COMSATS Membership Extended to Malaysia

The Executive Director COMSATS, Dr. Hameed Ahmed Khan, on his 2-leg tour to Singapore and Malaysia from 13 to 23 December, met the representatives and heads of the leading academic institutions in Singapore and extended COMSATS membership to the government of Malaysia.

During his four day sojourn in Singapore, the Executive Director visited two academic institutes, namely, National University of Singapore (NUS) and Nanyang Technological University (NTU), the two leading institutions of the country. The meeting with heads of the organizations focused potential collaboration in the areas of student exchange programs between COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT), National University of Singapore and Nanyang Technological University; building a research and knowledge network and for promoting entrepreneurial ventures between the members of the COMSATS Network of Science and Technology Institutions. The visit also aimed at building upon the existing alliances between the Singaporean and the Pakistani academic institutes.

In the second leg of his itinerary, from 17 December, Dr. Khan met the high ranking officials the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Science, Technology & Environment, government of Malaysia. The Executive Director COMSATS conveyed the Commission's willingness to include Malaysia into its pool of member states. The collaboration and cooperation with Malaysia is expected to benefit all the member countries from the exchange of both human and technological expertise available across the network. The areas that came under discussion included: establishment of Information Technology institutes; and setting up of virtual university; student and faculty exchange program.

Yet in another important meeting with the representatives of OIC Exchange Network, headquartered in Malaysia, headway was made between COMSATS and OIC Exchange Network. The two signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) some time back in the past for joint collaboration for the promotion of commerce and industry between COMSATS member countries and the OIC member states. The breakthrough in this area would strengthen COMSATS on hand project of Industrial Information Network (IIN) being undertaken jointly by United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO).