Malaysia Semiconductor Industry Association

STRATEGICALLY DEVELOPING

MALAYSIA’S ELECTRONICS AND SYSTEMS

MALAYSIA SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT

Malaysia’s strong standing within the global semiconductor market today owes much to the vision and foresight of its leaders, especially in the nation’s post-independence era.

During the 1960s, the fledgling nation was looking to transition its economy from one historically based on mining and agriculture, to an alternative focus on manufacturing. Furthermore, electrical and electronics (E&E) was quickly identified as a sector of gigantic potential due to Malaysia’s semi-skilled and Englishproficient workforce, emerging as an ideal match.

Free Industrial Trade Zones (FTZ) were subsequently established across the nation and foreign direct investments (FDIs) were put into immediate development. From 1972 onwards, Malaysian pioneers arrived and set up facilities, focusing on states like Penang, Selangor, Kuala Lumpur, Melaka and Johor which had the most advanced infrastructure at the time.

Areas that were historically made up of plantations and paddy fields transitioned into hubs of manufacturing, steadily but surely transforming an agrarian economy into one driven by new technology.

Over time, this development catapulted Malaysia onto the global stage, to achieve its position as a key player in the industry. With approximately seven percent of the total global semiconductor trade flowing through the nation, Malaysia continues to invest in its future.

As a well-established assembly and testing hub within the worldwide semiconductor supply chain, Malaysia is prominently positioned to experience significant growth. We step inside one of the nation’s key associations at the helm of this vital development

Writer: Ed Budds | Project Manager: Deane Anderton

INTERVIEW: MALAYSIA SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION

As the voice of Malaysia’s burgeoning semiconductor sector, we speak with Dato

Seri Wong Siew Hai, President of Malaysia Semiconductor Industry Association, to unpack its aims, objectives and response to recent challenges

Malaysia Semiconductor Industry Association is a sector-wide association covering companies incorporated across

the nation who are involved directly or related to the ever-expanding Malaysian semiconductor industry.

The association has ambitious aspirations of nurturing and growing the complete ecosystem to elevate Malaysia’s semiconductor companies’ global market position and value chain by enhancing their capabilities and capacities.

As the voice of Malaysia’s burgeoning semiconductor sector, we speak with Dato Seri Wong Siew Hai, President of Malaysia Semiconductor Industry Association, to unpack its aims, objectives and response to recent challenges

Malaysia Semiconductor Industry Association is a sector-wide association covering companies incorporated across the nation who are involved directly or related to the ever-expanding Malaysian semiconductor industry.

The association has ambitious aspirations of nurturing and growing the complete ecosystem to elevate Malaysia’s semiconductor companies’ global market position and value chain by enhancing their capabilities and capacities.

APAC Outlook (AO): What trends are currently developing and transforming the industry and how are you responding to them?

Dato Seri Wong Siew Hai, President (DH): Malaysia has continued to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) as well as investment from both local and domestic companies

The one major trend that is impacting us and that is being talked about in great detail across the whole industry is the US-China trade war and the geopolitical tension and the implications that this has on Malaysia. Semiconductor companies are trying to reduce and mitigate their risk by having a plus-one strategy for China and Taiwan, as nobody can afford to put all their eggs in one country when it comes to trade. We then hope that Malaysia to be the plus one for other nations in terms of trade strategy, to directly benefit from this recent trend.

What We Make, Makes A Difference

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MALAYSIA SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION OBJECTIVES

• R&D and technology – To strategically develop Malaysia’s semiconductor industry including electronics and systems, by nurturing and growing the complete semiconductor ecosystem.

• Ecosystem – To elevate Malaysia’s semiconductor companies’ global market position and value chain by enhancing their capabilities and capacities.

• Advocacy – To be the collective voice of the semiconductor industry by advocating the industry’s challenges and building positive relationships with the government and its agencies, as well as other industry associations and chambers of commerce.

• Global competitiveness – To collaborate with the government on strategy formulation and policy advocacy to enable Malaysia’s semiconductor industry, including electronics and systems, to be globally competitive.

AO: Are there any key investments or recent projects you’re working on that you’d like to pay special mention to?

DH: We have quite a lot of exciting announcements to come and have many more lined up for the future.

Because of the recent global geopolitical tension, our industry remains in a state of change. We are still trying to capitalise and seize the opportunities to win more business. We’re currently witnessing lots of multinational corporations as well as Chinese companies which are all attempting to figure out solutions for the geopolitical tension and they are looking at Malaysia as a solution to either expand or move their products into our nation, which is obviously positive for us.

AO: What would you say is the defining factor of Malaysia as an investment location that makes Malaysia stand out from the vast competition that it faces?

DH: Many of the companies that we do business with have been active in Malaysia for 50 years, so one crucial advantage we have is the years of relative experience to all the other countries in the region.

Next, we have strong automation companies in Malaysia supporting both the semiconductor and electronics industry. So, if you are looking for automation solutions to

do your manufacturing, we have a lot of experience in this area, alongside our strong capabilities in engineering and management, we have excellent talent and leaders in the industry.

Lastly, we have very good architects who are familiar with the requirements and specifications of multi-national companies having built up over 50 years of experience and who know exactly how to build the correct buildings and spaces. Furthermore, our experienced and knowledgeable contractors and architects understand the requirements of both US and European companies, which provides us all with great peace of mind.

SMARTer Worker

SMARTer Machine Automation

SMARTer Operation

SMARTer Asset

SMARTer Engineering

SMARTer Warehouse

Sophic Automation SDN BHD (Sophic) provides innovative industrial digital solutions to over 50 multinational corporations (MNCs) and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Southeast Asia. We have the capabilities to improve business efficiencies through our turnkey offering in automation and digitalisation solutions as well as engineering services. We’re solving customer pain points by enabling adoption of i4.0 technology and digitalisation, allowing our customers to improve their operation excellence and sustainability. Our company provides the most innovative and effective industrial automation solutions via our wide range of SMARTer solutions as below:

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SMARTer Operation solutions enables monitoring and control of functions at the operations control centre and/or backup control centre. This will allow for remote supervision and status control of machinery and equipment in a manufacturing line and smart city operations. To enable operation excellence, our overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) solution is used to measure productivity, as well as enable improvement in targeted areas of the manufacturing process. This solution helps improve performance through visualisation of data, measuring machine availability, quantifying quality of output and production cycle time, and systematically eliminating sources of production loss. The information gathered can also provide insights to enable decision making in relation to the acquisition of new machineries and equipment, and resource planning.

SMARTer worker also known as workforce efficiency solution, is digital system with smart wearable devices equipped with our in-house designed software application which will assist in various functions of a business operations.

The solutions also digitally record the activity performed, allowing for managers to govern the performance of its workers and enable paperless operations.

SMARTer asset solution (CMMS) enable real time transaction and analyses maintenance data for key assets such as machinery, inventory and spare parts availability. It centralises all maintenance information and data (such as asset parts and costs, as well as asset repaired and repair time) and facilitates the processes of maintenance activities (such as scheduling maintenance and track work orders). This enables predictive maintenance and allows for real-time response to any equipment failures or breakdowns.

Our bespoke SMARTer machine would be able to help address customer specific needs to improve its production automation which would

cover the robotic handler, material transfer via AMR / ARV, material storage, auto packing and vision inspection.

The SMARTer Warehouse solution, which is also known as an intelligent or automated warehouse, is a technologically advanced facility that utilises various cutting-edge technologies and systems to optimise and enhance its operations. The primary goal of a smart warehouse is to improve efficiency, accuracy, and overall productivity in the storage, handling, and distribution of goods. The implementation of smart warehouse technologies aims to reduce errors, minimise manual labour, optimise space utilisation, and accelerate order fulfilment.

The SMARTer engineering service team are able to provide the expertise to manage and undertake operations in semiconductor advance packaging manufacturing activities and product engineering services such as post silicon validation and new production introduction process for semiconductor products, as well as carry out customised software development support by leveraging our employees’ technical expertise in development of digitalised solutions and automated equipment. The team combines decades of industry experiences with the latest technology and analytics, to deliver SMARTer products and solutions that help the customers to outpace the competition.

These advanced solutions and higher valued engineering services are adaptable to the latest business needs and seamlessly scale up the production capacity while maintaining the same level of operational excellence. Sophic believes that the convergence of internet of things (IoT) and artificial intelligence unlock new levels of efficiency, precision, and innovation for SMARTER solutions. In conclusion, the company has built regional partnerships and has driven contributions towards the growth of Industry 4.0 in Malaysia. The Industrial IoT (IIoT) powerhouse has fostered local employment opportunities as one of the leading solutions providers and has played an integral part in forging a path to Malaysia’s Industry 4.0 transformation, having worked with local state authorities.

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AO: What are some of the major challenges that you’re having to contend with at the moment?

DH: Firstly, we are trying to take this opportunity to work with the government to improve the ease of doing business in any way that we can. For example, by getting expatriates the correct passes to work in the country, which used to take around six months, we’re reducing that time to less than 30 days.

Secondly, all around the world there is a talent issue, and at present Malaysia is facing a similar thing. We are also trying to work on programmes to try to take care of this problem. This is being achieved by enhancing the training after university and improving skillsets so that people can get jobs and support the factories in whatever the industry needs.

“EXCITING OPPORTUNITIES ARE AVAILABLE FOR OUR PEOPLE, AND THEY PRESENT THE ABILITY TO ALLOW STAFF TO REACH A HIGHER LEVEL IN THE ORGANISATION”

- DATO SERI WONG SIEW HAI, PRESIDENT, MALAYSIA SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION

Your Go-To Source for Innovative Solutions

At NI, we deliver test solutions that scale from the validation lab to the production floor and meet your evolving business needs at every step of the process. Since our inception in Penang, Malaysia in 2009, NI has partnered with semiconductor organizations and industry partners to accelerate semiconductor product development through disruptive approaches to test. As the semiconductor business continues to boom in APAC, we continue to scale our flexible hardware and software offerings to enable our customers to leverage test to optimize product and business performance.

We understand the unique needs of a production environment and have built our approach to semiconductor test based on a platform of flexible hardware and software that you can use from the lab through production. Our production-ready solutions like our Semiconductor Test System (STS) offers a single ATE platform that scales from characterization labs to the production line and meets the operational requirements of the production floor. Its compact design eliminates the need for extra floor space and power required by traditional ATE testers that unnecessarily increase the cost of test.

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Meanwhile, as all this is happening, we are also talking to the government to see how we can use other nation’s talent, since other countries around the world, including the US, Singapore, Australia and the UK, are all using international staff. On top of this, Thailand, China and Taiwan are hiring our people, so we are trying to encourage the government to realise that we’ve got to also utilise other countries resources too.

AO: What does it mean to the association to be celebrating its 50th anniversary this year?

DH: I always say that the US has the American dream, and everybody worldwide has their own dreams too, so we are aiming to create the Malaysian dream. This is especially true for the semiconductor industry where we now have 50 years of experience. These exciting opportunities are available for our people, and they present the ability to allow staff to reach a higher level in the organisation. The Malaysian dream of success and freedom is now possible in this country, not just in management and leadership, but even in sectors such as design and development.

“THE MALAYSIAN DREAM OF SUCCESS IS NOW POSSIBLE IN THIS COUNTRY”

- DATO SERI WONG SIEW HAI, PRESIDENT, MALAYSIA SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION

MALAYSIA SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION

PRODUCED BY APAC OUTLOOK MAGAZINE