Tag: Malaysia

IR 4.0 — To Survive or Become Obsolete

For the last 50 years only 19% of companies are in existence today. Many did not survive or unable to sustain due to many reasons. However, one of the key reasons are due to the fact that they are unable to compete or remained competitive whereas their competitors have transformed their business by leveraging new technologies and new business models.

Digitalisation and Internet has been very key in these transformation. New products and services have been created. Their operations are becoming more agile and productive. This is the outcome when companies embraced new changes openly. Their lleaders are the risk takers and have excellent vision of the future.

Every 3 to 7 years companies need to transform themselves, reinvent their operations and business. They should look at the current and future trends of technologies and see whether they can leverage these powerful technologies and together surf the great waves of disruption.

Check out Dr. Mazlan Abbas, CEO of FAVORIOT video explaining about the great changes happening in IR 4.0.

[Article orginally published here — IoT World]

How Do We Harness The Power of IoT

Harnessing the Power of IoT

[This article is originally published in IoT World]

It all started with when Kevin Ashton, working as a brand manager trying to figure out and track the amount of lipstick available on the shelves. In 1999, the term “Internet of Things” was coined by Kevin Ashton utilising RFID to track such assets. Twenty more years down the road, IoT has become a key technology not only to keep track of such asset but also create new products and services which can disrupt many businesses.

It ranges from manufacturing to agriculture and to Smart Cities. In fact, it can offer better tracking and monitoring solutions for end consumers using wearables devices. What we are seeing now is just the tip of the iceberg. There are many more applications can be built. The combinations of customised hardware or sensors, different kinds of connectivity, the power of the cloud and analytics brings forth unimaginable innovative solutions for the end-users.

Check out how we can harness the power of IoT by Dr. Mazlan Abbas, CEO of FAVORIOT in the below video.

Malaysia National 4IR Policy — An Opinion

[This article was originally published in IoT World]

We are aware that earlier in 2018, Malaysia launched National Industry 4WRD Policy Framework, however, the focus is on the manufacturing sector as we know manufacturing is one the biggest contributor to Malaysia’s GDP. However, it sparked interest in other sectors and industries as well because as described in the World Economic Forum (WEF), that the emerging technologies will have a disruptive impact on jobs of the future.

Here’s my personal opinions on Malaysia 4IR Policy:

  1. World Agenda — When Henrik Von Scheel (also known as Father and Originator of Industry 4.0) masterminded Germany’s digital agenda in 2009 with a belief that the industry will be transform by the fusion of digital, virtual and physical world, also called the cyber-physical systems, and this triggered the emergence of new era of fourth industrial revolution. This has been emphasized again by World Economic Forum in 2016. The fusion of various technologies have transformed and disrupted many businesses. And Malaysia should not be left behind.
  2. Covid-19 the Master Enabler — It took many years for us to educate the importance of digital transformation, but Covid-19 made us realise how important it us to transform our business, education and almost everything using digital. Internet seems to be mandatary in almost every part of lives. And to move towards IR 4.0, we must have the fundamental of IR 3.0 in place i.e. digital and virtual (content in digital with good access to Internet). That’s the more reason Malaysia also launched Malaysia Digital Economy Blueprint (MyDigital) in early 2021 to encourage the usage of digital technology to transform the economic sector.
  3. Humanizing Technology — Although 4IR can create new jobs, but it also create threats to the existing ones. Many people down the street are not aware how complex technologies of 4IR can help them in their daily lives. Thus, the aspiration of 4IR policy to ensure that it can provide quality of life by benefitting the society such as focus on happiness, healthy living, work-life balance, overcome social issues and sustainable living will help the adoption of 4IR technology to be easier and acceptable. Technology should not be seen as a threat but in fact should be seen to help them.
  4. Budget Justification — We hoped that the 4 policy thrusts, 16 strategies and 32 National initiatives can help the relevant agencies to justify for their 2022 budget. Without sufficient funding, it’s very difficult for us to maintain our momentum. We also want that the bureaucracy of 4IR fund approval need to be reduce to avoid unnecessary delays as what we have seen in the Industry 4WRD initiatives (Some SMEs complained that even a 4IR readiness assessment can take a year to complete. This does not include the 4IR intervention programmes).
  5. Producer-Nation Agenda — How do we increase our graduates salary if we are just being a Consumer-Nation? How do we sustain and grow our Startups if all the products and technologies are bought from overseas? How do we (i.e. the industries) share our technology or product map to Universities if we are not in control of our own product roadmap? One of the policy thrust — “Accelerate the 4IR technology innovation and adoption” is a “battle-cry” for many local Startups. Support them even if they are still small and have no reference sites to show or demonstrate. Support the innovators by being the early market adopters that are willing to take the risk to test out the new and untested local products. One day this small companies can grow and create more jobs for the country.

This can be my opinion and probably a wish list. Let’s see the actions that will be taken in the next 6–12 months. A Project Management Office (PMO) need to be setup to ensure transparency and KPIs are met.

IoT & IR 4 0 — Are You Ready for Jobs That Don’t Exist Yet?

The industry always complained that the talents that graduated from the local universities are not equipped with the latest knowledge. The industry expected the graduates that they hired can immediately start their job without sending them to further workshops or courses. The world is moving fast and thus it’s imperative to start contributing in the early part of the career. The employers are getting impatient as the competition heats up.

That’s why it’s important for the Universities to get feedback from their Industry Advisory Panel (IAP) to advice on the current technology and job trends. The lecturers too need to get involve in industry events to understand what’s the hottest job nowadays.

We know that the change the content of the syllabus or approving new programmes in the University can take months or sometimes 1–2 years. This would require the teaching staff to also equip themselves with the new knowledge. It’s a challenge nowadays to keep with the technological pace but that’s the reality.

Looking at the future technological trends and the business disruptions happening worldwide, the Universities should now anticipate what’s coming and to quickly adapt their current courses or programmes to match with the future jobs.

Check out the video below by Dr. Mazlan Abbas, CEO of FAVORIOT regarding this challenge.

FREE IoT eBooks for Download!

Download FREE IoT eBooks

I have decided to make two of my IoT eBooks available for FREE to anyone interested to download.

The first eBook is entitled “Your IoT Journey“. It is a compilation of my best and selected written articles which was published from my IoT World Blog. It’s not written in a very technical manner because the idea is to share the issues, challenges and the tips for anyone who’s interested to take the IoT journey. After several years, the topic about IR 4.0 become a hot one. But it also bring along confusion regarding the different Era of Industrial Revolutions.

The second eBook or rather eNotes entitled simply as “IoT Notes” was originally written to illustrate the complexity of IoT and IR 4.0 in a simpler way. I used GoodNotes application and my iPad Air to draw and add colours to the descriptions. Hopefully, this will become a companion notes to anyone who is learning IoT and IR 4.0.

Hope you enjoy the two eBooks and kindly share with others. Hopefully we can share the knowledge and create the next Generation-IoT.

  1. Your IoT Journey — Download
  2. IoT Notes (Compilation) — Download