September and october 2026 · Kuala Lumpur · Vol. I

Industry · Power · Geoeconomics

The lead

LOWY INSTITUTE · JUNE 2026 · 4 minute read

ASEAN’s physical economy moment

For much of the past decade, Southeast Asia’s economic future has been described through the language of digital transformation: fintech platforms, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, electric vehicles, and fast-growing consumer markets. That story is not wrong. But it is incomplete.

Geoeconomics · Industrial Strategy · Critical Supply Chains

Economic power eventually has to become physical. Apoorba Banerjee is an industrial strategist, writer and doctoral researcher examining the industries, infrastructure and supply chains through which geopolitical competition takes shape. Her experience across heavy engineering and manufacturing grounds her work in the realities of industrial capacity: what economies can build, maintain, move and scale.

Focusing on Southeast Asia and the wider Indo-Pacific, she is particularly interested in how industrial knowledge can strengthen public institutions, sharpen national strategy and improve the decisions states make.

01

LOWY INSTITUTE · JULY 2026

A difference Australia will find critical: minerals are not the same as materials

Australia and ASEAN are racing to mine critical minerals – but few are yet fit for industrial use.

MODERN DIPLOMACY

06 May 2026

The Iran war has made clear that Japan’s vulnerabilities do not end at the factory gate.

Geopolitical Monitor

07 May 2026

For Malaysia, Malacca is not merely a route through which the world’s ships pass. It is a strategic industrial spine linking energy security, manufacturing continuity, maritime governance and national economic resilience.

02/ Notes

03 / Speaking

MILOPS 2026 · KUALA LUMPUR · 3–6 AUGUST 2026

Apoorba Banerjee presented on the shift from supply-chain efficiency toward readiness, arguing for supplier diversity, multi-tier visibility and strategic buffers in an era of geopolitical disruption.

04 / Newsletter

Occasional field notes · Archive in progress

A letter for the long view.

Notes on geoeconomics, industry, and the slower work of institutional change. No cadence promised; no noise delivered.