By Philip Stanfield
Published in the Belfast Newsletter as part of a series, part one of five.
In 2006 SLA invested in Malaysia as part of our growth strategy. We identified Malaysia’s capital Kuala Lumpur or KL as the ideal location in Asia for us to penetrate the exploding demand of Mobile Internet services in Asia. We are a privately owned high tech company HQ’d in Belfast but our clients are all round the world. We write the software that is powering the Mobile Internet enabling people to watch TV on the iPhones and buy music on their phone or check Facebook from the train.
Malaysia has a population of 28 million and is near Thailand. KL does have a semi-chaotic feel and is metaphorically somewhere between the traditionally Asian town of Bangkok and the Swisswatch-like order of Singapore. Malaysia has a well developed technology infrastructure. Logistically it is well placed to reach growing markets such as Hong Kong, Thailand, China and Indonesia. And it has good air connections direct to the UK and Australia and New Zealand and the Middle East. It’s really important for us to have first rate communications links to be able to visit clients and run projects.
Politically Malaysia is a pretty stable country. It does have it’s quirks such as a recent initiative to ban yoga but then Northern Ireland politics has more than it’s own share of bizarreness. . It has an Islamic constitutional elected Monarchy. The King is elected every 5 years from one of nine hereditary Sultans. Government is based on the UK Parliamentary democracy model with a voting age of 21 and elections every 5 years. Ethnically the country is distinctly divided. Indigenous Malays called Bumiputera ‘sons of the soil’ make up just over half of the population. Chinese Malaysians make up about a quarter of the population and those of India descent just under ten per cent. There is a strong British influence and history due to Malaysia once being part of the empire. This is seen in civil services practices and a fantacism for football.
There is a strong European ex-pat community in KL and a vibrant social scene. You can spend 7 nights a week at social events from Rugby matches, black tie dinners to watching the Premiership football live in your local Irish bar!
The food in KL is unforgettable. It’s not just because Craig our Australian Director from Asia is an avid foodie – but every time I go all we seem to do is eat. And it’s so cheap. Breakfast for 20p from a roadside Mamak stall is Roti Chenai .. a curried pancake with a hot tea or Teh Tarik ; for lunch it’s off to have a banana leaf curry for a pound ; and in the evening the world is your oyster – my favourite is Tamarind Springs which is in the jungle near KL where you have a glorious feast of Thai/Laos and Vietnamese food. You can even go for ‘fish and chips’ an authentic delicacy prepared by a guy from Hull. On my first evening we went to the bustling Bukit Bintang market for dinner. What an experience. You sit down almost anywhere in the market and order whatever you want and it miraculously arrives within a few minutes. The secret is that each restaurant owner has a deal with all the others that they can order food from them! That’s where I first tasted chicken fish with marmite! The secret of course is to go in with a local friend and avoid looking like a tourist.You can have a great night out for a fiver with absolutely no tummy trouble. And at the weekend you can fly Air Asia for Ryanair prices off to a beach resort such as Phuket.
Whilst Malaysia is a Muslim country I’ve found that in practice it is very tolerant of other faiths. Last Christmas when I was in the KL equivalent of Victoria Square, Belfast (except it’s 10 times bigger) there was a huge Christmas tree with lots of school children singing Christmas carols. It was like being at home except that it was 30C outside! Mind you I think another aid to social harmony is that in Malaysia you get public holidays to celebrate the special times of all the major religions ..Christmas, Hari Raya Aidilfitriat the end of Ramadan, Diwali ! In January, we had the Tamil festival of Thaipusam; which is partially banned in India itself due to some of the devotee’s practises such as sticking horrendous numbers of pins and hooks through their own cheeks & flesh. February was all dragon dancing, red lanterns and Chinese New Year, and KL came to a stop as all many of the Chinese went back to their family kampung.
In addition to the high level of education, strong work ethic and good technology infrastructure and political stability the clincher for us in choosing Malaysia as Asia HQ was the Malaysian MDEC – their equivalent of Invest NI – and it’s MSC FDI programme. Malaysia has attracted many large global companies to set up there including Dell, Cisco and IBM (http://www.mscmalaysia.my/topic/Company+Directory#). MDEC provided us with real practical support in setting up in KL the offer of 10 years 0% Corporation Tax helped too!
We have grown our KL office to around 40 staff and are based on floor 33a of the Menara Standard Chartered building – really floor 34 but that’s bad luck in Chinese culture. It is a prestigious and awe inspiring place to go to work in. And has fantastic views of the Petronas Towers. Our team works really hard but everyone takes time out for a big lunch. We have installed a recreation room with TV and XBox and free soft drinks to build the camaraderie. Our KL office has not just locals but also people from Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, UK and South Africa. Currently the biggest bicycle race in Asia, the Tour de Langkawi, is happening in Malaysia right now. And the South African team is leading at the moment cheered on by the ex-Pats in the office – including avid cyclist and South African Barney.
Malaysia has strong links with UK and Ireland. My first experience of this was as an Electronic Engineering student at Queen’s University. In my class the top students were the Malaysians sitting in the front row of class – with most getting first class honours degrees. The tremendous work ethic of the Malaysian people is something we can all learn from. And that’s what always impresses me when I walk into our KL office – The people are top class and really friendly too. Recently our KL team delivered a major software project for one of the biggest companies in the world. We have all come to almost expect bugs or ‘unannounced features’ in software today. However the customer told us that our KL delivery was ‘zero defect’ – This incredible achievement was down to the close teamwork of the KL team and our Belfast project management team.
Downtown KL has a fantastic Monorail built by Bombardier and sky scrapers galore. It is easy to be seduced into thinking it’s just like Europe. But you do need to remember this is an Asian country with Asian ways of doing business. Old fashioned respect and courtesy are the norm and relationships are extremely important. It can be more challenging doing things day to day than in Belfast and you need patience to deal both with bureaucracy and also a tendency for people to always say yes to every request – but whether they actually do anything is another matter! Who you know matters as much as what you know. And you need to go at the pace of the local buying cycle.I can assure you from experience the negotiating skills of the Chinese businessman are impressive even compared with those of a Ballymena farmer. They do enjoy getting their value for money!
We saw the impact of the global recession in Asia before the UK with budgets being slashed and projects put on hold. But we are also seeing a resurgent market in South East Asia with a lot of growth potential. And we have have recently won major projects in Australia, Qatar and Indonesia. Just as Europe is not one country it’s important to recognise that across Asia the cultures, economic models and business practices will vary country by country. Get all the advice you can from the consulate, INI, UK T&I, trade associations etc.
KL is a great place to work, live and do business. And a good base to reach out across Asia too. We’re delighted that we chose Malaysia. Like Belfast it seems to rain every day but the temperature is always in the 30′s.