GEORGE TOWN: Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob has expressed confidence in the country’s ability to achieve the RM70 billion digital investment target by 2025, in line with the digital economy blueprint.
Ismail said Malaysia plays an important role as a digital investment hub in Asean.
“With world-class infrastructure, a holistic digital ecosystem, and highly skilled digital talent, Malaysia can be a major digital investment destination in Asean,” he said at the World Congress on Innovation & Technology (WCIT 2022) here today.
Also present were Penang governor Fuzi Razak, chief minister Chow Kon Yeow, communications and multimedia minister Annuar Musa and human resources minister M Saravanan.
Ismail said that since the MSC Malaysia initiative was launched in 1996, the country had attracted digital investments worth RM384 billion and generated 180,000 jobs as well as RM588 billion in revenue.
“After 26 years, MSC Malaysia has been rebranded as Malaysia Digital (MD). MD will transform the national digital ecosystem and drive more direct high-impact programmes for Keluarga Malaysia,” he said.
He said although MD was only launched in July, it had managed to attract foreign direct digital investments worth RM42 billion in just two months.
“These investments came in via 28 foreign companies which are involved in data centres, IT services, technological creative content, and global business services or GBS,” he said.
Meanwhile, domestic digital investments had recorded RM4.76 billion up to Aug 24.
“Through this effort, 6,000 high-value jobs have been created and will continue to grow going forward,” Ismail said.– FMT