China’s ByteDance, parent of the popular social media app TikTok, is set to invest approximately 10 billion ringgit (US$2.13 billion) to establish an artificial intelligence (AI) hub in Malaysia, according to a Reuters report citing the country’s trade minister.
As part of this agreement, ByteDance will also enhance its data centre operations in Johor state with an additional investment of 1.5 billion ringgit (US$320 million).
The Minister for Investment, Trade, and Industry, Tengku Zafrul Aziz, later said that the investment will significantly contribute to Malaysia’s goal of increasing the digital economy’s share to 22.6 per cent of the nation’s GDP by 2025.
Also Read: Microsoft to empower 2.5M Southeast Asians with AI skills by 2025
Over the past few weeks, Southeast Asia witnessed a slew of initiatives by global tech giants to promote AI in the region. Microsoft recently announced that it would equip 2.5 million Southeast Asian people with AI skills by 2025. The skilling initiatives would be implemented in partnership with governments, nonprofit and corporate organisations and communities across Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Amazon also launched a similar initiative in Singapore to develop innovative AI solutions and support the city-state’s Smart Nation and National AI Strategy 2.0 (NAIS 2.0) goals. Furthermore, the company’s cloud business unit, Amazon Web Services (AWS), plans to invest an additional S$12 billion (US$9 billion) into its existing cloud infrastructure in Singapore from 2024 to 2028. AWS invested S$11.5 billion in the Asia Pacific (Singapore) region through 2023.
In April-end, Microsoft announced it will invest US$1.7 billion over the next four years in new cloud and AI infrastructure in Indonesia, as well as AI skilling opportunities for 840,000 people, and support for the nation’s growing developer community.
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