KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian businesses, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and mid-sized companies, should not allow the growing buzz around artificial intelligence (AI), automation and Industry 4.0 to make digital transformation appear more complicated or expensive than it needs to be.

According to Dr. Salasiah Abbas, Chief Executive Officer of SOVA Intelligence (M) Sdn. Bhd., the starting point for transformation should not be technology, but a genuine business problem.

She said many business owners hear terms such as AI, robotics, automation and digital transformation and immediately assume that transformation requires millions of ringgit in investment and a complete replacement of existing systems.

“That is not necessarily the case,” she said. Instead, businesses should identify a specific operational challenge and address it with the most appropriate technology.

The problem could be a repetitive process consuming too many staff hours, management struggling to access operational information quickly, fragmented maintenance records, systems that cannot communicate with each other, heavily manual inspection processes or valuable historical data that is not being used to generate business intelligence.

“Start there, solve something real, measure the result and then scale,” Dr. Salasiah said.

This approach is particularly relevant to SMEs, many of which have already invested substantially in their existing technology infrastructure.

Dr. Salasiah said businesses should not assume that digital transformation means discarding systems that have served them well.

Employees may already be familiar with existing platforms, while years of operational and customer data may be stored within them. Replacing everything simply because newer technologies such as AI have emerged could create unnecessary cost and disruption.

“I don’t believe in throwing away a good system just because AI is fashionable,” she said.

“If it works, let’s see whether we can build around it, integrate it or make it more intelligent.”

However, as businesses become increasingly connected, cybersecurity is emerging as another critical consideration.

Greater digital connectivity means organisations must pay closer attention to infrastructure, access controls, data governance, system security and business continuity.

For Dr. Salasiah, cybersecurity cannot be separated from AI adoption. As more business processes, information and decision-making become digital, protecting those systems becomes an essential part of transformation.

Yet technology itself may not be the biggest obstacle. Dr. Salasiah believes leadership and people remain fundamental to whether a digital transformation programme succeeds.

When engaging with CEOs and management teams, she said her first questions are not about the software they use, but about the business itself.

“What are they trying to achieve? What is slowing the organisation down? Where are they losing money or time? What is affecting productivity? What can’t management see today? What would they like the organisation to be able to do that it cannot do now?” she said.

Only after understanding those issues should technology enter the conversation.

Malaysia’s business community, meanwhile, appears increasingly willing to explore AI. SOVA’s discussions and project opportunities have extended across logistics and fleet operations, engineering, manufacturing, temporary-power operations, aviation and maintenance, repair and overhaul, drone-based inspection, computer vision, industrial services, education, public-sector operations and smart-city environments.

For Dr. Salasiah, this diversity demonstrates that AI is no longer simply a technology-sector issue.

“It has become a business and management conversation,” she said. But she cautioned that there is a significant difference between using AI and transforming an organisation through AI.

An employee using generative AI to draft a document represents AI usage. A company that connects operational data, integrates systems, automates workflows and uses AI for forecasting, maintenance, inspection, resource deployment or management decision-making represents a much deeper form of AI transformation.

“SOVA is interested in the second,” she said. The company’s ambition is also to build an ecosystem that brings together international technology capabilities, Malaysian industry knowledge, universities, technical institutions and local talent to address real business challenges.

Different problems, she noted, require different solutions. One project may require enterprise software and AI, while another could involve computer vision, drones, robotics, automation, cybersecurity or system integration. Industrial environments may also require precision equipment and calibration.

“I don’t believe the future belongs to companies that claim they can do everything themselves,” she said.

“Technology is moving too quickly for that.” Instead, she believes organisations need partners capable of identifying what a problem requires and bringing the right expertise together.

Technology transfer and localisation are also central to SOVA’s longer-term philosophy, with the aim of building more capabilities within Malaysia rather than simply importing solutions.

Ultimately, Dr. Salasiah said Malaysia does not need every business to become an AI company.

“What we need is for Malaysian businesses to become better businesses because of AI — more productive, more efficient, more profitable, more innovative and ultimately more competitive,” she said.

Her message to business leaders is simple: they do not need to know what AI solution they need before starting the conversation.

They should instead identify what is taking too long, costing too much, being done manually, operating without sufficient visibility or preventing their systems from working together.

“If the answer is AI, we will bring AI,” she said. “If it requires automation, integration, robotics, computer vision, drones, cybersecurity or another capability, we will bring the right ecosystem together.”

For SOVA, that is the broader vision, not simply selling AI, but helping organisations identify where technology can create measurable business value and supporting them as they move from experimentation to meaningful transformation.

To know more about SOVA, visit them https://www.sovaintell.com/

Image is AI generated for Illustration Purpose