Brunei's Local News - Brudirect.com

Banda "Can Brunei be the Google of Halal?" The question put forward by the leader of a global Open Source Community Project based in Berlin, Germany, called ADempiere Bazaar, drew plenty of intrigue and interest from the audience during the 3rd International Halal Market Conference (IHMC) yesterday.

Introducing the concept of "Halal" software to an audience for the first time, Redhuan Daniel Oon said it rings an opportunity for Brunei to position itself to become the "Google" among the Ummah in new applications built upon successful Open Source applications.

"What Brunei can do in the sense of becoming a `Google' is that it can specialise in something and give a brand promise to the market. What Google promised was 'I'm faster'. So Brunei can say something like, `I'm cleaner,' or 'I'm more fo-

cused because I'm not doing anything else," he said. While planning plays an integral part in executing such drives, in doing so the Sultanate

should learn from others' experiences, and not "reinvent the wheel of mistakes".

"You have to explore the market and identify it with the niche, and focus on that, And of course you need to do a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis," Redhuan said, adding that it's not a question of what Brunei doesn't have, but a question of what it doesn't need. He said halal is something that not many others would prioritise as the top agenda.

Redhuan, an advocate of the link between "halal" and "open source", said the concept of "Halal" software is not just about software to support the halal industry, but also about the handling of the software itself.

"Just as what is instrumental becomes wajib in pursuing hasana (excellence), it is important to know the software itself when using it," he said. "Commercial interests reign supreme and often spread FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) about Open Software itself. They themselves even claim to be champions of Open Standards and Open Source, but it's still business at the end of the day. It is important for the Ummah to champion Public and Social Business in Software Applications. Just like how Dr Mohammed Yunus and Grameem Bank championed for Loan Financing." -- Courtesy of The Brunei Times