KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s push to attract RM500 billion in investment and develop 60,000 highly skilled local engineers by 2030 must be matched by efforts to create, commercialise and own more homegrown innovations, said Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
He said Malaysia needed to bridge the “missing middle” between research and commercialisation by strengthening access to capital, connecting researchers with industry and ensuring innovations addressed real-world problems.
“Being part of the value chain is one thing. Owning more of the value is another,” he said in his officiating address at the University Research and Innovation Investment Summit 2026 (URIIS 2026) at the World Trade Centre Kuala Lumpur today.
Zahid said the country had already built a strong foundation in talent, infrastructure, research capacity and investment but needed to translate these strengths into greater economic value.
He said this required three shifts — from grants to a broader ecosystem of capital, from research outputs to real-world solutions, and from talent to enterprise and ownership.
On funding, Zahid said public grants would remain important for fundamental research and strategic areas, but industry, investors and private capital needed to step in once technologies showed commercial potential.
“Government can help fund discovery, but it cannot fund every stage of scale.
“Research grants create possibilities; investment, meanwhile, helps turn the most promising ideas into products, companies and markets,” he said.
He said research should also be assessed not only through publications, patents and prototypes, but by how effectively it solved problems in areas such as food security, healthcare, energy, automation and productivity.
Zahid said rural Malaysia could serve as a testing ground for innovations, including digital healthcare, renewable energy, water technology and smart logistics.
“As the Minister responsible for rural development, I can already offer you a ready-made laboratory — our rural areas, our kampung. And if you need a place to start, Bagan Datuk is always available,” he said.
On the third shift, Zahid said Malaysia must ensure its growing pool of talent translated into more locally developed technologies, intellectual property and globally competitive companies.
“We should not only be proud when something is Made in Malaysia. We should aim to see more technologies Invented in Malaysia, and increasingly, more intellectual property and enterprises Owned by Malaysia,” he said.
Zahid said Malaysia should continue to welcome global investment while also becoming a place where the world could discover technologies created by Malaysians.
He called on the Higher Education Ministry, other ministries, universities, industry and investment partners to follow through on promising technologies emerging from URIIS 2026 and identify those capable of attracting capital and moving towards commercialisation.
“As we look towards 2030, our ambition can be captured in three words: Create. Commercialise. Own,” he said.
Also present were Higher Education Minister Datuk Seri Dr Zambry Abd Kadir and Finance Minister II Datuk Seri Amir Hamzah Azizan, among others.
