Mr Owen said his meetings with representatives of ST Engineering, a state-controlled aerospace, defence and security group with annual revenue of more than $7 billion, had been positive.

He said Singapore, which has very little capacity to produce renewable energy, was also interested in Hunter-produced hydrogen.

"The visit's been very, very good in terms of enhancing the business to business relationship in the defence industry space, particularly ST Engineering, who essentially is the major government-owned defence acquisition and sustainment organisation supporting effectively the whole of the Singaporean defence force, as well as a large part of the security apparatus," he said.

Mr Owen was part of a Hunter political and business delegation to Singapore this week.

He said Singapore was interested in working with Hunter businesses which are developing secure security communications, state-of-the-art space technology and hydrogen production.

Williamtown air base and BAE Systems could also help support the city state's future Joint Strike Fighter fleet.

"In artificial intelligence, there's a capability being developed in the Hunter in cooperation with other industry players around the world which has some benefit not only to their security forces but also the broader security apparatus in Singapore," Mr Owen said.

"In space domain awareness, there's a company called Low Earth Orbit Laboratories, or LeoLabs, and their Australian arm is being set up in the Hunter.

"There's a real opportunity in supporting the Singaporeans as they launch their own satellites into low earth orbit in terms of them understanding what is also in orbit near their satellite and giving them some kind of collision avoidance system.

"We talked a little bit about a company in the Newcastle area that has very, very capable point-to-point virtual private network [VPN] that's highly secure."

Mr Owen said he would talk to the Hunter companies involved and set up introductions to the Singaporean "industry establishment".

The chair of the Singapore government's Centre for Liveable Cities, Professor Cheong Koon Hean, told the Newcastle Herald that Singapore regarded hydrogen as a potential solution to its energy challenges.

The Hunter has attracted more than $200 million in federal and state funding in the past year to help develop a hydrogen export industry.

Mr Owen said the region was well placed to produce hydrogen for Singapore and other Asian nations such as South Korea and Japan.

"We're meeting a major company here before flying home and talking about collaboration in the green hydrogen and green ammonia space," he said.

"A fact that a major Singaporean business is looking to establish a footprint in Australia, and particularly in the Hunter, is a fair indication of that."

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