IDC: Strong Public Private Collaborations Required to Achieve Malaysia’s Vision

IDC ASEAN is calling for the new government to focus on public-private collaborations to achieve Vision 2020/25. As the initial Vision 2020 set higher goals to transform the country’s society and economy, the public sector needs to step up to set the direction and planning towards building a balanced ecosystem through collaborations and creating an advanced economy.

Since Malaysia’s independence in 1957, the nation’s economy has diversified from agriculture and commodity-based to developing robust manufacturing and services-based sectors. In the 80’s, the technology sector was identified as outperforming most other sectors of the economies by driving the country GDP. Earlier this year, IDC revealed that Malaysia’s IT spending is expected to reach USD 10 billion by end of 2018, with 70-75% of that still in hardware.  However, the investment in digital infrastructure, software, and expertise are the fundamental areas for public sector to focus on to bridge the digital divide and drive the economic growth towards Vision 2020/2025.

“As the nation aims at establishing a scientific and progressive society, this requires the most cutting-edge research, innovations and technologies for us to achieve these goals. Ultimately, the public sector should start considering how the ICT industry can fully benefit from the “digital economy” as well as create economic areas of new growth whether in jobs, sectors or physical locations. A joint effort between the public and private sector will create the foundation to increase the GDP, foreign investment, technological experience and expertise in the country”, said Sudev Bangah, Managing Director IDC ASEAN.

Randy Roberts, Research Director IoT and Telco, IDC Asia Pacific added, “Malaysia is one of the countries that has organically been moving towards being extra opportunistic in the utilization of ICT. The new government should implement new ways to achieve the vision especially in areas of research and development, infrastructure and science and technology (S&T). We have to start identifying how emerging technologies, or IDC’s “innovation accelerators”, such as Augmented and Virtual Reality (AR/VR), Cognitive/AI Systems, Next-Gen Security, Internet of Things (IoT) and Robotics can create new value for Malaysia to be on the same footing as other developing countries.”

To date, there have been progressive initiatives from the government to achieve the country goals especially with the recent proposal to include the right to internet access in the Federal Constitution. Initiatives such as this will directly drive the digital economy and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the country and create more engaged and connected citizens.  Although Malaysia is still ahead of most developing countries in digital readiness, the government should set an aggressive objective to be equivalent to leading countries in the region such as South Korea and Singapore.

According to IDC’s Market Perspective: Nations and Internet of Things: A Comparative Assessment, Malaysia is ranked number 8 out of 13 Asia Pacific countries in terms of IoT Readiness based on nations’ gross domestic product (GDP), government effectiveness, innovation, Internet of Things (loT) spending and lCT spending.  Therefore, IDC urges the expansion of wired and wireless broadband networks to provide improved internet access for consumers as well as local enterprises in Malaysia as all groups will benefit from the growth in online services such as e-commerce, online banking and real-time news and information.

This year, Malaysia slipped three spots to 27th from 24th in the World Digital Competitiveness Ranking, 2018. Therefore, IDC believes that public-private partnerships are imperative and public sector organizations should invest in building essential digital skills and knowledge to bolster the overall ICT industry and seek opportunities to collaborate with the private sector to help the nation in achieving Vision 2020/25.