Geographic Information Systems (GIS) should no longer be seen as just a mapping tool, but as critical national digital infrastructure.
Esri Malaysia Sdn Bhd CEO Tan Choon Sang said in a world shaped by climate risk, urbanisation, e-commerce and data-driven decision-making, location intelligence is now foundational to how governments and businesses operate.
He explained to The Malaysian Reserve (TMR) that Malaysia’s journey with GIS began in reactive mode.
Major events such as Covid-19, floods in Sri Muda, Shah Alam, Selangor, sinkholes and industrial incidents forced agencies to ask urgent questions such as where the people are, what assets are at risk and how do they respond quicker.
“When disaster happens, people tend to look into things like, ‘I don’t have this, but can I do this?’” he said in an interview during the GeoInnovation Malaysia 2026 event recently.
During these crises, Esri Malaysia worked closely with agencies like the Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) and the National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma), sometimes without charge, because the priority is always public safety, not profit.
However, Tan acknowledged that the country is now shifting into a proactive phase.
Instead of waiting for disasters, agencies are asking “what if” questions such as potential flood scenarios in Kuala Lumpur (KL), or if the traffic collapses.
Crucial information such as having evacuation data and knowing where to send people to help is where GIS moves from emergency response into long-term planning and prevention.
A key driver of this shift is the rise of smart cities and digital twins.
Digital twins allow cities to simulate realworld conditions in virtual environments such as testing roads, buildings, utilities and policies before they are built or changed.
“They are trying to build an environment where they can actually test it out. The same principle can be applied like designing a car and testing it on the road first,” he explained.
With these tools, councils can experiment safely, predict outcomes and choose better solutions for their communities.
However, he was careful to challenge narrow definitions of smart cities. For Tan, smart is not just about closed-circuit television (CCTV), traffic lights, or saving electricity.
“A smart city is a comfortable city where families can have jobs, have enough public facilities and a lifestyle that supports families,” he said.
A true smart city is safe, livable, economically viable and socially sustainable.
For that, Tan insisted that technology must support people, not just automate infrastructure.
Beyond the government, he highlighted how location intelligence directly supports Malaysia’s over RM450 billion ICT and e-commerce sectors.
In e-commerce, location transforms how businesses understand customers, logistics and market reach.
Two people may look similar demographically, but once location is added, behaviour and needs diverge.
“By adding a location, things will be very, very much different,” he said, giving the example of Domino’s Pizza and other delivery-driven businesses that rely heavily on geospatial technology to optimise routes, store placement and customer access.
GIS also plays a major role in asset management for large infrastructure owners such as utilities and property developers.
Tan described how organisations must first know what assets they have, then maintain them proactively rather than reactively.
With proper data, records and location context, owners can extend asset life, reduce downtime, manage costs, and protect long-term value, especially for heavily used energy and transport assets where even one day of disruption is expensive.
Despite these opportunities, he acknowledged that Malaysia still faces major challenges especially around data integration and sharing.
Many agencies collect the same data separately, leading to duplication, higher costs and inefficiency.
Cultural resistance is often stronger than technical barriers, as data is seen as sensitive or owned by individual departments.
Yet for Tan, the solution is building trust, showing value and creating systems that make data useful rather than just stored.
“Data is the strength, everything is data,” he stressed.
GIS platforms allow organisations to consume large datasets including population, movement, infrastructure, environment and turn them into insights, predictions, and better decisions.
Looking ahead, Tan believes the future of Malaysia’s geospatial ecosystem depends on breaking the stigma of siloed enterprise tools, saying if agencies and companies can share data through common platforms, the benefits multiply.
Costs fall because data is not collected twice while insights improve because everyone works from a richer, shared picture of reality. In return, productivity rises because decisions are faster and better informed.
Tan also urged private companies to not underestimate location analytics.
As he explained, many organisations still focus only on transactional data — what was bought, how much, and how often it was purchased but without understanding where things happen, they miss the deeper story of behaviour, risk and opportunity.
“Do not underestimate location and analytics, especially for companies heavily involved in logistics,” he said.
In essence, his vision is of GIS as Malaysia’s invisible backbone, supporting disaster resilience, smarter cities, stronger economies, and better lives. He envisions GIS to not just provide maps but meaning, prediction, and power through location intelligence.
Esri Malaysia’s GeoInnovation Malaysia 2026 event highlighted how geospatial technology is moving beyond mapping into a core decision-making platform, with 10 organisations recognised for projects that demonstrated measurable impact, strong adoption and long-term vision.
According to chief technology strategist Joanne Loh, the award framework is designed to distinguish between organisations at different stages of GIS maturity.
“We have two categories — the Pinnacle Award for organisations that have implemented GIS for some time; and the Rising Star Award for those with implementations of less than three years,” she told TMR.
From nearly 30 submissions, Esri Malaysia selected six Pinnacle winners and four Rising Star winners after a detailed assessment process.
Loh explained that evaluation went beyond technical deployment, focusing on how widely GIS is used across an organisation and its ecosystem.
“We look at how geospatial technology is used across operations, whether it is just one person, across the organisation, or even involving the community,” she explained.
She shared that innovation, collaboration and a clear system roadmap were equally critical.
“We also evaluate the impact they have achieved, including the return on investment,” she said.
One of the four Rising Star winners was Tenaga Nasional Bhd’s Land Management Unit (TNB-LMU), which was recognised for achieving a fully paperless workflow, transforming how land parcels are managed and monitored in the field.
Loh stated that field officers no longer rely on paper-based documentation, significantly shortening processing time and improving coordination between office-based and on-site teams.
Meanwhile, Gamuda Engineering Sdn Bhd was recognised for integrating GIS with Building Information Modelling (BIM) to monitor construction progress and manage stakeholder communication on large-scale projects.
By consolidating data into a single platform, the company enables thousands of stakeholders to operate from a shared, traceable view of project developments.
Among the Pinnacle winners, Majlis Perbandaran Hulu Selangor (MPHS) stood out for its organisation-wide adoption of GIS.
The local authority integrated geospatial tools across licensing, enforcement and public services, enabling faster access to information for residents through a public portal and on-site kiosks.
Processes that previously took weeks can now be completed in seconds, while real-time integration with complaint systems allows enforcement teams to prioritise resources more effectively.
“What impressed us was the level of collaboration. It is not just one IT or GIS department — it is being used by enforcement officers on the ground and actively engaging citizens through two-way feedback,” Loh said.
Looking ahead, she said Esri Malaysia continues to work with users on initiatives such as disaster management and digital twin development, highlighting GIS’s evolving role as a foundational platform for planning, prediction and public service delivery.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Shauqi Wahab
Dieser Artikel ist neu veröffentlicht von / This article is republished from: The Malaysian Reserve, 28.01.2026
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