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Image credit: SME Association

THE Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC), through its newly launched Business Digitisation Initiative (BDI) today allocated cumulative funds of RM1.5 billion to support nationwide Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) business digitalisation.

Minister of Digital, Gobind Singh Deo said the initiative is also aimed to ensure MSMEs – which accounts for 97% of businesses in Malaysia – to receive comprehensive support across funding, digital tools and capacity building to successfully transition into the digital economy.

He added one of the major challenges faced by MSMEs when trying to take their businesses online is talent shortage.

“Many business owners understand how the pandemic affected them, but they still haven’t fully adapted to technology.

“The question is, why is there a lack of adoption, and how do we deal with it? One key issue we identified is a lack of talent,” he said during BDI’s launch today.

Also present at the launching event was SME Corporation Malaysia (SME Corp) chief executive officer Rizal Nainy, Digital Ministry Secretary-General Fabian Bigar and MDEC chief executive officer Anuar Fariz Fadzil.

Anuar, in his speech, said that the initiative is targeted to uplift MSMEs by building their resilience, enhancing competitiveness and future-proofing their growth through meaningful digital adoption.

“BDI is about tackling real business ‘pain points’, where it could lack skills, tools, funding or simply not knowing where to start, and to provide practical and targeted solutions for these businesses that are realistic and relevant to their operations and business aspirations.

“Our approach includes tailored support, strategic partnerships, access to financing and freemium and affordable e-invoicing solutions built on the Peppol framework, making digitalisation more accessible while encouraging MSMEs to scale locally and globally,” he said.

Various Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) collaborations between MDEC-SME Corp, financial institutions, digital banks, peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platforms and local service providers were formalised at the initiative’s launch today.

Among strategic partners participating in this initiative is Maybank Berhad as its financial institution partners, Boost Holding and GX Bank Berhad as its digital bank and e-Wallets as well as Capbay, Funding Societies as its P2P partners.

Source: https://themalaysianreserve.com/2025/03/25/mdec-set-to-digitalised-malaysian-msmes/