By Danial Dzulkifly
KUALA LUMPUR, July 14 — Selangor is actively pursuing strengthening its technical and vocational training institutes through strategic partnerships to produce highly skilled workers and attract quality investments to the state.
Dato’ Seri Amirudin Shari said the Selangor government had established partnerships with significant partners to improve the training of highly skilled workers since 2020 through the Selangor Technical Skills Development Centre (STDC).
“In my experience, when we engage with potential investors and invite them to come to Selangor, they often ask about the availability of skilled workers and the types of jobs that can be offered.
“However, we cannot always guarantee that we will have the exact types of jobs they require, especially in highly specialised and highly skilled industries like aerospace or automotive manufacturing.
“Therefore, since 2020, we have actively explored opportunities to enhance our technical and vocational colleges. So we changed Inspen (International) College to STDC, and since then, we have signed agreements with Festo and Siemens, both from Germany,” the Menteri Besar said in an interview with BFM’s Breakfast Grille this morning.
Festo is a German automation company that manufactures and markets pneumatic and electrical control systems and drive technology for factories and process automation. At the same time, Siemens is the largest industrial manufacturing company in Europe and is the global market leader in industrial automation and industrial software.
“So why Siemens? It is because Siemens digital tools and machinery are used in around 70-80 per cent of factories in Malaysia. The same goes for our partnership with Festo, a renowned technical agency based in Munich.
“Additionally, we have formed an agreement with Apple, which resulted in establishing the first Apple Center for switch code in Southeast Asia. This centre In Shah Alam has already trained over a hundred students.
“In September, we will sign an agreement with Dassault Systemes. Although they may have started with aircraft, nearly 100 per cent of car manufacturers in Malaysia uses Dassault Systemes, and in the future, we could even leverage their future technology,” he said.
Amirudin also stated that in the previous five years, the state administration was able to develop more than 1,100 projects based on investments in the state, which resulted in the creation of more than 80,000 jobs.
He said that the First Selangor Plan (RS-1) 2021–2025, which focuses on key areas like economic stability, social progress, environmental sustainability, and people-centric governance, includes high-quality investment and job creation.
He said the five-year plan prioritises the people’s socioeconomic status and aims to achieve economic advancement and environmental conservation.
Amirudin added that the RS-1’s business-friendly strategy focuses on opening doors for high-impact investments, creating significant job opportunities, and assisting in the post-pandemic economic recovery.
