KUALA LUMPUR: The government will allocate up to RM1bil for customised packaged investment incentives annually over five years to draw international companies to the country, says Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng.
He said this was to attract Fortune 500 companies and global unicorns in high technology, manufacturing, creative and new economic sectors.
Lim said in order to qualify, companies must invest at least RM5bil each in Malaysia to generate additional economic activities that would support small and medium enterprises (SMEs), create 150,000 high-quality jobs over the five years, and strengthen the manufacturing and service ecosystems.
He also said that the government would allocate RM1bil in customised packaged investment incentives annually over 5 years to transform Malaysia’s best and most promising businesses into the most competitive enterprises in global export markets.
According to Lim, these incentives were strictly conditional upon the companies proving their ability to grow and export their products and services globally.
"We expect this measure to significantly strengthen our local supply chain ecosystem and create an additional 100,000 high-quality jobs for Malaysians over the next five years," he said when tabling the 2020 budget on Friday (Oct 11).
He added that the government had embarked on a comprehensive review and revamp of the existing incentive framework comprising the Promotion of Investments Act 1986, Special Incentive Package and incentives under the Income Tax Act 1967.
The new framework is expected to be ready by 2021.
Lim added that there were several incentives to promote high-value added activities in the electrical and electronics (E&E) industry to transition into 5G digital economy and Industry, including income tax exemption up to 10 years to E&E companies investing in selected knowledge-based services
He also said that they were looking to improve ease of doing business in Malaysia by reducing the number of steps to register a business.
