, invest in disruptive financial technology and explore alternative business models.
For more information, please visit www.scventures.io and follow SC Ventures on LinkedIn.
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