Infocomm Foundation, Dutch firm ink big data business deal

AMSTERDAM: Malaysia Infocomm Foundation (MIF) and Xomnia B.V. of the Netherlands signed a framework cooperation agreement on Monday to set up a joint venture (JV) company in Malaysia specialising in the big data business.

Big data refers to data sets that are so large or complex data that traditional data processing application software is inadequate to deal with them.

The agreement was signed by MIF chairman Raja Mazhar Mohar Tun Raja Mohar, executive director Saad Mohib and Xomnia founding partners William van Lith and Ollie Dapper.

It was witnessed by Infocomm founder Datuk Mohd Radzi Abd Latif.

Raja Mazhar told Bernama that the JV company would be set up within a year to help realise the government’s goal of producing 20,000 data analysts and 2,000 data scientists by 2020.

“We want to be at the forefront to support the government’s policy under the Big Data Framework and the digital economy,” he said.

Raja Mazhar said by partnering Xomnia, a pioneer in datathon in the Netherlands, the new company also aims to make Malaysia an international hub for big data entrepreneurship.

It would also focus on developing young talent through a competitive environment in datathon.

Van Lith said his company was “very excited” with the partnership as it would provide a chance to achieve its big data and artificial solutions on a global scale.

“We are also very happy that we can now educate talent on a larger scale than ever before,” he said.

Citing examples of the big data business, he said Xomnia created and developed predictive models such as when a burglary would happen and predicting an energy crisis.