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Oleh/By : DATO' SERI DR. MAHATHIR BIN MOHAMAD
Tempat/Venue : OKURA HOTEL, TOKYO, JAPAN
Tarikh/Date : 15/05/96
Tajuk/Title : THE GATHERING OF JAPANESE BUSINESS
LEADERS ON MULTIMEDIA SUPER
CORRIDOR (MSC)
I would like to thank the organiser , NTT for
hosting this prestigious gathering of business
leaders.
2. As we approach the 21st century, the world is
experiencing changes it has never experienced
before, especially in the economic and technological
spheres. In the old economy, national borders
defined the location for raw materials, energy
sources, transportation infrastructures and markets.
In the new economy, distance and borders are slowly
disappearing. Because of new communication
technology, what is becoming more important are the
footprints of satellites, areas reached by radio
signals and the electronic media, unlimited
information and news. Old tastes, social norms,
values and even political inclinations are being
transformed by the access to information. These
linkages in the international economy has opened up
and has resulted in truly transnational cooperation
making the European Community (EC), North America
Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and Asia-Pacific
Economic Cooperation (APEC) more real than ever
before. Manufactured products are no longer just
made in a single country. It may be designed in
Japan, with components supplied from Taiwan,
assembled in Malaysia and finally packaged in
Thailand for the world market.
3. The Asia-Pacific region is very much a part of
this new economic scenario. As the world economy
looks for more profitable locations to manufacture
and produce, the old unskilled labour-intensive and
resource-intensive sweat-shops of the Asia Pacific
are transforming into skilled and capital-intensive
industrial economies. The newly-industrialised
countries of the Asia-Pacific region are
consistently registering positive growth rates. The
1995 World Competitiveness Report records that the
GDP of the Asia-Pacific Region excluding China is
already 80 percent that of NAFTA and has surpassed
the European Community by 20 percent. The World
Development Report estimates that the size of the
economy of the Asia side of the Pacific region will
overtake that of United States. Because of their
strategic position and relatively younger industrial
economies, the so-called Asian tigers will be
enjoying a much stronger economic growth of 7 to 10
percent annually as compared to those of other
countries in the Pacific region.
4. Malaysia is a leading member of the ASEAN
countries in terms of economic growth. Guided by
Malaysia's Vision 2020, all sectors of industry in
Malaysia are undergoing rapid growth. The
manufacturing industry grew at 15 percent in 1995,
while the services industry grew at 9 percent. Now
Malaysia has launched a new strategy and programme
to switch to high-tech capital intensive industries
with special focus on information and
telecommunication-based industries, which include a
very ambitious plan for what we call a Multimedia
Super Corridor.
5. The Multimedia Super Corridor is located in an
area south of the capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur.
It encompasses two mega-projects that are already
under construction and one mega project under
implementation, namely the Kuala Lumpur City Centre
Complex, Putrajaya, new administrative capital of
Malaysia and the new Kuala Lumpur International
Airport. The Kuala Lumpur City Centre is graced by
the tallest towers in the world, which at 450 meters
each, stand taller than the Sears tower in the USA.
It is being designed as a self-contained integrated
multiple towered city-within-a-city. It will have
the latest in telecommunications infrastructure and
will be built as an intelligent building complex
surrounded by beautifully landscaped parklands. The
new Kuala Lumpur International Airport will be a
very green airport in the forest because it will be
lavishly dotted with trees, flowering plants and
shrubs. It will be in operation before the
Commonwealth Games in 1998. For a start there will
be 80 gates and 2 parallel runways. Putrajaya is
Malaysia's new electronic government administrative
centre and will be developed as a garden city with
`intelligent' features. It will provide a balanced
urban environment for 250,000 people served by state-
of-art communications and transportation systems.
These three mega projects will form the nucleus for
the Multimedia Super Corridor.
6. In between these three centres there will be
ample land to be developed specially for the
multimedia industry, both hardware and software as
well as locations for headquarters for design and
direction of multinational industries utilising the
communication network which will be put in place.
Already well-known Telegraph and Telephone companies
are planning to locate their headquarters for the
international operations in the Multimedia Super
Corridor.
7. The Multimedia Super Corridor will be built
fresh from the ground. Your input into the design
stage and therefore your participation are welcomed.
It will house knowledge-intensive and information-
intensive industries, the kind of industries that
will propel the Asia-Pacific region into the
information age. Future high-growth multimedia
industries such as remote manufacturing and
operations processing, semiconductor development,
distance learning, telemedicine, integrated
computing and communications solutions can be
located in the MSC and can act as a multicultural
production and coordinating centre.
8. By leveraging on the current three mega
projects that are being implemented, the MSC will
have access to one of the world's most modern
airports with every likelihood of becoming an
important South East Asia (SEA) hub. The MSC will
be in close contact with the most modern paperless
government, thereby facilitating financial and
investment activities. The MSC will be close to
homes of the knowledge workers, creating very
comfortable working conditions. With all this
advanced infrastructure and the help of information
technology and multimedia, the MSC can enhance your
organisation's productivity and reach to the fastest
growing economies of East Asia and indeed the world.
9. Malaysia has many other strengths that will
place the MSC as a leading multimedia catalyst
centre.
10. Malaysia still has a cost advantage as compared
to other NIEs in the region. Malaysia has a growing
pool of skilled engineers who can cooperate with
foreign investors in developing local and regional
multimedia content. Malaysia has cultural links
with all the major NIEs in the Asia Pacific region.
The population of Malaysia also speaks Malay,
Indonesian, different dialects of Chinese such as
Mandarin and Cantonese and different dialects of the
Indo-Pak continent. Most speak English fluently
while workers have a working knowledge of the
language. So Malaysia can service both East and
West from the Multimedia Super Corridor. As an
example, the MSC can serve as a multimedia hub that
will be able to sell multimedia products designed
and produced in the Asia Pacific region on the
Western hemisphere. This is possible by using the
multicultural resources in the MSC to translate the
various languages of the Asia Pacific region into
English.
11. The Malaysian legal and governmental system is
based on those of the United Kingdom. Additionally,
Malaysia has the political will to change any
existing laws that may impede the speed and
accessibility of the new information age. The
advent of multimedia brings with it demands for
rethinking and revision in the traditional laws
governing communication. The need for using
electronic signatures, the admissibility of
electronic documents in court, intellectual property
laws will have to be changed to accommodate the new
multimedia environment. The stability of the
Malaysian political scene will ensure that legal and
other changes will not be bogged down by excessive
politicking. Malaysia's history since independence
has shown consistency and predictability so that
long-term investments and gestations will not be
threatened by the twist and turns of volatile local
politics.
12. Our commitment to the development of
information technology and multimedia in the country
is proven with the creation of the National
Information Technology Council (NITC) in 1994. This
Council comprises representatives from both public
and private sectors. It formulates strategies for
the utilisation and development of IT including the
MSC. One of the NITC's recommendations is the
setting up of the Multimedia Development Corporation
(MDC) which will be responsible for the operation of
the MSC once it is established. The MDC has been
approved by the Malaysian Cabinet with an initial
budget of RM30 Million. The role of the MDC will be
to serve the clients located in the MSC and to
provide for them effective solutions. We are
looking into the possibility of the MDC having
offices throughout the world to market the MSC and
to provide a single point of contact for industries
interested in investing and relocating within the
MSC.
13. In addition to the MSC, the NITC is already
forming an international advisory panel to provide
expert advice and help guide Malaysia to ready
itself with all the necessary infrastructure. This
panel will consist of international players in the
field of entertainment, news, multimedia,
information technology, and other critical areas.
This panel of international experts is being invited
to Malaysia to participate in the first Multimedia
Asia '96 Exhibition to be held in Kuala Lumpur on
the 1st of August. Multimedia Asia '96 will be,
with apologies to our neighbours, Asia's premier
multimedia exposition and conference. The focus
of this major event will be to showcase the MSC to
the entire world. You are all most welcome to
participate in this exposition.
14. As part of the programme to attract foreign
investors to relocate within the MSC, the Malaysian
Government is looking into preparing a packet of
incentives aimed specifically at the MSC. This
packet of incentives will include tax exemptions for
five to ten years and other incentives. On top of
this normal set of incentives, because of the nature
of multimedia, the Government is looking into a set
of guarantees to ensure that foreign investors will
be able to maximise their investment in the MSC.
This `bill' of guarantees can include a provision to
ensure the availability of world-class physical and
information infrastructure so that all the required
capabilities and supporting services will be
available to investors. The government is looking
into providing access to sufficient human resources
with the required skills by expanding educational
and training programmes to teach multimedia and IT
skills. Unrestricted access can be provided to
foreign expertise and knowledge workers located in
the MSC by expediting immigration procedures and
removing stumbling blocks. Employment restrictions
in the MSC can be relaxed to enable investors to
hire and fire without regard to ethnicity, race and
religion. The Malaysian Government will enforce
laws that will protect intellectual property in
order to encourage creativity and more investment.
All these incentives are geared towards making the
MSC physically, environmentally and culturally the
most attractive place to work as far as multimedia
is concerned.
15. I believe this MSC is a one-time opportunity
for Japanese industry to get ahead of world
competition. The window of opportunity for this
project is closing up very rapidly. As we speak,
other organisations in the United States and Europe
are already planning their multimedia parks and
intelligent cities. Malaysia can spearhead this
effort in the Asia Pacific region and offer to
Japanese industry a chance to extend its enterprises
while enhancing profitability and productivity. I
therefore would like to invite all of you to look
into this opportunity to expand your organisation's
access to the entire world through the Multimedia
Super Corridor in Malaysia.
I thank you for your attention.
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