Most Malaysian Companies Use AI Only at a Basic Level. Here Is How to Move Past It

An opinion piece in The Edge Malaysia, citing AWS-commissioned research, reports that roughly 27% of Malaysian companies had adopted AI by 2024, up from 20% a year earlier. The same piece notes that around 73% of businesses remain at a basic level of AI use, with only about 10% applying it in more advanced, transformative ways.

In other words, many of us have tried AI. Far fewer have made it change how the business runs.

What “basic” usually looks like

Typing questions into a chat tool, drafting a message or summarising a document. Useful, but it lives on one person’s screen and disappears when they close the tab.

What moving past it looks like

• It is connected to your data. The tool works from your own orders, records or documents, not from a generic guess.
• It is part of a routine. It runs every day without anyone having to remember to use it.
• It has an owner and a number. Someone watches one measure, such as time saved or mistakes caught, so you know it is helping.

A minister recently told SMEs, as reported by The Star, that being an AI company does not mean just buying an AI system. Firms also need data systems, talent and safeguards.

A simple way to start

Choose one repetitive task. Write down how long it takes each week. Try a small automation on that task alone for a few weeks, and compare. If it earns its keep, grow it. If not, you learned cheaply.

If you want help choosing that first task, tell us what keeps eating your team’s time. We will listen first and suggest one small step.