Tomas Koch, senior partner and leader in McKinsey’s Asian energy and chemicals practices, described Thailand as an early adopter of digitalisation that has nevertheless been very slow in terms of investment and management.

Koch spoke to the media during the “Digitising Thailand’s Economy” forum held in Bangkok yesterday by McKinsey and Company, a global management consulting firm. He suggested that Thai businesses should be disrupted digitally to shift them into agile performance management to enhance their productivity.

Gregor Theisen, a senior McKinsey partner and leader of its “Digital Asia” practice, said that when compared with other Asian countries such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia and China, Thailand was slower to adopt e-commerce purchases, with a penetration rate of 22 per cent of households this year.

Meanwhile, digital-banking penetration in 2014 Thailand was 19 per cent, lower than in Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia.

According to a McKinsey survey, 30-40 per cent of top business players could be replaced by digital disruption across all sectors over the next five years, Theisen said. Those top companies are in telecommunications, technology products and services, retail, education, travel and hospitality, financial services, manufacturing, media and entertainment, healthcare, pharmaceuticals, utilities and energy.

Koch said that to deal with these challenges, companies should invest more on digital adoption, talent development and integration between new and old operations.

Regional business leaders and Thai policymakers agreed on the essential points to drive the country towards a digital ecosystem for future growth.

Suvit Maesincee, deputy minister of commerce, said Thailand needed new economic engines for sustainable growth through innovative technology and creativity. To that end, the government has asked the Board of Investment to create schemes to attract foreign investors to develop high-value business.

“Human-capital reform is another national priority, with the aim of transforming people to ‘Thai Citizen 4.0’. For example, Thai farmers should be transformed into smart farmers while unskilled labourers should be made knowledge workers instead.”

Krating Poonpol, venture partner at 500 Startups, said the digital talent pool in the Kingdom was still limited, while digital infrastructures needed to be developed.

“Apart from fintech [financial technology] start-ups, other digital business models like property tech and education tech are also needed,” Krating said.

Arawadee Photisaro, head of PTT’s Innovation Lab, said her company had recognised the importance of digital disruption and was planning to collaborate with its partners to develop new services to manage this risk.