I am privileged to convey this message as the founder and CEO of Optimal Systems Engineering Sdn Bhd (OPTIMISE), and as the leader of the team to champion energy, ESG and resource sustainability via Process Integration and Smart Systems Engineering (PSE) solutions in Malaysia, ASEAN and beyond.

Driven by the mission to build a sustainable society, we formed the Process Synthesis and Design research group at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) before the turn of the millenium.  Our success in providing PSE solutions for industry led us to establish UTM Process Systems Engineering Centre (PROSPECT) in 2007 and steered PROSPECT on a journey to develop cutting-edge solutions to maximise energy, water and resource savings for facilities based on process integration and smart systems engineering solutions.  In 2012, UTM-PROSPECT was ranked 1st globally under the Distinguished Competency (DC#5) of Water, Costs and Optimisation by Elsevier’s Scival Spotlight. In 2014, PROSPECT was ranked 1st by Elsevier Scival in the Emerging Competency (EC#49) of “Heat Exchanger, Retrofitting and Design”. 

Our international success led us to establish OPTIMISE as the spin-off company to commercialise UTM R&D products, services and know-how by “Advancing circular economy through innovative process integration and smart systems engineering solutions”. 

OPTIMISE’s core expertise is in process and innovation-driven industrial energy, ESG and resource sustainability using process integration and smart systems engineering solutions. We spearheaded the UTM Sustainable Energy Management program that resulted in UTM amassing over RM30 million (USD 7 million) energy savings between 2011-2020. We led UTM to be the first ASEAN institution certified with 3-star energy management gold standard and to be ranked 1^st globally by the Times Higher Education on Clean and Affordable Energy (SDG-7).  We have been involved in the program to train and certify over 1600 ASEAN energy managers and have outreached over 500 companies via professional training and consultancy. Our technologies and smart solutions have been used in building facilities and by numerous industries from subsectors such as power generation, oil and gas, petrochemical, fine chemicals, oleochemical, palm oil, chloral-kali, pulp and paper, medical glove and semiconductor. 

Our team’s resilience and agility has enabled us to rise above massive challenges of COVID 19 and climate crisis that have threatened the planet, people and profit.  We regard them as the defining moments for us to harness our innovations and strong partnership with the government, industry, academia and community, en route to realising our vision of creating a society practicing sustainable consumption and production.