Code isn’t king: AI reshapes Singapore tech hiring

With generative AI tools automating coding and web development, technical skills are no longer enough to land a job in Singapore’s tech sector.

“The ability to write code with an AI assistant is no longer a differentiator,” says Vishnu Nanduri, ASEAN head of AI and innovation at IT firm Kyndryl. Instead, candidates need to show “commercial readiness,” or the ability to turn technical output into business value.

Image credit: Arsal Ysfin

However, while overall coding standards are rising, industry leaders say the supply of specialized AI talent is still limited. Technical skills like AI architecture, applied machine learning engineering, and AI governance are “scarce in the talent pool,” according to Nanduri.

There’s an even greater shortage of talent with both AI expertise and domain-specific expertise, says Guna Chellappan, general manager of Singapore at Red Hat, the open-source enterprise firm acquired by IBM.

Specialized and highly regulated sectors like financial services, cybersecurity, and enterprise infrastructure are particularly in need of such professionals, he notes.

This lack of AI capabilities is mirrored in how the city-state’s companies are unprepared to take full advantage of AI. Kyndryl’s 2025 Readiness Report found that only 26% of leaders in Singapore feel their workforce have the necessary tech skills to make the most of AI.

Mind the gap

The skills gap has put Singapore’s universities in the spotlight. Some market observers say there’s a disconnect between classroom learning and real-world use cases, even if some local university courses have machine learning and AI modules.

“Graduates are leaving school with strong theoretical foundations, but the realities of deploying AI in business environments require a different set of skills,” Chellappan says.

As most companies work with unstructured data, legacy systems, complicated security requirements, and operational pressures, graduates are ill-equipped to work within an existing infrastructure, he adds.

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However, Nanduri argues that the gap between early professional hires and Singapore university graduates is not as “pronounced” as some say. He believes that Singapore universities are “doing a phenomenal job” with machine learning and data science fundamentals.

Sarup Banskota, CEO of CodeCrafters – a Y Combinator-backed startup focused on helping software engineers improve their craft – told Tech in Asia in a previous interview that computer science students should not expect to land a job with their degree alone.

Blended skills

Engineering versus literacy