This article first appeared in Digital Edge, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on August 30, 2021 - September 5, 2021

Kiplepay Sdn Bhd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Green Packet Bhd, and Visa have introduced a first-of-its-kind prepaid card in a bid to accelerate Malaysia’s journey towards becoming a cashless society.

The Kiple Visa Prepaid Card builds on Kiple’s Wallet-as-a-Service (WaaS) ecosystem. The card will enable customers to go cashless more easily while also facilitating enterprises to fast-track their e-payment solutions in response to the growing demand for cashless services.

The prepaid card is designed to give customers instant access to more than 70 million merchant locations worldwide and can be used in retail stores, as well as online and mobile app stores.

Students, in particular, will now have the opportunity to own a card that is linked to their KipleUNI Student ID through Kiple’s e-wallet, which allows them to unlock more perks such as cashback and merchant discounts.

On top of that, students can carry out transactions securely, make cash withdrawals and even spend overseas using a single card.

For enterprises, Kiple offers a white label WaaS solution, coupled with the Kiple Visa Prepaid Card, as part of its services as a Visa principal licensee. This solution is best suited for businesses that are looking to offer their own e-wallet, with the added advantage of the Kiple Visa Prepaid Card’s access to a network of 70 million merchants in more than 200 countries and territories.

Leveraging this solution, businesses can roll out their e-payment platforms as quickly as within four months; accelerating their speed to market by five times from the usual 24-month lead time.

IBM has unveiled a new processor, codenamed Telum — its first chip with artificial intelligence (AI) inferencing acceleration that will allow it to conduct tasks such as fraud detection while a transaction is being made.

Three years in development, the breakthrough of this new on-chip hardware acceleration is designed to help customers achieve business insights at scale across banking, finance, trading, insurance applications and customer interactions. A Telum-based system is planned for the first half of 2022.

IBM Telum is designed to enable applications to run efficiently where the data resides, helping to overcome traditional enterprise AI approaches that tend to require significant memory and data movement capabilities to handle inferencing.

Businesses typically apply detection techniques to catch fraud after it occurs, a process that can be time-consuming and compute-intensive, owing to the limitations of today’s technology, particularly when fraud analysis and detection is conducted far away from mission-critical transactions and data.

Because of latency requirements, complex fraud detection often cannot be completed in real-time — meaning, a bad actor could have already successfully purchased goods with a stolen credit card before the retailer is aware that fraud has occurred.

According to IBM, Telum can help clients move their thinking from a fraud detection posture to a fraud prevention posture, evolving from catching many cases of fraud today to a potentially new era of prevention of fraud at scale, without affecting service level agreements, before the transaction is completed.

The new chip features a centralised design, which allows clients to leverage the full power of the AI processor for AI-specific workloads. This makes it ideal for financial services workloads such as fraud detection, loan processing, clearing and settlement of trades, anti-money laundering and risk analysis.

With these innovations, clients will be positioned to enhance existing rules-based fraud detection or use machine learning, accelerate credit approval processes, improve customer service and profitability, identify which trades or transactions may fail, and propose solutions to create a more efficient settlement process.

Microsoft Malaysia and Silicon Valley-based Seeloz Inc have entered into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to support the Malaysian supply chain ecosystem with artificial intelligence. This will affect major strategic sectors in Malaysia such as manufacturing, oil and gas, utilities, palm oil and public services.

The MoU will see the introduction of Seeloz’s Supply Chain Automation Suite (SCAS) powered by Microsoft Azure in the Malaysian and Asia-Pacific markets. According to Seeloz, SCAS is the world’s first autonomous requirements planning (ARP) to redefine supply chain planning using AI.

The breakthrough technology has been proven to reduce inventory carrying costs by up to 40%, reduce supply chain management costs by up to 25%, and substantially boost operational efficiency in more than 20 industry verticals.

Supply chains are a key part of Malaysia’s digital transformation journey, with the country being home to two of the top five ports in Southeast Asia and manufacturing being a key pillar of the nation’s economy. A manufacturing-focused solution redefining supply chain planning for inbound supply chains, Seeloz’s SCAS Production is designed to accelerate growth in the manufacturing sector, mitigate the impact caused by the pandemic and provide flexibility for businesses to explore more opportunities in the digital economy.

KSK Land, a wholly-owned subsidiary of KSK Group Bhd, is the country’s first property developer to use Delve, a software that utilises generative design and artificial intelligence to help developers design better neighbourhoods faster and with less risk.

KSK Land aims to use Delve to drive smart, sustainable developments through real-time data-driven feasibility and massing studies.

Created by Sidewalk Labs, a New York-based urban innovation company, Delve is a digital master planning tool that uses machine learning and computational design to enable developers to optimise their urban plans for multi-dimensional outcomes.

Delve generates a multitude of valid design options and quantitative analysis for a range of project scenarios. It also augments decision-making in the development process, allowing development teams to proceed with better information in less time, with fewer redesigns and better quality-of-life outcomes that maximise returns.

The application of Delve will help power the development of KSK Land’s data-driven AI pricing engine by KSK City Labs — a newly set-up data and tech arm of the company — enabling it to customise the pricing of units based on the personalisation of individual units and characteristics, including factors such as sunlight exposure hours.

Homegrown crypto data aggregator, CoinGecko, is organising its first virtual conference on non-fungible tokens called “GeckoCon — NFTs Gone Wild” (GeckoCon) on Nov 17 and 18.

The two-day virtual conference will have presentations, fireside chats and workshops covering the theme of NFT in the forms of art, music, gaming, sports, collectables and more.

GeckoCon’s panellists, comprising more than 150 key leaders in the NFT space, include crypto game platform Axie Infinity co-founder Aleksander Larsen; Proof of Attendance Protocol POAP) founder Patricio Worthalter; and NFT marketplace Rarible co-founder Alexei Falin. 

An NFT is a digital asset not interchangeable with other similar NFTs, represented by a unit of data stored on a blockchain. It can come in the form of photos, videos, audio or other types of digital files.

Also included in the line-up of events are virtual after-parties, competitions and powwows in the metaverse. For more information, visit conference.coingecko.com.

Bigo Live, a global live streaming platform, has launched the Bigo Marketplace, to help Malaysian micro enterprises and small and midsize businesses (SMBs) leverage the platform’s growing user base to increase brand exposure and sell their products.

The launch comes after Bigo Live’s first e-commerce online marketplace event, Bigo Pasar Malam, last month. Bigo Live users were able to participate in live stream sales sessions simulating the Malaysian night market experience.

During the live stream sales sessions, broadcasters offered products such as clothing, cosmetics, snacks, gadgets, accessories and homeware from their own businesses. The event drew nearly 200,000 views, with some managing to sell more than 100 items within two hours.

With Bigo Marketplace, Bigo Live has launched a new feature called “Shop” on the Bigo Live app, which users and broadcasters can access for an easier and more convenient shopping experience. 

hoolah, an omnichannel “buy now pay later” (BNPL) ecosystem, has partnered with Jumper.ai — an end-to-end conversational commerce and shopper engagement platform — to offer merchants in Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong the opportunity to let their customers pay later in a way that is convenient, flexible and transparent through conversational commerce.

This is a first-of-its-kind partnership in Asia in which a BNPL solution is made accessible on social and chat networks.

Through this partnership, merchants have an easy way to offer hoolah’s BNPL solution to their customers no matter where they prefer to shop, including Facebook, Instagram, LINE, Pinterest, Telegram, Twitter, WeChat, WhatsApp, SMS and YouTube. 

Funding Societies and foodpanda have launched a new initiative for small and medium enterprises to get financing without repayment of principal for the first three months.

The exclusive pre-approved financing service gives SMEs a three-month extension with no principal repayment for a financing tenure of up to 18 months.

Disbursement of financing within two working days, competitive interest rates and minimal documentation ensure a smooth and hassle-free experience for SMEs.

To qualify, the SMEs have to be a sole proprietorship, partnership or private limited company registered with the Companies Commission of Malaysia, have at least 30% local shareholding and have been in operations for at least six months.

Insurer AIA and corporate innovation powerhouse RISE are inviting start-ups to join their three-month intensive accelerator.

Companies operating in insurtech, consumer lifestyle, blockchain, health and biotech, sales and marketing tech, artificial intelligence and robotic process automation, data and cloud are welcome to apply.

According to the website, product-ready start-ups are preferred and must possess proven technologies that can add strategic value to AIA, among others.

Successful companies stand a chance to win a THB1 million (RM127,682) prize pool from AIA and an opportunity to receive a US$3 million investment from SeaX Ventures. For more information, visit www.aiarise.riseaccel.com.

Brother International Malaysia (Brother) is running its interactive Merdeka Match & Win competition in conjunction with the 64th Merdeka celebrations.

To win the daily credits, visit myhandycrea tions.com/BrotherMerdekaMatchAndWin, click on “Play Now” and match the Brother­MyHandyCreations Merdeka sewing embroidery patterns in the fastest time possible.

The fastest time submission of the day will win RM100 in Touch ’n Go e-wallet credits. Daily submissions will end at 11.59pm and the winner will be announced at 9am the following day.

Participants must be Malaysians and/or residents in Malaysia, and multiple attempts are allowed to improve scores and response time, but each person will be entitled to win only once throughout the duration of the contest. 

Contest details and daily winners will be published on the BrotherMyHandyCreations website. The contest runs until Aug 31.

ScaleUp Malaysia is on the lookout of high-growth scaleups to join the third edition of its accelerator programme.

The Cohort 3 programme, which is organised in partnership with China-based Quest Ventures and US-headquartered Indelible Ventures, is looking to shortlist 20 scaleups that are eyeing regional and global expansion.

Quest Ventures is looking to co-invest in a maximum of seven companies whereas Indelible Ventures is seeking to co-invest in up to five companies. This brings the total investment to about US$1 million. 

The 20 shortlisted companies will begin their accelerator journey in October before pitching in front of the investment committee at the end of the programme. As part of the partnership, ScaleUp Malaysia Ventures will invest at least US$59,000 in the companies selected by the investment committee.

To qualify for Cohort 3, scaleups must be operating on business models that have the propensity to disrupt existing markets or have solutions that can navigate future challenges and take advantage of opportunities brought about by any economic climate. 

Participants will be shortlisted based on five key criteria: highly scalable products or service with large growth potential looking to scale in Malaysia, Asean and at the global stage; ability to demonstrate product-market fit; looking towards fundraising in the near future; already generating revenue; and passionate and driven founders. 

Applications close on Sept 2. For more information, visit www.scaleup.my/cohort-3.

Hosted by: Endeavor Malaysia

When: 3pm, Sept 3

Endeavor Malaysia has limited spots up for grabs for its third edition of the Blitzscaling Circle, featuring Roland Ros, founder of Kumu, the fastest-growing social media app in the Philippines.

The talk will be on Ros’ journey: from building a messenger app to pivoting into a live streaming platform, which has become the highest-grossing app in the Philippines. https://forms.gle/G1oaGmdNL9RXnp4D9 

Hosted by: Talentbank

When: Sept 6 to Oct 31

This year’s Talentbank Digital Career Festival features more than 100 employers such as IBM Malaysia, Maybank and ByteDance. The virtual career fair will connect both job seekers and employers in a virtual environment using chat rooms, teleconferencing and webinars. www.digitalcareerfest.com

Hosted by: Ministry of International Trade and Industry

When: Sept 9 to Dec 31

Connecting global halal industry players, MiHAS attracted about 30,000 traders and visitors in 2019. This year, it aims to showcase its first hybrid exhibition of the event, providing both virtual and physical exhibitions. The virtual exhibition features AI-assisted business-matching sessions, a virtual network lounge, industry-specific sessions and live conferences. www.mihas.com.my

Hosted by: Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka (UTeM)

When: Sept 13 to 17

Women in Artificial Intelligence is a non-profit group aiming to increase female representation and participation in the AI industry. Speakers include Ever AI Technologies co-founder Dr Fairoza Amira Hamzah and Affin Bank director Marzida Mohd Noor. The event also features masterclasses for robotics, computer vision, social media analytics and more. wai-my-summit-2021.peatix.com/view

Hosted by: PyCon MY

When: Sept 18

PyCons are conferences about the Python programming language usually conducted by grassroots volunteers. This year’s keynote speaker is Dr Lau Cher Han, founder of CoronaTracker.com and CEO of LEAD, an institution that provides programs on data science. The conference will focus on the challenges and opportunities in using Python for automation in various industries in Malaysia. pycon.my

Scarlett Chai has moved up to become marketing manager of Luno, the country’s first regulated digital asset exchange.

Chai will lead the marketing efforts in Malaysia, focusing on strengthening Luno’s position as the country’s leading digital asset exchange. In addition, she will be responsible for expanding the company’s growth and success.

The exchange is currently storing more than RM1 billion worth of digital assets on behalf of more than 300,000 customers.

Datuk Mohd Rauf Nasir has joined Nokia as managing director for Malaysia, Maldives and Sri Lanka. Based in Kuala Lumpur, Rauf will oversee the company’s business and operations for the countries in his new role. 

Rauf has more than 30 years’ experience in the local telecommunications and IT sectors. Before joining Nokia, he was country president of Motorola Solutions Malaysia, where he helped grow the company’s business of mission-critical communications in the areas of public safety, oil and gas, transport and enterprise.

His role is especially crucial for leading Nokia’s delivery of innovation and key solutions in the region from the company’s portfolio, including high-speed private wireless networks and 5G.

Futurise Sdn Bhd CEO Mahadhir Aziz will leave the organisation on Aug 31 to helm another government agency. Mahadhir was appointed as CEO in 2018.

Futurise, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cyberview, an agency under the Ministry of Finance, works as a public policy adviser to ministries and industries involved in shaping Malaysia for the future economy.

Under Mahadhir’s leadership, Futurise spearheaded the National Regulatory Sandbox initiatives that led to major milestones such as the first testbed for autonomous vehicle testing in Cyberjaya and Malaysia’s first drone testing zone. 

Mahadhir chairs several strategic committees focusing on the development of Malaysia’s future tech and regulations, including the National Regulatory Sandbox Advisory Panel. He was also instrumental in the development and and  implementation of the Cyberjaya Global Technology Hub Blueprint. 

Futurise head of innovation ecosystem Tengku Azrul Tengku Azhar will act as the immediate contact person and executive committee members will stand in on an interim basis as transitional support for Futurise until a successor takes office.

Tesla has unveiled the company’s latest invention, the Tesla Bot, which will be able to perform basic repetitive tasks to eliminate the need for people to handle dangerous or boring work.

The illustrious Elon Musk announced on an online event on Tesla’s advances in artificial intelligence that an initial prototype of an androgynous robot will be ready by next year.

The Tesla Bot, which will have five-fingered hands and come in black and white, is intended to be “friendly” and built such that “you can run away from it and most likely overpower it”, reported AFP.

Focusing on form is the key to pain-free running, but that is easier said than done. The NURVV Run Smart Insole is a wearable device designed for runners who want to improve their performance.

The pressure-sensing insole works as diagnostic tool for levelling up training or addressing painful running woes.

The insole is linked to GPS tracker units, which weigh 22.7g each, and sits on the outside of each shoe’s ankle collar. The motion sensors on the insole analyses pace, distance, cadence and more. This information is then processed into detailed data on foot-strike patterns, pronation and balance. The data is uploaded to an iOS- and Android-compatible mobile app. 

The GPS tracker units are detachable from the clip-in housings linked to the insole, which means they can be charged separately without having to remove the insole from the shoe. A single charge lasts around five hours of running time. 

The collated data is then analysed and a “health score” given. The app makes recommendations based on this data, and if something is wrong with your running form, it offers ideas on ways to improve it. This could include suggestions on the optimal distance for your next run or, if it thinks you are overtraining, that you take a rest day. Available on Amazon for US$299.95.

Welcome to the age of behavioural addiction — an age in which half of the US population is addicted to at least one behaviour. We obsess over our emails, Instagram likes and Facebook feeds; we binge on TV episodes and YouTube videos; we work longer hours each year; and we spend an average of three hours each day using our smartphones. Half of us would rather suffer a broken bone than a broken phone, and millennial children spend so much time in front of screens that they struggle to interact with real humans.

In this revolutionary book, Adam Alter, a professor of psychology and marketing at New York University, tracks the rise of behavioural addiction and explains why so many of today’s products are irresistible. Though these miraculous products melt the miles that separate people across the globe, their extraordinary and sometimes damaging magnetism is no accident. The companies that design these products tweak them over time until they become almost impossible to resist.

By reverse-engineering behavioural addiction, Alter explains how we can harness addictive products for the good — to improve how we communicate with each other, spend and save our money, and set boundaries between work and play — and how we can mitigate their most damaging effects on our well-being and the health and happiness of our children. Available on Amazon.

The latest ZBook Firefly G8 — one of the new models from the recently refreshed line of mobile workstations from HP — is made for those who need performance, reliability and versatility to work fluidly and get the job done in any environment.

It is said to be the most powerful of its size and class, as it features a 15.6in display, a 4GB GDDR6 VRAM, NVIDIA Quadro T500 graphics option, and a selection of 11th Gen Intel processors — perfect for video conferencing, web browsing and streaming.

As businesses have shifted from traditional offices to hybrid work environments, creative and technical professionals need pro-grade performance on the go or stationed away from the office, stated HP in its media release. 

At just 1.35kg, the ZBook Firefly G8 is built for extreme mobility, as it is the world’s lightest mobile workstation with a colour-accurate display. ZCentral Remote Boost solution allows for real-time collaboration across teams and applications remotely with almost any device.

The real-time collaboration capability of this solution is a powerful tool that brings fast, responsive performance on demanding projects to artists, designers and engineers who need access to resources, compute power and infrastructure of the office or production studio while working from anywhere.

The HP ZBook Firefly G8 comes equipped with HP’s multi-faceted security stack that protects users, data and companies from external threats. The security stack includes HP’s Multi-Factor Authenticate to protect systems from unauthorised access. It also includes HP Sure Sense and HP Sure Run to ensure businesses will not be halted by malware or malicious actors.

The HP ZBook Firefly G8 is now available in Malaysia from RM5,959. To purchase, visit HP’s online store, Shopee or Lazada, or contact the HP For Business Hotline at (03) 7627 6550.

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