Nuclear Malaysia, as a premier R&D organisation in nuclear science and technology, continues to play an active role and contributes to the implementation and realisation of national science and technology (S & T) policies to ensure that it remains a relevant public research institute. With a maturity of more than three decades, Nuclear Malaysia has been capable of facing the challenges and managing the change. In line with the current needs and development, a strategic action plan and its implementation has been developed to meet set targets. Nuclear Malaysia has placed emphasis on building the human capital potential and also ensuring that all activities fits the mainstream S&T and national interest. The change of name from Malaysian Institute for Nuclear Technology Research (MINT) to Malaysian Nuclear Agency (Nuclear Malaysia), and organisational restructuring have enabled the agency to realign its functions and activities. Following this reorganisation exercise, Nuclear Malaysia now has four programmes, namely research and technology development, technical support, commercialisation and technology planning and management services. These programmes will provide means for Nuclear Malaysia to focus its activities, including a renewed interest in nuclear power as one of the sources of energy for the nation.

Technology Planning and Development

In realising the potential of S&T as an agent for new economic development for the nation, particularly in facing the global competitive market, Nuclear Malaysia has focused its R&D activities into six priority areas, namely advanced material, advanced manufacturing, biotechnology, ICT, advanced alternative energy and nanotechnology. With its multidisciplinary features, nuclear technology has the ability to offer technical solution to arising technical problems. The R&D projects are market driven to produce beneficial products to generate economic returns through downstream activities. The implementation of R&D projects are periodically monitored and analysed to ensure that the projects are on the right track and meet the set target within the time frame. To strengthen project implementation and optimising resources sharing, several related projects have been consolidated into a few main projects, which will produce more significant socioeconomic impact. In this respect, apart from conducting collaborative research internally through the matrix system, research is also conducted through collaboration with other research organisations. Research collaborations with industrial partners have been also enhanced to produce research products that can be directly beneficial to end users. Thus, efforts have been made to ensure that research products can be commercialised through technology transfer and licensing.

Commercialisation of Technology

Efforts have been geared to commercialise research products that have market potential. Besides business partnership identification, initiatives have also been taken on products and processes promotion through participation in technology showcase and exhibition. Nuclear Malaysia also participates in exhibition and innovation competitions, and these opportunities have been taken up to develop networking. In this case, the promotional activities among small and medium scale industries (SMI) have been given special attention in line with the government’s intention to transform the SMI into self sustainable high technology industry. Several collaborative efforts have been sealed with selected SMIs to seek source of funding to carry out commercial activities. Effort to develop techno-entrepreneurship was not only limited to companies, but also with the staff of Nuclear Malaysia, who was also given opportunity to participate in the exercise. The Executive Forum held at Nuclear Malaysia, for example, saw well-known business figures invited to deliver talks related to the business world and to encourage interest in techno-entrepreneurship. Through commercialization and technology transfer activities, Nuclear Malaysia has generated an income of RM 14.5 million in 2010, representing about 23% of self sufficiency.