Lack of support from our own Malaysian companies

Exactly the same thing I am saying on this one: "Not enough exposure for some great stuffs that some of us are doing"

Do you have any suggestions for which dept/agency/media would be responsible for promoting local technology/software? And what these entities should/can do? 

this phenomenon can be mitigated. have given one such example in a longer comment here: http://magic.userecho.com/topic/459026-promotion-of-malaysian-technology-companies-is-poor-to-international-markets/

If you are referring to IT implementation for GLC or MNC, here's the mentality and possible roadblocks,

1. CTO, CIO want to be safe in their position in their company, thus they must ensure the system is implemented successfully, with good support. Budget is not an issue. In this case, they will go for solution with good track record and reliable support.

2. Tender bidding process - to ensure the procurement process is fair, the tendering process has become lengthy.

3. Foreign companies have a better after-implementation support, a dedicated team to handle customers' 1st and 2nd line support. For startup, the support team are probably the developers, which probably the founders as well.

4. We are selling ourselves too cheap.

I would beg to differ on point 3. Support from developers are the best and can solve problems quickly. Support driven development simply makes better software. Being local and supported by local has much more advantages to being supported by foreign companies.

It may be true for some cases especially in government, GLC, enterprise, or big corporation, as the "person-in-charge" who may just believe more on the past experience and reputation as they may not want to bear the risk, or want to secure their position, but on the other hand, it is not always true because I personal experienced that there were some cases where Malaysia companies prefer local software providers instead for the reason that the solutions and supports are more localized to the Malaysian company. My opinion is understand our clients' needs, strengthen our advantages and also fine tune our weakness.