Science, AI key to digital hub drive

Thailand should invest more in science education and research, while broadening its adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) to gain an adv...

Thailand should invest more in science education and research, while broadening its adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) to gain an advantage in its quest to become a digital hub in Southeast Asia, according to tech experts and the World Bank.

Pathom Indarodom, director of the Digital Council of Thailand (DCT), said Thailand's 2024 IMD competitiveness ranking of 37th out of 67 countries indicates it lags regional peers China, South Korea, Malaysia and Vietnam in crucial areas such as knowledge, technology infrastructure, and future readiness.

While Thailand boasts strengths in high-tech exports with the 11th ranking, and 8th for telecommunication investment/internet speed, the challenge lies in leveraging these for creating innovation and scaling businesses, Mr Pathom said at a recent World Bank forum on its Thailand Economic Monitor.

He said that in terms of education, Thailand's annual computer science and engineering graduates are 20,000 fewer than the industry demands.

In addition, the country regularly reports low student scores on the Program for International Student Assessment (Pisa) tests.

No government has tried to fix the problem at its root, even though the country needs more teachers to inspire high school students to learn more in the fields of science and mathematics, said Mr Pathom.

The DCT says that moving towards an AI transformation requires significant investment in education and research, coupled with building strong public-private-academic sector partnerships to deliver real outcomes.

TOP USERS

"Thailand has made great strides in digital adoptions over the last couple of years. When technology comes, we're always one of the heaviest users," said Aditip Panupong, head of commercial and strategic alliances at Google Thailand.

Thailand, for example, is always one of the top 10 YouTube markets in the world, with this strong consumer adoption extending to other Google platforms like Google Maps, and even high growth in the Gemini chatbot.

"We are now in the middle of the AI revolution, which is the fourth tech revolution apart from internet, mobile and cloud. Every technological evolution creates new growth engines for a tech-driven economy," said Mr Aditip.

"In the past 6-8 months, from a business standpoint, we have seen momentum -- out of the clients we work with, 20% of them have adopted AI in one shape or form, and another 75% have expressed interest in or plan to use AI."

Banks have deployed AI for fraud detection, while retail and hospitality sectors use AI for customer segmentation and for hyper-personalised marketing campaigns.

In healthcare, Google works with Rajavithi Hospital on using AI to detect retinal diabetes, addressing the shortage of doctors in remote area.

"We need more STEM [science, technology, engineering and mathematics] students, and need to make sure that students will start to use AI for research and increase productivity, as well as increasing computational skills," said Mr Aditip.

He highlighted the importance of collaboration for AI's collective benefit, noting Google's work with academia, researchers, government, and public institutions to tackle challenges that a single stakeholder cannot solve.

ASEAN DIGITAL HUB

Ji Eun Choi, senior digital development specialist at the World Bank, said Thailand has the potential to be a regional digital hub.

She said the country's world-class digital public infrastructure, including digital ID and digital payment systems, are its key assets that are much more advanced than those in many peer economies.

Growing foreign direct investment in data centres signals investor confidence in Thailand's capacity to serve not only domestic needs but also regional demand, said Ms Choi.

The Asean Digital Economy Framework Agreement is being developed to create a digital economy framework, aimed at establishing the region as a single digital market.

This regional integration, by allowing easier cross-border data flows, would create a significantly larger market for digital businesses to thrive.

In addition, she said Thailand stands between two poles -- open and closed data -- meaning strong data protection and allowing the use of data across different agencies.

The Personal Data Protection Act covers data protection, but data is allowed to flow across borders and is shared by different agencies.

Ms Choi said Thailand should offer incentives to the private sector to share data and use data in more productive ways.

She cited interesting models in South Korea that drive AI inclusion, in particular for small businesses.

One of them is a state AI voucher programme to incentivise AI adoption among small firms, which boosts AI industry development and increases the number of AI solution providers.

Mr Aditip added that a critical challenge for Thailand is the limited, undocumented, and undigitised nature of Thai data, which hinders the development of large language models and other AI capabilities crucial for regional leadership.

He said Thailand should identify its strengths, like food or tourism, and digitise their information.

Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (Syndigate.info).