KUALA LUMPUR, Nov. 18 (Xinhua) -- Malaysia is eyeing a higher position in the electrical and electronics (E&E) and semiconductor industries as it seeks greater resilience amid global trade challenges, Malaysian Second Finance Minister Amir Hamzah Azizan has told a forum here.
The government will provide capital and support to further this goal and strengthen the country's infrastructure to support businesses, he said during a panel session at the Fortune Innovation Forum 2025 on Monday.
"We want to go up the value chain more and that includes advanced packaging and chip design... What we have to do is to prepare our workforce to be able to go up that path. We will also have to provide capital, to allow venture capital and PE (private equity) to come in," he said.
"As we grow it, the ecosystem gets bigger, more diverse and stronger along the way. The government plays a role in that it provides capital. It provides support in terms of training along the way, it goes out and looks at where it can strengthen infrastructure in the country so that the infrastructure can support the plants that actually come in," Amir Hamzah explained.
He noted that Malaysia has managed to work around the disruptions caused by trade tensions and unilateral tariffs, adding that Malaysia will continue to take a measured approach with long-term outcomes in mind.
"The Malaysian economy has a very deep diversification in this space... It's a wide range of markets and the base on the economy is also quite well integrated. It's this that has helped us in being able to address the challenges that we're seeing today in the ever-changing world," he said.
The two-day forum running from Nov. 17-18 brings together some of the most influential voices in business, technology, and policy to discuss how the region and the world can navigate this era of disruption and seize the opportunities it presents and features high-level discussions on critical issues, including the digital revolution and artificial intelligence, shifting geopolitics and trade routes and sustainable energy transitions.
