I’ve got to give it to MRANTI—their I-Nation Global Summit 2024 was probably one of the best I-Nations (or E-Nations, before MRANTI was established) I’ve been to.
Granted, I didn’t attend every single one in history, but if 2024’s was any indication of the event’s quality moving forward, sign me up for future ones right now.
Over the course of three days, various key dialogues were held. From the experience, here are four reasons why I think future iterations of the event will be worth your time.
Actually interesting expert lineups
First of all, who’s talking always matters. Different experts, different insights, and I-Nation 2024 brought together knowledgeable speakers in their respective fields to have impactful dialogues.
Names we saw included Prof. Dr Jomo Kwame Sundaram, Research Advisor at Khazanah Institute, Jack Melcher-Claësson, Head of Accelerate at Epicenter Stockholm, MRANTI’s CEO Datuk Wira Dr. Hj. Rais Hussin Hj. Mohamed Ariff, and many more.
One person I was personally anticipating listening to, though, was Tony Fernandes. Everything I’ve previously known about AirAsia, I’ve learnt online, so it was intriguing to hear what the man himself could share.
And share, he did—very charismatically—what AirAsia’s biggest assets for business growth have been, which we covered in a separate article here.
For 2025’s I-Nation, I would like to hear from even more exciting names that we don’t often see gracing the stages of business and industry events.
A big-picture focus
A core theme of I-Nation 2024 was bridging local and global markets, which is crucial as Malaysia continues to develop.
We still have big challenges when it comes to things like food security and healthcare transformation, and that’s where having global leaders share their strategies really helps.
I-Nation brought such experts together and allowed for the first step to deeper collaboration and powerful action—open discussions.
For example, there was the National Technology Innovation Sandbox (NTIS) Global Sandbox Forum which saw speakers from around the world share their sandbox success stories.
They talked about the importance of having an interconnected innovation ecosystem, the need for governments to be agile when it comes to policies, and the value of cross-collaboration amongst stakeholders and ecosystem players.
Hopefully, stakeholders in the audience were taking notes from the forum and other satellite events at I-Nation 2024 like the Ecosystem Builders’ Summit (EBS), Supercharger Finale 2024, and HealthTech Innovation Connect.
Bold, realistic discussions
I think it says something about a talk-heavy event when you actually want to lock in for a bulk of the conversations, even if the industries don’t involve you.
The key dialogues were well-curated in terms of topics that actually mattered, and many speakers tactfully shared opinions that would push the envelope for their sectors.
Not too much jargon was thrown around—the priority was to let the public know what’s going on and what’s being done, or needs to be done, to improve things.
One example that stuck with me was during the discussion of “Malaysia’s Efforts in Advancing Sustainable Agriculture and Robust Food Systems.”
Some insights boldly shared included acknowledging that Malaysia is not yet self-sufficient for various crops, and despite a lot of our pride in our agritech, the industry still has not gone through massive innovation.
Subsidies to strengthen food security are also likely not in the right place, and we need economic reform to tackle monopolies and cartels.
I-Nation’s panels gave us a realistic look at how Malaysia is doing (good or bad) in several sectors, and it was refreshing to witness instead of the “walking-on-eggshells” conversations that I feel some business events tend to lean towards.
They’re walking the talk
At the end of the day, though, hours upon hours of talks mean nothing if there’s nothing to show for them later on.
Thankfully, that’s not the case with MRANTI and I-Nation.
CEO Dr. Hj. Rais Hussin said that what they’re aiming to do is to create a report of sorts after every I-Nation to follow up on what has been done since the discussions, and it will be shared so that stakeholders can be accountable.
It’s a great move to take I-Nation and MRANTI’s efforts to the next level and shows that they’re serious about making a tangible impact to transform Malaysia for the better.
I’m all for that, and you should be, too.
- Read more about MRANTI here.
Featured Image Credit: MRANTI