NEWS: Malaysia has potential to export creative content

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia has the potential to become the destination of choice for the production, marketing and distribution of creative and digital content, both local and foreign, said Information Communication and Culture Ministry secretary-general Datuk Wira Kamaruddin Siaraf.

He said the country has a pool of talent, government support and infrastructure to attract global creative multimedia players to work in partnership and to use Malaysia as their global hub.

“We are now moving ahead from developing capacity to implementing aggressive go-to-market strategies,” he said at the Asia Television Forum in Singapore yesterday.

In a statement released here, Kamaruddin said international companies like Codemasters Studios, a British computer and videogames developer as well as Rhythm and Hues, the Oscar-winning special effects and animation studio, have established their operations in Malaysia.

He added another production company, Freemantle Media, has expressed interest to collaborate with the Film Development Corporation (Finas) while BBC Worldwide has stated its commitment to co-produce documentaries with

Radio Televisyen Malaysia (RTM). He said Sony Pictures has also enquired about co-production opportunities for films in the country.

“These initiatives are estimated to generate between RM20mil and RM40mil over the duration of the three-year collaboration,” he said.

Kamarudin said the government’s goal was to finance, develop and produce 100 creative projects over the next five to 10 years, which is expected to create over 10,000 jobs in the sector.

“Ideally, we will like this to be a concerted effort, one which can be undertaken jointly with friends and partners from the global content community,” he added.

Kamaruddin said Finas would launch a RM200mil Creative Industry Fund to spur participation and accelerate growth in digital creative industry as mentioned in Budget 2010.

He added the initiative would support the government’s strategic plan to expand the creative content industry to become a major contributor to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) over the next five years. — Bernama