Malaysia yesterday unveiled plans to set up new offices in China and Saudi Arabia to promote its eight-year-old Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) and seek out new business deals to bolster growth in the high-tech zone. Information and communications technology (ICT) sales in the MSC, launched in 1996 as Asia's answer to California's Silicon Valley, hit over five billion ringgit ($1.32 billion) last year, of which 1.2 billion were exported, said Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. Abdullah said the government would leverage on its chairmanship in the 57-member Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) and the 117-member Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), as well as strong ties with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), to secure new deals. "I am pleased to say that we have already won several international contracts in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Myanmar and Iran, among others," he said before chairing his first meeting of the MSC blue-ribbon panel of international advisors. "We plan to accelerate the roll-out of products and services produced by MSC companies to the global market through stronger and more targeted marketing efforts." --MORE 1058 Local Time 0758 GMT
