News in Brief: April 5, 2022

SYARIKAT TAKAFUL MALAYSIA KELUARGA BHD announced its foreign shareholding stood at 9.26 per cent, or 77.38 million ordinary shares, as of March 31, 2022.

“The said percentage is within 30 per cent of the prescribed limit allowed to be held by foreigners under the company's constitution,” the company said in a stock exchange filing to Bursa Malaysia today.

-- BERNAMA

RESERVOIR LINK ENERGY BHD’s wholly-owned subsidiary Reservoir Link Sdn Bhd has received a letter of award from ExxonMobil Exploration and Production Malaysia Inc (EMEPMI) for the provision of equipment and service called the Annulus Wash and Cement Placement Equipment.

Reservoir Link non-independent executive director Thien Chiet Chai said the company appreciates EMEPMI’s trust in Reservoir Link’s capability to deliver.

“Looking ahead, we will continue in our active participation to tender for more projects in the oil and gas as well as solar renewable energy business segments to deliver the absolute best value to our shareholders,” he said in a statement.

-- BERNAMA

MEDIA SPECIALISTS ASSOCIATION (MSA) has opened entries for the 2022 MSA Awards, themed Malaysia in Metaverse.

For 2022, the “MSA Awards have undergone a restructuring of its judging criteria in order to reflect the changing media landscape and ever-evolving industry and to focus on the most important aspects of agency life – the body of work, the people, and the industry’s impact on culture,” the association said in a statement.

This year, the MSA Awards will expand the celebration of agencies’ work beyond media with the introduction of platforms such as Esports and Martech into the award categories, “thus allowing for a truer, more robust representation of the role of a media agency.”  

Submissions for the 2022 MSA Awards open on April 21, 2022 and closes at 12 pm on May 12, 2022 and are to be made online.

-- BERNAMA

HYUNDAI-SIME DARBY MOTORS SDN BHD (HSDM) has delivered the Hyundai Kona Electric cars to the first 13 customers in Malaysia.

Ranging from Kona Electric Lite, Kona Electric Plus to the Kona Electric Max, the new electric vehicles (EV) were presented to their owners during a key handover ceremony at the Sime Darby Auto Hyundai  Ara Damansara showroom. The Kona Electric is a B-segment sports utility vehicle in the EV market in Malaysia.

The first shipment of slightly over 100 cars was sold out almost as soon as it was first launched in Malaysia in November 2021.

Sime Darby Motors Malaysia retail and distribution managing director Jeffrey Gan said the growing EV segment continues to hold vast potential in Malaysia as the country strives toward decarbonisation within the automotive industry.

-- BERNAMA

AFFIN BANK BHD has appointed HCL Technologies Malaysia Sdn Bhd, and will also tap on Google Cloud, to enhance its data architecture and enable data-driven decision-making across every corner of its operations.

The investment is part of the RM316 million that the bank has earmarked in 2022 specifically for capital expenditure in information technology, whereby the bank’s on-premises data platform will be integrated with Google Cloud’s public cloud platform and equipped with artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities.

President and group chief executive officer Datuk Wan Razly Abdullah Wan Ali said the bank’s customers would greatly benefit from this as data architecture enhancement will reshape how products and services are designed and delivered.

“We are building for the future by tapping on advanced cloud-based technologies and data-driven strategies to improve our decision-making and promote greater synergies across our operations,” he said in a statement.

--BERNAMA