Businesses to get onestop portal for more streamlined interactions with government

19 NOV 2021

Singapore is already known as one of the world's most business-friendly countries, but we’re not resting on our laurels.

Got 43 seconds to spare? Find out how GoBusiness can help your business go simpler and go further!

From early next year, the existing GoBusiness portal will be enhanced to be a one-stop shop for aspiring entrepreneurs and those already running a business to meet all their needs when it comes to transacting with the government. All they have to do is log in with their Singpass and select their company’s UEN or business entity.

Here’s a preview of some of the upcoming features!

Personalised dashboard for all transactions

An inevitable aspect of running a business is periodic transactions with the government. The new GoBusiness dashboard streamlines over 300 government-to-business services, some of which include:

  • Would-be entrepreneurs will get a personalised step-by-step guide on business registration and can then choose to complete the incorporation within the same transaction. Upon completion of the registration, there will be suggestions on what to do next, including applying for relevant licences and grants.

  • Speaking of licences, users can access and apply for more than 200 licences that are administered by different government agencies, saving them the trouble of visiting separate portals. They can also easily view the status of all their applications and will be prompted if any action is required. At the same time, they can keep track of existing licences and renew or amend them as needed.

  • There are many government grants that businesses can benefit from and the new portal can assess the user’s profile before making recommendations of grants that may be relevant.

Getting e-advice on business

In addition to these services, GoBusiness will also provide e-Advisers that users can access without logging in.

  • Users can get information on what business structure best suits their needs after answering a few simple questions.

  • Prospective entrepreneurs can check the availability of business names and handles on social media channels and find out about the Singapore Standard Industrial Classification Code for their business activities.

  • Users who want to use commercial spaces can get pointed to the right government agency to get approval by answering some simple questions.

  • Event organisers can get help navigating the regulatory landscape, especially in these times of Covid. They will receive a curated set of licences and recommendations for safe management measures for their event.

Frontend simplicity, backend complexity

Of course, integrating over 300 services into one dashboard is no mean feat. On top of that, the dashboard has to be responsive and speedy, as well as reusable and scalable for continual enhancements.

Needless to say, the backend plumbing was an enormous effort so kudos to the product team engineers and UX designers!

Built with business users in mind

GoBusiness was first launched in 2019 as GoBusiness Licensing to simplify licence applications for the food services sector in Singapore. Over the next two years, more than 500 business users across multiple sectors, including food services, e-commerce, retail and events, were consulted on how to improve the portal, resulting in the upcoming revamped portal.

Still, consolidating information about hundreds of government services is just the first step. The team is working on enabling more applications and transactions to be completed on GoBusiness itself, delivering a more frictionless search-apply-track experience.

So if you’ve always had a business idea kicking around in the back of your mind, next year may just be the right time to check out how to make it a reality by heading to GoBusiness. And if you’re already a business owner, you’re going to get some help in 2022 to take your enterprise to the next level!