MIMOS and Microsoft have jointly established an Applied Artificial Intelligence (AI) Centre in Malaysia named “Centre of AI for Future Industry (CAIFI)”.
The strategic collaboration signifies the commitment by both parties to accelerate the nation’s shift to Cloud, by placing Malaysia on the roadmap to be a digital-first nation as strategised under the National Policy on Industry 4.0.
The partnership between MIMOS and Microsoft was announced by Malaysia’s Minister of International Trade and Industry (MITI), Darell Leiking during his visit to the Microsoft Headquarters in Redmond, United States as part of the Ministry’s Trade and Investment Mission.
The Minister of International Trade and Industry (MITI), Darell Leiking says, “Amongst the key learnings from countries that have already embarked on their Industry 4.0 transformation, are the need to pay attention and adopt modern technologies into the nation’s digital plan and ecosystem.”
“The Centre will deliver capacity development for rapid response government policy making, and tools required to increase intelligence and leverage on modern technologies such as AI in Malaysia to create a culture of innovation and continuous learning to enhance the adoption of Cloud,” he adds.
The Centre will be equipped with Microsoft’s IoT and AI programme, providing access to developmental tools for learning purposes. All workshops, training and labs on AI and Internet of Things (IoT) will be conducted to help train entrepreneurs including SMEs and graduates from the finance and manufacturing industry to leverage on the power of these emerging technologies.
“We applaud the Government of Malaysia and MITI for the ambitious aspirations with National Policy on Industry 4.0 (Industry4WRD), among which is establishing Malaysia as the main destination for the high-tech industry by 2025,” says Hossein Nowbar, Deputy General Counsel, Microsoft Corporation.
Malaysia is well placed to play a leading role in the development of AI and other emerging tech, and Microsoft welcomes efforts by the Government to have progressive polices and forward-looking regulatory environment.
“We stand now at the dawn of a new era, one which is built on the cloud and based on data-driven technologies,” says K. Raman, Managing Director of Microsoft Malaysia. “We hope to play our part in setting the trajectory of our nation towards being a leader in innovation as well as technological skills, priming ourselves for Industry 4.0.”
The collaboration between Microsoft and MIMOS is also in line with the recently launched ASEAN Digital Skills Vision 2020, an initiative that pledges to equip 20 million ASEAN workers with digital skills and opportunities in the next two years. As part of its pledge, Microsoft aims to provide 15,000 university students with internship opportunities, deliver digital skills training to 2.2 million SME employees, and to hire 8,500 digital workers by 2020 across ASEAN.
