Executives upbeat about future with 'strong potential'

Although there are signs around the world of a fragile recovery from the global economic malaise, the improving situation has yet to have any impact on Thailand's information and communications technology industry, which is being supported by both the local government and private sectors.

Top executives recently gave their views on the industry's future in interviews with The Nation.

Jadesada Kraisingkorn, country manager of IBM Thailand's Software Group, said the outlook for the local IT market was aligned with the country's economic situation.

Government forecasts say economic prospects should pick up from the fourth quarter of this year, so the IT market should follow suit, she said.

Jadesada said Thailand's IT industry had strong business potential, especially in terms of overseas business expansion. This is based on many factors, including the sophistication of skills and expertise of many Thai IT professionals and the size of the domestic IT market, which could become a great breeding ground for IT talents, she said.

However, the industry needs support from many parties, especially from the government, because there can be no success without government support.

She said Thai IT professionals had strong potential in creative areas such as gaming and development of multimedia content, perhaps fitting well with demand from the US market. There were also many top local talents with skills in various industry solutions, making the Thai industry ideal for the Asean market.

Jadesada said "various factors" could support local IT professionals in expanding into overseas markets, including government support in the form of incentives or policies making it easier for local professionals to begin trading overseas.

Promoting the development of local skills, in the form of certification programmes, could also help, as could the promotion, adoption and use of open standards instead of encouraging Thai IT professionals to stick with proprietary platforms.

Somkiat Ungaree, president of the Association of Thai Software Industry (ATSI), said that the government's support for the private sector, demonstrated by its Thai Khemkhaeng (TKK) stimulus package, would have a positive impact on the software market and industry.

The association expects that by the end of this year, the software industry will have total revenue of about Bt70 billion, showing growth of 8 per cent over last year.

The association plans to take part in an industry "Buy Thai First" project, promoting local software development and encouraging businesses to purchase and use local software products and services.

"Earlier, we expected the local software market to grow by around 5 per cent, but after the government announced its TKK package, we reassessed the situation and now expect growth of around 8 per cent. The government's support will encourage customers to use local software and will give them confidence in local products, which are developed to international standards, with high service quality and affordable prices," Somkiat said.

Accharas Ouysinprasert, country manager of Intel Microelectronics (Thailand), said that the ICT market showed positive signs this year because the economic situation was recovering. This was especially good for the hardware industry, because the government, through the Education Ministry, planned to buy about 100,000 notebook computers for students, and this would give the notebook-computer market strong growth of more than 20 per cent.

However, to support the ICT industry as a whole, the government should promote use of local products and software in both the government and public sectors, to create confidence among customers and give the local industry strength as well as market growth. This would enable local businesses to compete with international rivals.

Nart Liuchareon, chief executive of the CDG Group, said Thailand's ICT industry was still stable and continued to grow because local businesses were spending money on technology to support their enterprises.

He said the new TKK stimulus package, under which the government would provide for funding of its mega-projects, would have both direct and indirect affects on the ICT industry.

"I think that from the economic situation, the tourism industry is affected because of the reduction in tourism. But the ICT industry is continuing to grow, especially in the telecom industry, because operators are spending much more money to create competitiveness in the quality of their services," Nart said.

He said his company was expecting revenue growth of about 10 per cent, allowing it to reach revenue of about Bt5.5 billion by the end of this year - Bt500 million more than in 2008.