NEWS: IAP meeting to be smaller but more focused

KUALA LUMPUR: The Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC), custodian of the MSC Malaysia initiative, has downsized this year’s International Advisory Panel (IAP) meeting.

The event, which starts Nov 10 is hosting less delegates and speakers than the one last year, which was on a grander scale because it coincided with the prestigious World Congress on Information Technology conference in the capital.

However, the speakers and attendees will still make up a comprehensive cross-section of IT experts, comprising technologists, academicians, futurists and social entrepreneurs.

MDeC decided to streamline the number of delegates to enable the discussions to move quicker, as well as to have the ability to dwell longer on the more interesting topics without creating a backlog in presentations.

“A smaller group will allow us to be more focused on what is needed to take the MSC Malaysia forward,” said Datuk Badlisham Ghazali, MDeC chief executive officer, at a press conference on the IAP meeting.

MSC Malaysia, conceptualised in 1996, is a government initiative to leapfrog the country’s knowledge-based economy and move the people into the Information Age.

Foreign and home grown companies, numbering more than 900, are part of the initiative and are operating in high-tech areas nationwide. These businesses are involved in R&D work, multimedia products and services, as well as information and communications technology (ICT).

Guest speakers

This year’s IAP meeting, themed Innovation Economy: Paving the Path to Prosperity, will be at the Putrajaya International Convention Centre (PICC), located about 25km from Kuala Lumpur.

The topics of discussion include how to keep the MSC Malaysia at the forefront of assisting Malaysia’s economic recovery and creating future prosperity via an innovation-based economy.

Also up for discussion are the programmes that will be needed to create new jobs via ICT, develop world-class talent and, attract domestic and foreign investments.

Among the speakers will be Prof Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, which makes tiny loans for self-employment to some of the poorest people in that country.

He found that such micro-financing helped those people to survive, as well as created the spark of personal initiative and enterprise necessary for them to pull themselves out of poverty.

Also coming here is Brian Mefford, chief executive officer of the Connected Nation, an organisation that works in the trenches to bridge the “digital divide,” that gap between the technology haves and have-nots.

It also believes that states, communities, families and individuals can realise great economic and social advantages when nations accelerate broadband availability in underserved areas and increase broadband use in all areas, rural and urban.

Mefford and his team were responsible for helping make broadband available in the US state of Kentucky, under what was called the Connected Kentucky Initiative.

Both speakers will share their insights into how similar programmes can be just as useful in this country.

Other key issues

Deputy Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation Fadillah Yusof, who officiated at the press conference, said the IAP meeting will also look at ways to accelerate the country toward a high-income, knowledge-based economy through innovation and the creativity of its people.

It will also deliberate on education, technology, entrepreneurship, robotics, content development and broadband utilisation — all of which will help generate a blueprint for the country to achieve its economic and development goals.

Badlisham said the IAP has been very useful in pointing Malaysia in the right direction and helping it to stay the path over the years. “It will continue to help us look at the areas where we should be focusing on,” he added.

This meeting, he said, will assist MDeC in bringing the MSC Malaysia into its third phase, which is set to kick off in 2011.

The third phase places priority on creating a demand for local IT services — inside and outside the country — that will drive various sectors of the Malaysian economy.

Badlisham said MDeC will also seek the advice of the IAP on which technology sectors would benefit from further stimulus. MDeC has already identified several but would like to focus some additional expertise on the matter.

The IAP meeting is an annual conference and this year’s is the 12th in the series.

Present and past

Another conference, the 21st MSC Malaysia Implementation Council Meeting, will take place a day before the IAP meeting, at the PICC. The theme is MSC Malaysia 2.0: Contributing to Malaysia’s New Economic Model.

It will focus on ideas that will help reinforce MSC Malaysia’s relevance as the national ICT initiative to generate and sustain the economic-growth and wealth creation of the nation by transforming it into an innovation-led, knowledge-rich and progressive society.

Meanwhile, Malaysia was the first South-East Asian country to host the high-profile World Congress on Information Technology (WCIT) last year. It beat India to host this prestigious event.

WCIT is a forum that brings together global leaders in business, government and academia to discuss policies and ideas on information technology. It is held every two years and has a 30-year history.