Malaysia is hosting a technology meeting this week that seems to be eliciting little more than yawns in the tech world—a source of credit risk, since the country's ambitious plans to improve gross domestic product (GDP) levels is based on becoming one of the world's high-tech meccas in coming decades. For risk experts, Malaysia’s explicit reliance on the technology sector to generate tax revenues could also pose foreign exchange risks.
This week the country is hosting the fourth International Advisory Panel (IAP) meeting of its Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC). The meeting is designed to generate ideas and advice about the MSC project. But the lack of coverage of the event in the international technology press and the rather unspectacular guest list indicates that Malaysia's touting of the project has fallen flat. According to some observers, there is little significant research and development taking place within the new techno-city of Cyberjaya.
What is the MSC? It is a 15 km by 60 km corridor near the country's capital of Kuala Lumpur set aside for information technology companies. It is set to extend from the Petronas Twin Towers in central Kuala Lumpur to the new international airport being built south of the city. Within the zone will be the new administrative center, Putrajaya, and the "intelligent city," Cyberjaya.
The entire conglomeration is the baby of Prime Minister Mohamad Mahathir and nearly every news story put out by the adulatory pro-government Malaysian news organs alternates the letters "MSC" and the word "Mahathir" in fairly slavish fashion. Seldom has a leader been so closely identified with a government project as Mahathir is with the MSC—and that may be part of the problem.
But the guest list for the conference does not suggest that some of the bigger names in high-tech these days are much interested in the MSC. Motorola is not exactly cutting edge in the Internet sphere, though its chief businesses -- among which are chip making, digital set-top boxes and cable modems in addition to its well-known line of cell phones -- are likely to pull it out of the disasters of the last several years—notably the Iridium fiasco.
The goal of the MSC, though, is not be a center of manufacturing of such products. It aims to be a hub of multimedia. And yet who are the notables attending? Acer Group chairman and chief executive officer Stan Shih, Fujitsu Ltd chairman Tadashi Sekizawa and Silicon Graphics Inc. chairman and chief executive officer Bob Bishop. All are among the 29 members of the IAP attending this year's meeting and none of those men represents a significant force on the multimedia front save as producers of the hardware that line the guts of the machines that feature such media. Those are lucrative lines, of course. But they are not what multimedia means to most people. If one defines that as the integration of audio, video, text and graphics within an electronic interface that provides information and/or entertainment, there doesn't seem to be many foreign multimedia tycoons in attendance.
One part of the MSC's PR troubles is that it is so government-driven and gathering-oriented. That doesn’t appeal to the busy and cynical young Internet wizards. It is the sort of thing that appeals to, well—stodgy and old-line Japanese technology companies, ambitious Taiwanese computer makers and the American high-tech industry.
Malaysia is doing well on the fundamentals of its economy, but its technology polices and clumsy PR techniques don't promise a wealth of investment in the MSC.