KUCHING, Sept 28: Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg yesterday witnessed the signing of two memorandums of understanding (MoUs) at San Jose, near San Francisco in California, that could catapult Sarawak’s digitisation agenda.
The first MoU was signed between Sarawak-based company PPTelekom and Cisco, a global leader in data centre technology, at the conglomerate’s headquarters in San Jose.
The MoU is a private initiative between PPTelekom and Cisco to accelerate the development of a Mega Data Centre (MDC) Hub in Sarawak by banking on the state’s strategic advantages, namely its abundance of hydropower, safe and stable climate, and strategic location in the centre of Asia.
The second MoU was signed between Sarawak Information System (SAINS) and Cisco to expedite Sarawak’s transformation from an economy heavily dependent on non-renewable resources to one that would be powered by digitisation.
The collaboration would help to build a secure intelligent platform as the foundation for the state’s digital transformation as well as developing leading cybersecurity capabilities to safeguard Sarawak’s citizens, digital assets and businesses.
Abang Johari, in his brief address after the signing ceremonies, expressed confidence that a secured big data system would become an engine of growth for Sarawak for decades.
Digitisation would be the way forward for Sarawak in line with world trend towards the realisation of an economy based on digital technologies, he pointed out.
The chief minister and members of his delegation arrived in San Francisco on Wednesday, on the second leg of his working visits overseas.
Earlier, the delegation visited the research and innovation facilities at Stanford University campus where they were given briefings on education, research and innovation at the university before being taken on a conducted tour of labs, research and education facilities at the campus in San Francisco.
At the Cisco headquarters, the delegation was given presentations on the future of technology and its impact on the country and the government’s digitization programme and also an insight into secured intelligent network platform for government services. — DayakDaily
