Focus on five key ICT areas (Malaysia)

KUANTAN: Pahang Government will focus on developing five key information, communication and technology (ICT) clusters in the next Malaysia Plan to accelerate the state’s economic growth.

The five clusters are logistics and data services, integrated content, agro-biotechnology, defence technology and communications, and education content as well as applications.

Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Adnan Yaakob said these clusters were targetted to become the ideal industries of the future.

He cited the defence technology and communications cluster as an example whereby focus would be on manufacturing of advanced technologies integrated into usable systems to support national defence by providing secure communication links and overall added national security.

      “These systems will lend support to the strong air force presence in the state, and the entire defence automotive industries in Pekan,” he said in his speech at a dinner here on Monday.

The event was held in conjunction with an international conference on software engineering and computer systems jointly organised by Universiti Malaysia Pahang’s (UMP) Compu-ter System and Software Engineering Faculty and the state government.

About 200 participants attended the three-day conference which saw 138 papers presented.

Among the guests at the dinner were State Science, Tech-nology and Innovation Committee chairman Datuk Mohd Sharkar Shamsuddin, UMP vice-chancellor Datuk Dr Daing Nasir Ibrahim and the faculty’s dean Prof Dr Jasni Mohamad Zain.

Mohd Sharkar was one of the speakers in the conference, presenting a talk on the development of high-speed broadband in Pahang.

Adnan acknowledged that turning the five clusters plan into reality would be a tough challenge.

“Such challenges can be handled and overcome with support from all sectors.

“With the right ICT implementation structure, Pahang will be on the right track,” he said.

On the conference, he said it was a platform for participants to share expertise that could contribute to the advancement of the ICT industry.

The Mentri Besar said that several investors from abroad had shown interest in developing high-speed broadband in the state.

He declined to elaborate but said that once the project was rolled out, it could provide broadband services to all households in Pahang.

He later witnessed the signing of a memorandum of understanding between UMP and Heitech Padu Bhd to set up Oracle Academy that would focus on teaching, research and software development using Oracle technology.