Lim Chong Yew, who was originally from the opposition camp, chose to lead Gerakan to join the Barisan Nasional in 1972 and became a member of the ruling party camp to gain central support for Penang's industrial development. It was also in this year that the eight major multinational companies later known as "8 Samurai" (Eight Samurai) invested in Penang and settled in the Bayan Lepas Free Industrial Zone, establishing Penang's position in the semiconductor industry.
The so-called "8 Samurai" includes the United photo restoration service States' "National Semiconductor", AMD, Intel, Osram, HP, Bosch, Hitachi, Now Renesas Electronics ) and Clarion. Relying on cheap land and labor, many large multinational companies have begun to invest in Penang, so that Penang is still the economic center of Malaysia after losing its status as a free port. However, at that time, Malaysia, as a medium-sized country with a population of less than 30 million, did not have many advantages over neighboring countries in terms of population or land area.
Therefore, the labor supply has always plagued foreign businessmen entering Malaysia in the past 50 years. On the other hand, with the implementation of economic reform and opening up in China and Vietnam in the late 1980s, the huge market and the advantages of cheaper labor have also brought competitive pressure to Malaysia. In order to improve the disadvantage of insufficient technical personnel, Lim Chong Yew, who was about to resign in 1990 at that time, under his leadership, the Penang Development Corporation (PDC) promoted the establishment of the Penang Technology Development Center (PSDC) in 1989 to train more for Malaysia.