ONE FOR THE ALBUM: (From right) Pua with Talib, Inti College Sarawak chief executive cum principal Ivy Lau Ee Nee and Popular Book Co event and promotion executive Kally Teo.
KUCHING: Phison Electronics Corporation CEO KS Pua, developer of the first System On Chip (SOC) which is widely used in today’s pen drive, has urged the younger generation to ‘think outside the box’.
Pua, whose company is valued at more than US$1 billion in Taiwan, said every obstacle in life should be taken with a pinch of salt.
“It is not only youths in Malaysia who are facing the rising costs of living. It is happening in almost every part of the world,” said Pua during a special talk, organised by Popular Book Co (M) Sdn Bhd and See Hua Daily News, at Inti College Sarawak here yesterday.
Hailing from Selangor, Pua also said to break free from the vicious cycle, youths have to put on their thinking hats and be brave to rise to the challenges.
Pua hoped that his talk and book ‘Driven to Success’, which he authored, will inspire youths to kick start their business.
At the same time, Pua cleared the misconception that he was the inventor of the USB pen drive.
According to him, he only improved its usage as other companies had already developed the pen drive which runs on multichips.
“I never said that we invented the pen drive. We are the ones who integrated the multichip into one called SOC,” said Pua who credited his team members for inventing the SOC.
On Phison Electronics, he said he and four partners set it up in November, 2000 and after 12 years, the plant employed more than 550 workers including 300 engineers.
He said the plant had shipped out 500 million controllers worldwide and exceeded US$1 billion in sales revenue in 2010.
“There are 50 Malaysians in the company while one of them is a Sarawakian,” said Pua, whose next stop for his talk will be in Kota Kinabalu.
On expanding their plant to Sarawak, Pua said it might happen in the future.
“For now we are planning to set up the second plant in Pulau Pinang due to the supply chain and facilities,” he added.
Regarding his book, Pua said 24,000 copies of the Mandarin version had been sold so far while the English version has hit the 7,000 mark in Taiwan.
In Malaysia, Pua said around 8,000 copies of the Mandarin version and 6,000 copies of the English version had been sold.
On the book, he said it was not for profit making but was written as a source of inspiration for youths worldwide.
Also present at the talk was Assistant Minister for Tourism Datuk Talib Zulpilip.