Following an invitation from the Ministry of education to establish an overseas campus, a partnership between Boustead Holdings Berhad, YTL Corporation Berhad and the University of Nottingham was formally announced in 1998.

This development was the first ever branch campus of a British University established outside of the UK.

The University of Nottingham welcomed its first 89 students in September 2000 in Kuala Lumpur. In 2005, the University relocated to 118 acre campus in Semenyih, in the valley of Broga Hill. In 2006, the campus reopened a Kuala Lumpur branch in Chulan Tower on Jalan Conlay to teach MBA.

Being a branch campus of the University of Nottingham, students are not necessarily taught with similar course materials and generally do not sit the same exam papers as those in the UK, but are still under the jurisdiction of the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA). Upon completing a degree at the Malaysia campus, students are awarded a University of Nottingham degree certificate at a convocation held locally which is indistinguishable from the certificates awarded at the Nottingham campus. The degrees that are awarded are accredited by international professional bodies such as the Association of MBAs and the UK Engineering Council.

The Engineering Degree courses are accredited by the Board of Engineering Malaysia (BEM) and the Malaysian Qualifications Agency (MQA).