More Data Scientists in Malaysia, please

The national ICT agency, Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) supported by seven public and private institutes of higher learning (IHLs) has plans to increase the number of local data scientists from the current 80 to 1,500 by the year 2020.

MDeC chief executive officer Dato' Yasmin Mahmood said the national Big Data Analytics (BDA) initiative will be supported by specialised data science programmes to address talent gap and rising demand for data professionals in Malaysia.

From July 2015 onwards, the universities that will offer undergraduate and post-graduate data science and computer science courses with data and business analytics specialisations are Asia Pacific University (APU), Malaysia Multimedia University (MMU), International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM), Sunway University, Monash University, University Institute Technology Mara (UiTM) and University Teknologi Petronas (UTP).

MDeC has also introduced a Data Science specialisation using Massive Online Blended Learning Approach (MOOC), an online course using content from Johns Hopkins University, in collaboration with Coursera, leader in providing universal access to education. This data analytics course is an extension to MDeC's existing MyProcert, a government-subsidised professional certification.