Malaysia’s 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

2008 was now 3 days behind us,  with the new year 2009 waiting us with the full loads of challenges. A lot of interesting things happen in our IT industry last year, which is relatively small and young, as compared to the IT powerhouse such as India or US.

No event such as CES and CeBIT, or Masable or TechCrunch award here, but our own home grown events/awards are on the right path if it is groomed properly.

This post list some of the IT (Information Technology) events and awards that I came across last year. I’m well aware that there are many more that I might missed, but I’m more than happy to include it here, in case you mention it in the comments section.

The ‘when‘ is provided as it is, depend on 2008 event’s date. The list is not in order of important or whatsoever.
youthmalaysia Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

1. YouthMalaysia – The organizer of Youth 08 which is the largest youth event. Under this event, there are other project such as Malaysia Dotcom Youth Search , YouthSays andThe National Youth Entrepreneur Convention (NYEC). Youth09 is just aroung the corner, so you mingt want to checkout the official site for further detail

When: January each year

mcc Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

2. Mobile Content Challenge – Competition between universities and colleges to develope mobile content. Co-sponsored by Maxis via its Maxis Developer Program

When : July 08 – 31 October 08.

barcamp Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

3. Barcamp KL & JB – Is an informal workshop/conference where participant sharing and presenting the app/solution/idea to attendees. And not to misled you, here it the full meaning from barcamp itself

BarCamp is an international network of user generated conferences – open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants.

When : Barcamp KL held on July while Barcamp JB held on December. Visit their website for detail.

startupcamp Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

4. Startup Camp -Just like barcamp, this is the informal conference for start-up community to sit down together discussing and sharing ideas, strategies and etc

When: November

foss Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

5. FOSS – Malaysia’s premier free and open source software event

When: Since FOSS 08 held on November, you could expecting 09 event held on the same month. Do check the official website or follow their twitter to get update

apicta Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

6. APICTA 2008 – An award  to individual or organizations that build application/solution that benefit Malaysia and world as a whole. There is APICTA Malaysia which open to Malaysian only, and regional APICTA which open to participate countries from Asia Pacific.

When : APICTA Malaysia winner announced at Oct, while the regional award announced at November

pc fair 2009 Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

7. PC Fair – Organized by PIKOM, it is arguably the largest hardware, gadget fair in Malaysia. Held few times a year all over Malaysia, this fair used to be using as a medium to promote new solution/gadget with a bargain price.

When: First round started April every year.

ipcc Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

8. The Intellectual Property Creators Challenge (IPCC) – Annual creative multimedia content competition organized by MSC. Divided to 4 categories which are Animation, Computer Causl Games, Digital Interactive Comic and Mobile Edutainement Content.

When : Closing Date July 08

gew Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

9. Global Entrepreneurship Week Malaysia – An event where various type of peoples and organizations interact and taking part in a range of activities, to celebrate entrepreneurship across the globe.

When : 17 – 23 November

innotech Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

10. MSC Malaysia Innotech – Platform to connect stakeholders, local and international Venture Capitalists (VCs), entrepreneurs and implementation agencies as a means to move forward in the industry. International speakers within the industries will share their thoughts and ideas on the opportunities and challenges that exist in the Malaysian industry

When: Bi-annual

wcit Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

11. WCIT – Held in Kuala Lumpur in 2008, this event brings together global leaders in business, government and academia  through the exchange of policies and ideas on technology.

When: May

eny Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

12. Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year® Award – An award that need no introduction. It recognized entrepreneurs who has performed extremely well on their industry and leads the company to the new height. The winner will represent the country to the global award. 2008 winner can be found here.

When: Announced at the end of the year

itshowcase 468 60 Malaysias 2008 IT Events, Awards and Challenges

13 IT Showcase Asia IT Showcase Asia emphasizes on managing your IT resources right. Major highlights of this high-profile congress would include the latest updates on virtualization, cloud computing, IT security, IT governance, refurbished technology and networking. This is the place to check out the latest technologies like FTTH, Broadband / WiMAX, Blade Server Technology, VoIP and much more!

Date : 6-7 October 2009
Venue : Berjaya Times Square Hotel & Convention Center

Mashable 2nd Open Web Awards winners announced!

mashable awards 300x41 Mashable 2nd Open Web Awards winners announced!

The 2 awards under this umbrella, People’s Choice Winners and Blogger’s Choice Winners was announced recently.

This is the second year Mashable conducting this award where multilingual websites from all over the world compete on 16 categories each. Congratulation to all winners!!

The winner list, listing down a lot of social media sites that you have never heard before. It is great opportunities to get to know which one is great, but rarely getting a coverage or publicity especially if they are originated from Europe or Asia.

If you notice on the list, the winners on Blogger’s Choice Winner is a well establish and a familiar name, while People Choice Award is otherwise (at least in this region).

ShareThis & PlayFish are big winners this year, they won on their categories on both awards.

Head here to get the full list of winners

An evening in KL’s Pikom PC Fair

We spent this evening in KLCC & PC Fair. It was a rainy day when we depart from our home to the nearest LRT station at Bandar Tasik Selatan. The traffic is smooth although there are bumper to bumper queue on certain location due to holes on the road surface.

It took us about 35 minutes to reach KLCC via LRT . There are massive crowd heading to PC Fair including us, even though I initially presume there will lesser crowd considering the bad weather as well as the bad economy.

3107857612 cf1e22bab9 An evening in KLs Pikom PC Fair
Huge crowd heading to KL Convention Centre

When we reach KL Convention Center, where the PC Fair is being held, the place is already pack with peoples. We bring baby stroller along for our little Luqman, but unfortunately the security guard barring any stroller from entering the exhibition hall. So me and my wife have to keep switching carrying Luqman who is now 10kg weigh!!

3107860660 9699ebaaf2 An evening in KLs Pikom PC Fair
Taking a break outside of Hall 3

In total, there are 6 exhibition halls, but we skip certain hall such as some part of notebook & camera section , sound & speaker due to time constraint.

Netbook is obviously the ‘star’ of the show on this round of PC Fair. Each manufacturer trying to win the customer by providing the best deal including special prices, freebies & etc. Certain Netbook such as Dell Mini Inspiron partnered with Maxis to bundle the package with 3G subscription.

The new internet broadband player, P1 Wimax also made it presence big . The advertisement, banner, bunting, flier, and even the salespersons are almost everywhere, so I presume they are one of major sponsor on this edition

What I got?? I settled down with only 160GB Western Digital Element external hard disk drive worth MYR 169. My wife and I notebook’s are almost out of space, hence we need a new safe place to keep our ever-growing photos & videos.

3107862596 044d628d30 An evening in KLs Pikom PC Fair
160 GB WDElements

We’re heading back to our home around 8.00 after having diner at 1 of fast food outlet nearby.

3107858570 eb4002d1fd An evening in KLs Pikom PC Fair
KLCC and Maxis tower from KL Convention Centre

3107025671 f6ce7ff6c8 An evening in KLs Pikom PC Fair
Exxon Mobil Tower now flanked by Traders Hotel & a new Condos

A glimpse of APICTA 2008 award

apicta A glimpse of APICTA 2008 award

This post if part of my initiative to give more coverage to Asia-Pacific & Malaysia’s IT industry in general. Personally, I’m quite new with APICTA (Asia-Pacific ICT Award) although the about page show that it has existed since 2001.

Initiated by Multimedia Development Corporation of Malaysia (MDEC) on 2001 (if I’m not mistaken), APICTA which is now on its 8th edition, have just had its annual award held in Indonesia last November.

Malaysia, represented by 20 companies has contested in 16 categories and bag 3 wins, not too bad. They are:

Security
Nexbis National Security Solution
Nexbis Sdn Bhd

Industrial Applications
G.PRO RFID SDT
GPRO Technologies Bhd

Tertiary Student Project
Solar Powered Offline Car Ventilation System
Multimedia University

Before this regional APICTA award, there are Malaysia APICTA award which was held earlier to choose companies and applications that will compete on international level

The next APICTA 2009 will be hosted by Australia. Congrats to the winners and wishing for more innovations.

APICTA International Award 2008 Winners & Merits (Malaysia)

MSC Malaysia APICTA Award 2008 Winners

View the press release

PC Fair 2008 kicking your wallet

3097567810 e7fcdc4ac9 o PC Fair 2008 kicking your wallet

Another round of PC fair, which would be the last for year 2008. Guess what.. I’m not visiting any PC this year, because we were rewarded with ‘something‘ greater than gadget this year.

Nevertheless, this is just a heads up for those who wants to spend year end bonus (haven’t got mine) with shining new gadget.  But bear in mind, to spare some for the rainy day

This is the schedule for this week’s PC Fair. Full list can be viewed here

12 – 14 December 2008 (11:00am – 9:00pm)

KL Convention Centre, Kuala Lumpur – Kuala Lumpur City Centre, 50888 Kuala Lumpur

Mahkota Parade Melaka, Melaka – Jalan Merdeka, 75000 Bandar Hilir

Dewan Suarah, Bintulu, Sarawak – Jalan Tun Ahmad Zaidi, 97008 Bintulu

Batu Pahat (BP) Mall, Batu Pahat, Johor – Jalan Kluang, 83000 Batu Pahat