The Ministry of Entrepreneur and Cooperatives Development has put a name and five letters on what it plans to do to Malaysian small business after Budget 2027. The SCALE Action Plan, announced at the SAMENTA SME CEO Forum 2026, is a 2027 work programme rather than a spending announcement, and...
MediAsas Malaysia: RM200 Per Worker Off An SME’s First-Year Premium
MediAsas is the government's new basic medical plan, launching in January 2027, and it carries the first direct subsidy an SME has been offered for staff medical cover: for companies with fewer than 75 employees, the government pays RM200 of the first-year premium per worker, capped at 50 workers per...
SME Export Malaysia: Three MoUs to Help Businesses Sell Overseas
Malaysian SMEs were handed a concrete export route this week. SME export Malaysia support moved forward on 15 October 2026 when the Entrepreneur Development and Cooperatives Ministry signed memoranda of understanding with Lazada Malaysia, the Entrepreneurship Development Company of Uzbekistan and the Construction Industry Development Board, at the Enterprise 50...
Labuan Service Tax: SMEs Seek Section 48 Relief
Labuan service tax relief is again on the table, and the island's SME association wants it settled in Budget 2027. The Small and Medium Enterprises Association of Labuan, led by president Jefery Tan, called on 2 October 2026 for the Section 48 service tax exemption to be applied to services...
Budget 2027 Malaysia: SMEs Want Outcomes, Not Allocations
Budget 2027 Malaysia will be tabled on 9 October, and the SME Association of Malaysia has one central demand: stop measuring SME support by the size of the allocation, and start measuring whether it changes anything. National president Dr Chin Chee Seong told a press conference on 2 October that...
MSME Minimum Wage Exemption: What Employers Must Do
On 30 September 2026 the Cabinet agreed to exempt micro, small and medium enterprises from the next minimum wage increase, for the time being. If you run an SME in Malaysia, the short version is that nothing has changed about what you must pay today, and something has changed about...
Minimum Wage Malaysia 2026: MSMEs Exempted, RM1,700 Stays
Malaysia's minimum wage stands at RM1,700 per month. A rise to RM2,000 was under consideration, but on 30 September 2026 the Cabinet agreed to exempt micro, small and medium enterprises from the next increase for the time being. Economy Minister Akmal Nasrullah Mohd Nasir said on 28 September 2026 that...
Malaysia Minimum Wage: What Budget 2027 Signals for SMEs
The floor under Malaysian wages is about to move again. At a dialogue with UiTM alumni in Shah Alam on 26 September, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim signalled that Budget 2027, due to be tabled on 9 October, will take direct aim at low pay, and he went further than usual:...