Sunday, August 28, 2011

Hi-tech to see at Cyberjaya, Malaysia

I will be at Putrajaya, Malaysia, in mid October 2011 for a conference. Apparently this is a bit like the center of Canberra: a planned city, specifically designed as a national capital with landmark buildings around a lake (and a bit dull). But Next to Putrajaya, and sharing the same same railway station, is Cyberjaya with a science parkand part of Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor.

Most such planned hi-tech centres have not been successful. London is attempting this with East London Tech City (or " Silicon Roundabout"), intended to build on the investment in London for the Olympics. Post-Olympic developments have been even less successful than artificial high-tech parks and it will be interesting to see how London does. One of the UK's successes is Silicon Fen, the area around Cambridge University. However, this grew up organically, as described in "The Cambridge Phenomenon". I have visited Cambridge a couple of times to see how this was done and it will be interesting to compare with the Malaysian equivalent.

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