Call for strengthening India-Malaysia ties

Emphasising that it was the right time to strengthen business and trade ties between companies in Tamil Nadu and Penang, Tan Sri Koh Tsu Koon, chief minister of Penang, Malaysia, said both India and Malaysia could leverage their potentials in sectors like biotechonology, information technology, automotive, iron and steel, food processing, among others.

"The convergence of IT and life sciences offers global opportunities for Indo-Malaysian joint ventures. Companies in both the countries should take advantage of their strengths to offer productive and cost-competitive solutions to multinationals," Koon said.

He was delivering the keynote address at a Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) meeting here.

Koon said that Penang, a leading industrialised state of Malaysia, is moving up the value chain, focusing on high-mix and low-volume development of hardware products, while forging partnerships with emerging manufacturing destinations such as India and China for mass production.

The state employs proactive policies in partnering with emerging hardware manufacturing destinations, he added.

Penang has built a strong manufacturing base coupled with robust infrastructure for supply chain management. He cited Dell's Penang facility which produces over 95 per cent of Dell laptops sold in the North American market. Penang supplies custom-built Dell laptops to customers within four days of the placing of orders.

Koon noted that the entry of multinational companies had helped in creating a strong supplier base, comprising small and medium enterprises.

Echoing Koon's views, Gopal Srinivasan, member, regional council, CII-southern region and director, TVS Electronics Ltd, said there was huge scope for co-operation between Tamil Nadu, which produces over 50 million mobile phones, two million computers and one million cars annually, and Penang, which had evolved from a trading centre to a manufacturing hub.

Srinivasan said the signing of Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) between Malaysia and India in 2004 had resulted in a significant improvement in the bilateral business and trade between both the countries.

Malaysian exports to India accounted for $4,611.69 million between January-November 2006, as against $3,555.10 million in the corresponding period of the previous year. Indian imports totalled $1,221.48 million, compared with $988.26 million in the corresponding period a year ago.