Local ICT industry still in infancy: Expert

THE Information Communication Technology (ICT) industry in Brunei Darussalam is still in its early stage and has yet to meet local demands or for it to go all out, said Dr Yong Chee Tuan, director of ICT Centre at University of Brunei Darussalam (UBD).

He had written a review of the state of ICT in Brunei through the Digital Review of Asia Pacific 2007-2008 and his views showed the uphill task the ICT industry faced.

He added that Brunei has the potential to reach the stage of maturity and going out onto the international level, but only with the support of the Government through a conglomerate of ICT experts to manage the front office of ICT.

"We also need to look at how businesses are conducted," said Dr Yong.

He added that Brunei needs to strengthen the business domain by not just concentrating on pure technology but also on understanding the nature of the business industry to fully utilise the technology.

On the subject of e-government, Dr Yong believes that without the proper white paper on e-government it would allow the public to have their own ideas of what e-government means to them and could turn out as negative.

"That can make things more difficult to move forward," said Dr Yong.

He added that the initiative will always be questioned unless a common framework is developed to move forward in which case the e-government needs to be redefined.

In addition, he suggested government agencies need to launch a few killer applications, thus building confidence with the public.

Moreover, there is also a need to support locally developed technology with intellectual properties to show that the ICT industry in Brunei is a growing and vibrant industry.

Despite the efforts done at improving the ICT structure in Brunei through laying down foundation such as networking and setting up bandwidth, Dr Yong said, that many are still dependent on using applications which have been proven to be successful.

"Private sector firms don't normally like to experiment with new applications to minimise the risk factor," said Dr Yong.

According to the review 2007-2008, Brunei's dependency on oil and gas industry must be addressed and the country has several options which it can take advantage of.

In the review, the ICT industry hold a lot of promise in developing and using it to strengthen diversification, but there is a need to resolve some of the internal factors to entice investors confidence.

Dr Yong's review made heavy emphasis on education, as he believes Brunei's education system can greatly benefit from ICT.

The Brunei Times