The National AI Office (NAIO) is the body Malaysia built to do what the roadmap’s AI-CIU never did: act as a single, central authority for national AI. It is the most important institution in Malaysian AI today — and understanding it is essential to understanding everything that has happened since 2024.
Approved by Cabinet on 28 August 2024 and launched by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim on 12 December 2024, NAIO sits under the Ministry of Digital and was incubated for its first year under MyDIGITAL Corporation. It is led by Shamsul Izhan Abdul Majid (“Sam Majid”).
The seven first-year deliverables
NAIO set itself seven deliverables to complete within its 12-month incubation period, with staggered releases through 2025.
What NAIO has actually done
Beyond the deliverables, NAIO and the Ministry of Digital have moved on several fronts in 2025: launching the AI Malaysia (AIM) platform to connect business, research, policymakers and ASEAN partners; overseeing the rollout of Google’s Gemini suite to some 445,000 public officers; hosting ASEAN AI engagements; and finalising the National AI Action Plan 2026–2030, which sets a goal of placing Malaysia in the global top 20 for AI readiness by 2030.
How NAIO differs from the body the roadmap planned
NAIO is not the AI-CIU renamed. It sits in a different ministry, arrived three years later, and carries a forward-looking mandate to build a new plan rather than to complete the old one. That distinction is the crux of why the 2021 roadmap was superseded rather than finished — explored in NAIO vs the AI-CIU.
The open question
NAIO’s budget — RM10 million in 2025 — is modest against the tens of billions in private data-centre investment reshaping Malaysia’s AI capacity. Whether a lean central office can steer a build-out funded overwhelmingly by foreign hyperscalers is the defining test of this institution.
Drawn from the public record: Cabinet approval (28 Aug 2024), launch (12 Dec 2024) under the Ministry of Digital, RM10m Budget 2025 allocation, the seven deliverables, leadership under Shamsul Izhan Abdul Majid, the AIM platform, and the Gemini deployment to ~445,000 officers.
Full sources: airmap.my/sources. Independent of NAIO, the Ministry of Digital and MOSTI.