The World Economic Forum (WEF) has recognised and awarded two Western Digital (WD) factories as the latest entrants to its Global Lighthouse Network (GLN). The smart factories are located in Malaysia and Thailand. Of the 90 total sites within WEF’s Lighthouse network, Western Digital factory in Penang is the first company to receive such esteemed recognition in Malaysia. CEO of WD David Goeckeler was delighted with the achievement and said that “It is an honour and a testament of our leadership efforts in 4IR with both technology innovation and workforce engagement.” “Western Digital, as a leading data infrastructure provider, is committed to enabling sustainable growth and transformation across our facilities around the world to deliver value to our customers, employees, and partners,” he added. 

At a press conference in Malaysia, Senior Vice President Global Flash Backend Operations – KL Bock, recalled that the solutions for lights-out were not available in the industry and the Malaysia team had to create their own blue-print from scratch to make it happen in order to provide cost efficient and effective enablers to support the growth taking shape in the global flash memory market. Arham Abdul Rahman, CEO of the Malaysian Investment Development Authority (MIDA) congratulated WD for this milestone. He mentioned in his speech that Malaysia is on board towards the 4th Industrial Revolution and Digital Economy and he is confident that this is an exceptional example to the rest of the industries operating in the country. 

The Global Lighthouse Network is a project that was initiated by the World Economic Forum and McKinsey & Co since 2018 that recognises production sites and value chains that are world leaders in the adoption and integration of the cutting-edge technologies of the 4IR.