March 2026 - In this interview, we speak to Dr. Gopinath Rao Sinniah (GS) who is a co-founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Malaysia-based FAVORIOT Sdn. Bhd.
Malaysia has been on a strategic IoT journey over the past decade. The Malaysian Technical Standards Forum (MTSFB) recently hosted oneM2M in a set of knowledge and expertise sharing sessions in the context of Malaysia’ Digital Acceleration strategy. In this interview, we learn more about the IoT landscape in Malaysia and some of the promising application opportunities from local and international customers.
Q: Would you begin by introducing yourself to our readers?
GS: I am the CTO at FAVORIOT - pronounced like the English word ‘favourite’ – which is a leading local platform for IoT solutions that was founded in 2017. My career began in research and then progressed to university teaching. I then returned to research in the Wireless Communications and IOT sector for MIMOS Berhad, which is a government agency. There, I worked on wireless networking, focusing on IPv6 and 6LoWPAN technologies. My contributions during this tenure focused on inventing and filing patents for IPv6 mobility, multicast stream optimization, and secure communication protocols for 6LoWPAN and IoT gateways. In 2015, I joined REDTone IoT, a new subsidiary of REDTone which is an MVNO and tower provider, as an IoT Specialist. There, I was responsible for architecting and developing the core IoT platform using technologies such as Apache Cassandra, NGINX, and RabbitMQ. I specifically focused on designing Smart City solutions and leading research activities in Big Data analytics to provide actionable insights for urban deployments. In 2017, I joined two other colleagues as a co-founder to launch FAVORIOT.
Standardization has been an important part of my career. My early introduction to standardization goes back to 2009. In 2014, I became Chair of the IoT and Sustainable Cities Working Group in MTSFB. In 2022, I was appointed to the role of Reference Panel Chair, overseeing ten working groups. Around mid-2025, I took on the role as Chair of MTSFB’s AI Standards Task Force.
Q: Let us move on to FAVORIOT. Would you tell us about the company and what it does?
GS: While I was working at MIMOS Berhad, Malaysia’s national Applied Research and Development Centre, I was part of a group that created an IoT roadmap. Since that time, around 2010, my co-founder and I realized that a lot of people knew about IoT, but they also do not know how to go about building an application. We thought that a platform could act as a good interface. Initially, we focused on serving the elderly community, using a special watch to monitor heart rate, blood pressure, and other crucial parameters. We extended the concept for pilgrims going on Umrah and Hajj to Mecca.
Then, COVID hit and put a stop to our activities. That caused us to pivot. WE began offering a platform-as-a-service which would act as a kind of glue, coordinating between different sensors and making us independent of hardware protocols. Compared to our 2017 offering, we have added new features, new integrations, and, more recently, AI capabilities. We are also integrating oneM2M standards into our platform, beginning with the inter-working proxy entity (IPE) because that allows us to connect proprietary components together and to bring IoT data into a common environment. You often will hear me referring to interoperability and that is what oneM2M brings to our service offering.
Our goal now is to ensure that any developers or IT architects can use the platform and speed up their development process. Instead of building their own cloud or server system, they can just subcontract to use our platform. We have built FAVORIOT with a highly competitive and cost-effective pricing model that is designed to lower the barrier for IoT adoption. Our commitment to innovation has been recognized through several prestigious accolades, including the MYSTI (Malaysia Science, Technology, and Innovation) recognition from the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (MOSTI). That recognition carries a lot of weight when we are talking to local government officials in Malaysia.
Q: And what can you share about FAVORIOT’s business operations?
GS: Our platform serves a range of industrial developers and SMEs. Some users operate via a direct subscription to our platform, so we have limited knowledge about them. Others come to us for end-to-end solutions that combine sensors, connectivity, dashboard, and applications. We have enterprise customers using cloud and on-premises approaches. In total, we have around 10,000 registered users worldwide.
To increase our global footprint and strengthen our domestic capabilities, we establish strategic partnerships with specialized firms both locally and outside of Malaysia. For instance, our collaboration with a video analytics company creates a powerful synergy; they leverage our IoT platform for complex connectivity needs while we integrate their processing capabilities for our clients. This "win-win" partnership model allows us to deliver comprehensive end-to-end solutions efficiently. Currently, while approximately 90% of our operations are centred in Malaysia, the remaining 10% of our business is steadily expanding across various international markets.
Q: Among FAVORIOT’s projects, would you describe one of them and explain why it stands out?
GS: I would like to talk about a smart city project. In Malaysia, there are local government administrations, such as the one for Putrajaya. They have a variety of sensors deployed across their municipality and these sensors are deployed by different vendors. There are environmental sensors to monitor a lake and others for road traffic. When the municipality wants to do any monitoring, they must access different dashboards. Our proposal to them was to integrate the different data sources into a single platform, and the concept turned out to be successful.
Of course, the project faced many challenges including the need to work with proprietary devices. It is not simple to integrate them. We had to build different integration mechanisms and then integrate the different solutions into a single dashboard.
One reason why this project is strategically important is that the Malaysian government is encouraging local councils to adopt smart city concepts. This began with the adoption of MS ISO-37122:2019, which is a set of smart city indicators. There are about eighty-five indicators, several of which relate to high-quality, real-time data which corresponds to the need for IoT solutions. That is driving demand for smart city systems. In the past year, we have seen a lot of councils wanting to implement the IoT base indicator because that is the way to enable environmental monitoring, CCTV monitoring and so on. One city is pushing the concept of a smart pole to integrate weather monitoring, environmental sensing, CCTV devices, and EV charging.
Across Malaysia the data requirements vary while the data collection and platform components remain the same. In Kuala Lumpur, for example, there is an emphasis on traffic monitoring. In the south of the country, industrial and environmental monitoring are key priorities. Other cities focus on data related to tourism. The next step for these cities is the use the data they are collecting and to do more analysis. Our offering is to utilize the FAVORIOT platform as a centralizing interface, integrating these disparate data sources into a single, unified dashboard. This project serves as a successful blueprint for how interoperability can drive the national smart city agenda across Malaysia.
Q: Are there any other interesting project categories?
GS: Yes, we see growing momentum for projects in the agriculture sector. These are related to the cultivation of chillies, and high-end varieties of the durian fruit which depend on precise temperature and soil parameters.
Healthcare is another growing area, starting off with hospitals that are implementing remote patient monitoring. This generally begins with the monitoring of patients in wards to ease the workload on medical and nursing staff. Beyond this, there will be extensions for home monitoring solutions.
In addition to agriculture, healthcare, and smart cities, we are seeing significant momentum in the ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) sector, where data-driven reporting has become a necessity for modern enterprises. A key area of focus for us involves leveraging the platform for environmental conservation and precision agriculture, specifically in monitoring mangrove ecosystems and high-value crops. By deploying sensors to capture real-time environmental parameters, such as soil health, water quality, and carbon sequestration data, we provide the granular insights required for accurate ESG reporting.
The final category I would highlight is about the growing role of AI and AI working in combination with IoT. While FAVORIOT already has a foundational AI implementation within the platform, we are currently working to significantly enhance our AI features, with an enhanced and new service offering planned for Q2-2026. The importance of AI is a factor in me getting involved with AI standardization efforts.
Q: Would you tell us about your interest and involvement with standardization?
GS: The early foundations for IoT in Malaysia were being set around 2010 through university projects and industrial adoption. There was then a National IoT Strategic Roadmap in 2015 followed by plans to speed up digital acceleration through initiatives such as MyDIGITAL in 2021 and MyTMAP2030 (Strategic Communications and Multimedia Technology Roadmap 2025-2030). I became involved with standardization through my MTSFB activities.
Within MTSFB, we are guided by national policy initiatives and by the desire to create standards for our local industries. We start from the position that most standards already exist. Our job is to take what exists and to fit that into a Malaysia context. That is how we create standards for industry, either by fast tracking proposals or working on longer term requirements. Our standards then go to the MCMC (Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission) where standards recommendations are either enforced or put forward for voluntary adoption. Most technical standards are for voluntary adoption. Mandatory requirements apply to issues such as spectrum, poles, and devices, for example.
My involvement in standardization began in 2009, driven by the goal of aligning Malaysian innovation with global technical frameworks. Locally, I serve as the Reference Panel Chair for MTSFB, Chair of Internet of Things and Smart Sustainable Cities and Chair of the AI Standards Task Force, a role that aligns with Malaysia’s national agenda and the positive trajectory of AI development, including major data centre buildouts by companies like AWS and Microsoft. While the Ministry of Digital has established a National AI Office, their focus is on implementation; we bridge the gap by developing the necessary technical standards. There is clear industry support for this mission, as over 200 companies joined our first meeting to begin workshops on setting requirements.
On the international stage, I represent Malaysia within the Asia-Pacific Telecommunity Standardization Program (ASTAP), where I have led the development of regional reports on smart city technologies and IoT frameworks for elderly care. Furthermore, I contribute to the ITU-T Study Group 20 (SG20) regarding the functional architecture of the Artificial Intelligence of Things (AIoT). I have also served as a lead contributor at the ITU World Telecommunication Standardization Assembly (WTSA) to advance resolutions on e-health, IoT, and IPv6 deployment. Across the IoT domain, our priorities remain focused on interoperability, security, and the emerging capabilities of AIoT.
Q: How did you become involved with oneM2M standards?
GS: I first learned about oneM2M through the ITU-T when I attended an SG20 meeting. That was around 2015. I became interested in the architecture and oneM2M’s horizontal layers. Recently, we have found common ground between the solutions we are building and what oneM2M has to offer. I already mentioned our plans to build oneM2M’s IPE capability into our platform to enable the kind of interoperability that is beneficial in smart city types of application. IPEs provide the means to create an interface between non-oneM2M technologies (e.g. legacy devices) and the oneM2M service layer standard.
Q: MTSFB recently hosted oneM2M’s 72nd Technical Plenary. What are your thoughts on the event?
GS: The event was a first of its kind in Malaysia. We are very grateful to oneM2M for bringing so many delegates and experts to meet with local industry. We invited MTSFB members and almost a hundred attended. There was a big crowd and a lot of interaction covering pertinent questions about IoT. This shows that there is a huge potential locally.
The meetings were important for sending out the message that Malaysia is active and serious about IoT. The fact that oneM2M standards are open and accessible means a lot to us. In addition, oneM2M’s modularity means that we are free to apply key elements of the standard, the ones that address our local needs.
Q: When it comes to building IoT applications, what is your advice to other organizations?
GS: In our business, we find that many users do not know where to start with building an IoT solution. We use a simple framework to explain that there are five key components: devices, connectivity, platforms, applications, and security. When it comes to implementation, my advice is to start small and to think big.
Adopters need to avoid getting bogged down with complexity. They should focus on their part in the solution. Using a platform can hide complexity and save time. Businesses should talk to us! We are working to incorporate standards, like oneM2M for interoperability, into our platform. That means adopters have access to a range of technical standard options.
Q: Are there other topics you wish to raise?
GS: One thing I would really like to highlight is how we have designed the FAVORIOT platform to be an enabler that removes the 'fear factor' for organizations. By acting as a central interface that handles the complex 'glue' between different sensors, we allow developers to focus on solving business problems rather than worrying about underlying infrastructure.
As we move toward Q2-2026, we are specifically enhancing our AIoT capabilities to shift from simple data collection to enabling real-time intelligence at the edge. This evolution is exactly why my work with the MTSFB AI Standards Task Force is so vital, ensuring that as we adopt these advanced technologies, we do so within a framework that prioritizes security and ethical standards. Whether it is for environmental monitoring or smart city, you do not need to build from scratch; you can just start with us.
Q: How can interested parties find out more about FAVORIOT and MTSFB’s initiatives and ways to get involved?
GS: Interested parties can explore our latest solutions at favoriot.com (or specifically the platform at platform.favoriot.com). For those interested in contributing to Malaysia’s technical landscape, I encourage you to join the various working groups at MTSFB (mtsfb.org.my), particularly our sessions on IoT, Smart Sustainable Cities, and AI standards. You can reach me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
