Singapore – November 04, 2026 -- The National University Health System (NUHS), Singtel and Ericsson have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to launch the National University XG AI Centre (NXAC), which the partners describe as the world's first 6G AI centre dedicated to healthcare and Singapore's first translational research and development centre.
Singtel and Ericsson become founding partners of NXAC
NUHS will provide clinical, academic and research leadership. Ericsson will contribute expertise in mobile network technologies, network architecture and future 6G research, while Singtel will supply advanced network deployment and services expertise.
NXAC will act as a testbed where industry partners work alongside clinicians, nurses and operations teams to develop and evaluate technologies in a working hospital. The programme starts on 5G and 5G-Advanced and is designed to evolve towards early 6G.
Partners plan to pursue public funding and a corporate laboratory
The partners intend to jointly pursue public research and innovation funding. This includes setting up a corporate laboratory, or an equivalent industry-public research programme, hosted by NUHS and run through NXAC. Joint training programmes, fellowships, internships and clinician-engineer collaborations are also planned.
Seven development areas target hospital operations and home care
NXAC's initiatives cover:
- ambient AI healthcare
- spatial intelligence and sensing
- simulation-to-real-world development
- autonomous healthcare facilities using AI and digital twins
- connected devices and wearables, including hospital-at-home and remote rehabilitation
- autonomous medical robotics for logistics, medication delivery and patient support
- medical extended reality for clinical education, remote specialist collaboration and surgical support
NUHS Chief Executive Professor Yeoh Khay Guan said the focus is on practical applications across NUHS' 14 entities, including autonomous mobile robots, connected devices that extend care into the home, and human augmentation for advanced surgeries.
Daniel Ode, Head of Ericsson Singapore, Brunei and Philippines, said applications such as robotic surgery, holomedicine and remote monitoring demand "deterministic network performance that cannot be compromised." Ng Tian Chong, CEO of Singtel Singapore, linked the effort to Singapore's ageing population and increasingly complex healthcare needs.
MOU builds on five years of 5G work at National University Hospital
The partnership began with 5G infrastructure in 2021. In 2022 it expanded to an indoor 5G network at National University Hospital, covering 10 operating theatres and three inpatient wards when fully commissioned in November 2023.
In February, NUHS formed a strategic partnership with GSMA Foundry, under which it serves as the first global healthcare sandbox for the telecommunications industry. NXAC will serve as the global healthcare test-bed sandbox for over-the-horizon technology that may be co-developed and validated at NUHS.