They built this city

They led the way in building a groundbreaking new training complex for soldiers in Singapore.  

Dubbed SAFTI City, this sprawling urban warfare training facility stretches over 80 hectares and is designed to train 20,000 soldiers annually.  

Phase 1 of the training area was launched in March, and boasts more than 11,000 embedded sensors; targets that can “fire back”; battlefield effects simulators and even an Exercise Control System that collates and analyses data to provide accurate feedback.  

For their innovation and commitment, the team behind the project was awarded the Team (Engineering) Award at this year’s Defence Technology Prize Award Ceremony. 

Their win is testament to years of collaborative innovation, and marks a huge leap forward in how the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) trains for operations in built-up, urban environments. 

The team is helmed by key project leaders Beatrice Kwan, Senior Programme Manager of the Programme Office (Range Development) from Defence Science and Technology Agency (DSTA); Lieutenant Colonel (LTC) Darius Kwa, Head Training and Capability Development Branch (Land) from the Army’s Headquarters Training and Doctrine Command; and Mr Liew Kien Peng, Project Director of Training and Simulation Systems from ST Engineering. 

From vision to validation 

To Ms Kwan, the completion of Phase 1 of SAFTI City represents the culmination of eight years of effort put in by her predecessors as well as the current team. 

Although the project began in 2017, the 41-year-old only joined the team in 2021, amid the COVID-19 pandemic. 

She candidly described her first impression as “not knowing what I had signed up for” and how she got “a bit of a shock (coming) into the programme (as) I thought it’s really big and complicated”. 

Undeterred, she and her team tackled the massive challenge and pushed on to deliver. 

Introducing battlefield injects on the go 

Having to integrate over 30 systems to bring SAFTI City to life, Ms Kwan calls it her most challenging and complex project to date. 

To build a dynamic yet controlled environment where troopers and instructors can train effectively, she and her team had to balance the development of hardware like sensors, triggers and blast simulators, with software such as data analytics – all while keeping attention to safety at the forefront. 

Their proudest achievement was the successful deployment of the Exercise Control System.

Using a portable handheld tablet, instructors can adjust battlefield conditions in SAFTI City on command, record elements of the training, and conduct in-depth reviews after the mission using the data collected. 

The system was developed in-house in accordance with the SAF’s unique requirements. 

A well-deserved win 

Ms Kwan views SAFTI City’s completion with immense pride.  

“With all the innovation and creative thinking that we put in (to) make SAFTI City configurable and complex...it will be up to (the SAF’s) imagination (to use it to enhance training).  

“We look forward journeying (further) with the SAF to bring their training to the next level.”