Visual symbolic communication systems such as emojis are increasingly important to facilitate casual communications and spontaneous information exchange in our daily lives. However, the use of such systems poses dangers to the preservation of local visual symbolic languages as practised by many indigenous and culturally rich local communities. This research aims at developing a local cultural value-based visual communication system for indigenous people in the Malaysian Borneo states of Sabah and Sarawak. The design of such systems requires systematic analysis and identifying the core issue in solving complex socio-technical system problems. Meaningful engagement with different community levels, the sustainability of local knowledge, and cultural values were the primary considerations in designing a culture-preserving model. By utilising the Law of System Completeness of TRIZ, and the engagement of the interaction of supersystems, a conceptual model that can map and analyse indigenous symbolic visual communication systems was developed. This modelling approach has provided numerous insightful ideas for transforming global communication approaches to be sensitive to the cultural needs of indigenous communities.