Risk management firm Optro opens Singapore hub

As organisations grapple with growing digitalisation, cyber threats, and shifting regulations, Optro, an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) management platform, has formally launched its Asia-Pacific (APAC) expansion with a new regional hub in Singapore. Previously known as AuditBoard, the company announced the move this week at the Institute of Internal Auditors International Conference in Singapore. Used by over half of the Fortune 500, Optro is pitching its GRC tools to the APAC market that its executives say has been underserved. “There hasn’t been disruption in this market in a very long time,” Justin Greenberger, Optro’s chief customer officer told Computer Weekly. “You have legacy players who have been here for quite a while that have not innovated in the way that Optro has been able to do recently.” For years, risk management in the region has relied heavily on bespoke, customised applications that Greenberger described as “workflow tools masquerading as SaaS [software-as-a-service] products”. This is no longer tenable for organisations coping with digital disruption – including from the use of AI – which poses business risks. A common challenge for enterprises adopting AI has been data readiness , the arduous process of cleaning and structuring data before an AI can parse it. But Greenberger, who previously led IT cyber security audits for General Electric, dismissed the narrative as outdated. “I think the data readiness talk is overstated,” he said. “In the AI world that we’re living in, with the agentic layer and almost instant views that you’re creating off the data, I don’t think that’s as big of a concern as everyone is making it out to be.” Instead, the real challenge is internal alignment, that is, getting compliance, risk, and audit teams to speak a common language. A term like “residual risk”, for example, “could mean five different things to five different people,” Greenberger noted. To address the complexities in GRC, Optro has been on a buying spree. In October 2025, the company acquired FairNow, an AI governance technology, allowing enterprises to inventory their AI models and manage third-party risks. More recently, it acquired Midship, an AI-native controls testing platform that automates up to 87% of controls management, freeing up auditors to focus on broader strategic risks. Optro’s software allows customers to leverage frontier AI models like Anthropic’s Claude and Google’s Gemini through the model context protocol , so they can use standard operating procedures and their proprietary data to prompt the system, such as asking the AI how to simplify costly internal controls. The company has also developed a base AI model but given the sensitive nature of corporate audits, Greenberger said the model is ring-fenced. “Because of the regulation and the types of data we deal with, we do not self-train those models on our own platform,” he said, ensuring confidential data never enters the open domain. The launch of the Singapore hub comes after Optro spent some time researching the local market and building relationships with global professional services firms like KPMG before formalising its entry. Optro plans to introduce local data hosting in Singapore shortly and is currently hiring for regional account coverage, which will allow the company to provide 24-hour global support. Financial institutions, which operate in some of the most heavily regulated environments in the world, are a primary target for the company’s APAC expansion. Singapore’s OCBC Bank is already tapping Optro’s platform to modernise its internal audit function. “At OCBC, we continuously enhance our audit capabilities to support the bank’s next frontier strategy,” said Harry Lim, head of group audit at OCBC Bank, in a statement. “Leveraging platforms like Optro allows us to sharpen our focus on what matters most and ensures consistent, high-quality audit delivery across the organisation.” Despite the growing integration of AI, which could theoretically automate so much work that fewer human auditors require software licences, Optro is sticking to a per-seat pricing model, rather than moving to consumption-based licensing . Greenberger said this provides financial certainty for enterprises that want predictability, adding: “We don’t like being surprised when we have token costs, so I think predictability is going to really matter as these things evolve.” Ultimately, Optro’s pitch to the APAC region is around helping customers achieve returns on their investments and putting an end to software tinkering. “I can’t tell you how many people have said to me that they’re tired of customising the solution,” Greenberger said. “Their total cost of ownership is through the roof, and their software is terrible to maintain. I think there’s a big desire in the market to move to standardisation.” Read more about AI in APAC Hitachi will use OpenAI’s Codex agent to unpick ageing mission-critical systems and gain early access to its frontier AI models in a slew of high-profile Japanese partnerships for the US AI lab. Oxford Economics report reveals that pursuing total AI self-sufficiency will lead to economic trade-offs , delayed enterprise adoption and higher carbon footprints across the Asia-Pacific region. Alibaba Cloud unveils two new datacentres in Johor , cementing its largest infrastructure presence in Southeast Asia while capitalising on spillover demand from Singapore. Kmart is deploying Google Cloud’s AI capabilities to let customers preview clothes on themselves and visualise furniture in their homes as it embraces conversational commerce to win over shoppers.