KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 12 — Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim launched Malaysia’s home-grown multimodal artificial intelligence (AI) model, ‘ILMU’, during the inaugural Asean AI Malaysia Summit 2025 at the Malaysia International Trade and Exhibition Centre (Mitec) today.
ILMU is Malaysia’s own multimodal large language model (LLM), trained on local language and data to understand our culture, context and daily realities.
Fully developed, owned and operated in Malaysia, it is built by YTL AI Labs, in partnership with Universiti Malaya (UM).
ILMU keeps data local and gives the nation strategic control over its AI future, ensuring we lead with intelligence rooted in our own values and voice.
The name ILMU stands for Intelek Luhur Malaysia Untukmu, reflecting the model’s core values of ‘Intelek’, for context-aware intelligence; ‘Luhur’, for ethical foundations rooted in Malaysian values; ‘Malaysia’, for cultural and linguistic fluency; and ‘Untukmu’, because it is built to serve all Malaysians.
Asean Secretary-General Dr Kao Kim Hourn and Digital Minister Gobind Singh Deo were also present at the launch.
Meanwhile, Gobind, in a statement, applauded the establishment of ILMU, a groundbreaking Malaysian innovation by YTL AI Labs that reflects the national vision for a future driven by technology, inclusivity, and cultural relevance.
“Built by Malaysians for Malaysians, ILMU showcases our ability to create world-class AI infrastructure while preserving our linguistic and cultural identity.
“This is more than just technology; it is a step towards empowering our people, our businesses, and our nation in the digital era,” he said.
YTL Power International Bhd managing director Datuk Seri Yeoh Seok Hong said ILMU represents YTL’s commitment to innovation, rooted in Malaysia’s diverse cultural and intellectual heritage.
YTL AI Labs said ILMU performed on par with state-of-the-art models like GPT-4o and Llama 3.1.
It said ILMU achieved the highest score among all frontier models in Bahasa Melayu language understanding (MalayMMLU — a test of multi-domain knowledge in Malay), demonstrating stronger performance on real-world prompts.
ILMUchat (the AI Chatbot) for consumers will be available for early access on Malaysia Day, Sept 16, 2025.
The public is welcome to register their interest at https://www.ilmu.ai — Bernama
