Malaysia Cloud & Datacenter Digital Summit, organized by W.Media, took place virtually on October 8, 2020.
The digital event saw the coming together of more than 200 IT (Information Technology) and DC (Datacenter) professionals, business leaders, and other technology enthusiasts who discussed the future of the cloud, datacenter, 5G, IoT (Internet of things) in South East Asia, particularly Malaysia.
Cloud and datacenter were at the center of discussion and were closely knitted in almost all panel discussions and thought leadership presentations.
Let’s look at some of the key highlights of the digital event.
Malaysia Cloud & Datacenter Digital Summit 2020 – the major highlights
As mentioned in the starting of this write-up, cloud and datacenter technologies were one of the hot topics of discussion at the event.
Let’s explore the reason why.
Malaysia stands at the very edge of transforming into a full-fledged cloud computing hub and many factors or driving forces are leading towards this mega shift. In the budget 2020, the Malaysian government earmarked a whopping amount of MYR 21.6 bn into the National Fiberisation and Connectivity Plan (NFCP). This move indicates the government’s focus on accelerating digital transformation by promoting more cloud adoption and roll-out of 5G connectivity through Malaysia.
The event included key sessions by leading cloud and datacenter professionals who shared their views on the digital future of Malaysia and the growth drivers.
Let’s look at some of the key session highlights.
Role of Enterprise Architecture (EA) in driving digital transformation across organizations
In his opening presentation, Aaron Tan Dani – Chairman, IASA ASIA PACIFIC, shared how a well-defined EA blueprint can help organizations successfully implement their digital transformation goals. Quoting a prediction by Gartner, “By 2025, organizations will predominantly focus EA on delivering business outcomes from the perspectives of their business ecosystem” he said digital transformation has become the need of the hour. According to him, 2025 is this year- 2020 only, due to the COVID-19 induced push for getting digitally transformed.
Source: Malaysia Cloud and Datacenter Digital Summit, 2020
He further shared key designs of EA principles that can drive digital transformation across organizations, as well as the key challenges faced by enterprises when moving from computerization to digitalization.
Importance of cybersecurity and risk assessment during cloud migration
Highlighting the key cloud migration challenges and risk assessment, Sina Manavi – Group AIA, shared how cloud migration is not as easy as it sounds. Presence of multiple vendors, agents, servers, administration overheads, integration issues, etc. make the process a bit complex for the first-time movers. He shared a few cloud migration challenges faced by almost every organization willing to step into the cloud:
- What security controls to use?
- Building a cloud security framework
- Building a data protection framework
- Planning for legacy apps, asset inventory, etc.
- Access to automation tools and integration capabilities
He further shared a few solutions to overcome the above challenges. According to him, setting up a cloud risk management and governance framework can simplify the cloud migration. He also emphasised the role of cloud service providers in helping organizations swiftly move towards the cloud.
Source: Malaysia Cloud and Datacenter Digital Summit, 2020
Lack of knowledge and cloud data management – key challenges to cloud adoption in Malaysia
In his session, Malaysia Cloud-First Strategy, IR. Wan Murdani Mohamad, shared Malaysia’s direction in accelerating cloud adoption from 2017 to 2021. The Malaysian government has set a target of achieving 50% cloud adoption by the year 2024. The focus in 2021 would be on the implementation of cloud-first strategy in the public sector.
To accelerate cloud adoption, Malaysia is focusing on two high impact domains – Governance and People. Formation of cloud computing committees and upskilling competencies across people through cloud awareness program are key strategies to speed-up the cloud adoption across the Malaysian economy.
He further stated lack of knowledge, skills, and experience in the cloud followed by cloud data management complexities as the key challenges that can hinder cloud adoption.
Digital Infra and cloud – the key drivers of datacenter growth in Malaysia
In his thought leadership presentation, Sabarinathan Sampath – SVP & COO, ZNet Technologies, shared his outlook on the datacenter growth in South East Asia, specifically Malaysia, and how cloud and digital infrastructure plays a key role in driving this growth.
Source: Malaysia Cloud and Datacenter Digital Summit, 2020
The presence of digital infra components like 5G, automation tools, cloud computing, and APIs can make businesses agile and help them in providing great user experience and build long-lasting customer relationships.
With its proactive measures to drive cloud adoption – from improvements in connectivity, energy sustainability, and business sophistication to enabling MYR 16 billion revenue opportunity for service providers with the advent of 5G, Malaysia is on a fast lane to cloud adoption.
Apart from key sessions and presentations, the event also had interviews of Wan Murdani Mohamad, MDEC, Vidit Arora, Securonix and interactive panel discussions like:
- Next-gen Cybersecurity – How can Malaysia do better?
The participants were Alvin Teoh, MDEC; Peter Leong, Technology Program Director; Vidit Arora, Securonix; and Moderator: Fong Choong Fook, LGMS
- Data Centers at the Crossroads: Transformational Strategies
The participants were Ong Chin Seong, PIKOM; Tan Tze Meng, MDEC; Mohamad Rejab bin Sulaiman, TM One; Rhys Cole, Powershield; and Moderator: James Rix, Arcadis UK
The event was sponsored by MDEC, Open Computing Singapore, HR.Exchange, Securonix, Insyghts Security, etc. DHN was one of the media partners.
Overall, it was an insightful event with a lot of takeaways for those in the cloud, datacenter, and technology domains.
If you missed the live event, you can watch the on-demand session to know more about the topics that were discussed.
If you’re looking to attend more such cloud and datacenter focused events, get ready to join Thailand Cloud and Datacenter Digital Summit on 4th November 2020. Register for this upcoming cloud event through this special link.
