AI Weekly Malaysia

Malaysians aged 18-30 can claim 3 months of ILMUchat Pro for free (normally RM50/month, RM150 total) by completing required AI courses on the Rakyat Digital platform and verifying via MyDigital ID. The programme, part of PM Anwar Ibrahim's AI Untuk Rakyat initiative targeting 100,000 young Malaysians, launched 31 August 2026 and is delivered by the Ministry of Digital with YTL AI Labs and MyDIGITAL Corporation.

Why: If you're building AI tools or SaaS for the Malaysian market, 100,000 young users will soon have free access to a locally-tuned AI assistant that handles Bahasa Malaysia, Manglish, and Chinese with built-in context for tasks like PTPTN queries and SME grant applications. Founders should evaluate whether ILMUchat's localisation depth is a genuine moat or a gap their own products can fill, and developers should test it as a potential integration or competitor before the free period ends and users decide whether to pay RM50/month.

Accel is in talks to lead a $1B round for Thinking Machines Lab, the AI startup founded by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, at a $40B valuation—down from the $50B it reportedly sought. The company has over $100M ARR, implying a ~400x revenue multiple, and recently launched Inkling, an open-weight model monetized via usage-based compute fees on its Tinker platform for adapting models on proprietary data. Several co-founders, including Lilian Weng and Luke Metz, have returned to OpenAI.

Why: For SaaS founders, the 400x revenue multiple signals that investors are still pricing AI labs on talent and platform potential rather than revenue, which affects how you benchmark your own AI startup's positioning. For developers, Inkling and the Tinker platform represent a concrete open-weight option for proprietary-data fine-tuning with usage-based pricing worth evaluating against alternatives like OpenAI or Anthropic offerings.