The windfall was due to a network expansion covering the whole of Thailand through M&A deals over the last 12 months and the switch from static media in 21 prime areas to digital media in July last year.

The number of digital screens was increased to 35 in January and MACO continued to receive positive feedback from its clients.

All this added up to a situation the company could take pride in, its CEO, Phun Chon Kit, said on Monday.

Pjun said that in terms of the business strategy for 2018, MACO would continue to develop advertising media already in place and would seek other areas where it could install additional static media or digital media.

MACO is also trying to establish a foothold overseas, first in the AEC countries, where it would focus on catering to companies’ advertisement budgets, both domestically and internationally.

The overseas business would be a joint venture with local partners, he added.

MACO is now finalising its negotiations with those companies and the picture is expected to become clearer by the middle of this year.

In a statement on its website, Xerox cited “material deviations” in the audited financials of an existing joint venture known as Fuji Xerox that is controlled by Fujifilm.

The move follows a lawsuit by powerful shareholders Carl Icahn and Darwin Deason who have vigorously opposed the merger, which had been announced in January.

Xerox added that Jeff Jacobson had resigned from his role as the company’s CEO, along with five board members who were replaced by five new members.

The new board will be chaired by Keith Cozza, who is the current CEO of Icahn Enterprises, while its new CEO is set to be John Visentin.

The board will immediately convene to “evaluate all strategic alternatives to maximize shareholder value.”

Icahn said: “We are extremely pleased that Xerox finally terminated the ill-advised scheme to cede control of the company to Fujifilm.

“With that behind us and new shareholder-focused leadership in place, today marks a new beginning for Xerox.”

The conflict was the latest involving a big company and a high-profile shareholder activist, in this case Icahn, a battle-tested billionaire who has aggressively challenged companies since the 1980s.

Icahn and Deason had in late April won a temporary injunction against the merger after a New York judge agreed the deal prioritized the interests of the Xerox CEO over that of the company’s shareholders.

The enterprise division will enhance its various domains in 2018, including cloud, big data, campus networks, data centres, and Internet of thing (IoT), said Qiu Lei, vice president of the marketing and product solution sales department at Huawei Enterprise Group, and part of Huawei Technologies of Shenzhen, China.

With full-stack solutions across devices, networks and the cloud, Huawei works with partners to meet customers requirements. Those include service deployment, elastic resource release, big data analytics, and ultra-broadband DCI (data centre interconnect) in order to help ISPs in their digital transformation and to remain competitive in the digital era, said Lei.

Huawei can offer a one-stop innovative ICT infrastructure platform, as well as provide customers with various resources within data centres, including high-density and high-performance servers, distributed storage, and agile interconnection networks and infrastructure for different Internet services.

Altogether, more than 1 million of their servers have been used around the world.

“Asia Pacific region plays a very important role,” said Lei. “In the coming future, we will strive to bring digital to every person, home and organisation for a fully connected, intelligent world. In this digital economy era, the Asia Pacific is one of the most promising regions with rapid growth of Internet users at 14 per cent compound annual growth and e-Commerce at 32 per cent CAGR.

The result will be US$300 billion (Bt9.56 trillion) worth of economic growth in the next 10 years. “There are abundant opportunities for Internet access and cloud data centre development in the region,” said Lei.

He added that his enterprise business group has high potential growth, with the digital integration of Asean propelling the rapid growth of the digital economy and a safe and smart life, to fuel national economic progress and drive the development of an intelligent society.

As digital changes people’s live, he said, Internet service providers (ISPs) in Asia Pacific are increasingly developing their business and driving innovative technology in e-commerce, social networking, mobile gaming, mobile payment, and travel domains across countries. Together with governments and local enterprise, they are promoting the development of the digital revolution and digital integration, and innovative ICT has become an important driver in this new era.

The firm launched three new solutions to the market at the Huawei Asia Pacific ISP Summit 2018 in Hong Kong last week. They are: its next generation FusionServer V5 platform solution, CloudCampus solution, and FusionPower 5000-S uninterruptible power supply (UPS) for large data centres in Southeast Asia.

United Information Highway (UIH) is the first digital infrastructure and solution provider in Thailand to utilise the CloudCampus solution to support its customers.

Sunti Medhavikul, managing director of UIH, said that the firm laid down the CloudCampus solution to support its business early this year. The system allows it to offer cloud services featuring high bandwidth, large capacity and high reliability to support its mid-range to high-end corporate customers.

Lei said that to harness the full potential of the digital economy, it is crucial for ISPs to move towards a robust ICT infrastructure that will accelerate their digital maturity.

By the end of this year the enterprise business group will generate revenues of $10 billion, a 30 per cent growth over last year, said Lei.

“Our global base is trying to make it as efficient as possible to provide the country two main benefits,” Markus Lorenzini, Siemens’ chief executive officer for Thailand, told The Nation in a recent interview.

“High-efficiency power plants will lower the electricity price. Moreover, the higher the efficiency, the lesser is the carbon footprint. It’s good for the environment compared to other conventional ways of power generation,” he explained.

Lorenzini said that it was likely that some power plants may still have sufficient capacity but the question was whether it was worth operating them at low efficiency.

“Because if you have a low-efficiency machine, first of all your generation cost would be higher, and second, your carbon footprint would have a bigger impact on the environment,” the CEO said.

“Under Thailand’s PDP [Power Development Plan] – the country is going to replace power plants. It’s not an addition to the capacity, but it’s actually replacing of capacity,” he said.

PDP is an electricity master development plan for the next 20 years valid from 2015-36.

He cited the example of “Wang Noi Replacement 1” power plant, which will be shut down and replaced with a modern and high-efficiency plant.

In his view, Thailand has a diversified energy portfolio and is also doing quite well in having a good mix of decentralised power generation, which is a kind of Small Power Producer in supporting industrial estates and being the backbone for future investment and stability in supply.

To support such a trend, Siemens’ business strategy is encouraging the utilisation of its portfolio to support the country in energy development and make use of its expertise to enhance technology and provide reliable solutions for power plants, said Chotipol Changcharoen, senior vice president of the power and gas division.

Chotipol said the company also emphasised how it could bring to Thailand other successful projects that Siemens had developed in other parts of the world.

Lorenzini said, “Germany and some European countries’ benchmark are utilising renewable energy even though the price is decreasing heavily.”

He said, however, that their attempt to enhance power generation from renewable energy poses a challenge to the grid and operators, as currently renewable energy cannot be produced at the same price level as conventional fuel.

“Therefore, when renewable energy has been significantly increased, it gives you challenges. It may also have an impact on the tariff,” he said.

Looking to the future

“Thailand is a sustainable market for Siemens”, said Lorenzini, who also mentioned Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia as promising markets.

Siemens has about 30-per-cent market share in Thailand while the market in the other three countries is still developing.

Thailand’s power development plan is the driving force for Siemens in the energy sector, he added.

Siemens’ contribution to the energy market in Thailand includes the largest onshore wind farm in operation in Southeast Asia which are Korat phase 1 and phase 2 in Nakhon Ratchasima province.

The two wind farms are the largest in Thailand and contain 90 SWT-2.3-101 wind turbines that can produce approximately 207 megawatts of renewable energy.

The firm has also provided four power plant projects for the central power plant of the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand during the past 10 years. They are Chana 1, Bang Pakong 5, Chana 2, and Wang Noi 4.

Last year, Siemens and its Japanese consortium partner, Marubeni Corporation, continued to collaborate with the state-owned utility on the fifth order for a turnkey combined cycle power plant named “South Bangkok Replacement 1”.

Two units in a single-shaft configuration of the gas-fired power plant will apply two H-class gas turbines for the first time in the country.

According to the commission, in 2019 the power plant with around 1,200MW capacity is expected to serve 1.5 million Thai households, he said.

“When the project is finished, it would operate at over 60 per cent efficiency, which is the highest rate in Thailand,” Lorenzini added.

The CEO added that these types of standout plants would offer a high level of efficiency, short start-up times, and flexibility in accommodating fast loading.

In terms of the development in neighbouring countries, Chotipol said these days energy is flowing from one country to the others as energy is imported and exported through the Asean transmission grid.

“I think in the future it does not matter, or it may be less important, to have the power plant here and generate power just for only this country, but we can have the power generation here and transport it to other countries, or vice versa,” he added.

As the only building connected to BTS Bang Na, it offers access to Bangkok’s transport network, with easy access to Suvarnabhumi airport, service stations, public buildings and shopping centres.

Noelle Coak, the Regus chief for Thailand, Taiwan and Korea, said: “The latest Regus opening is perfectly placed at the gateway to the industrial and manufacturing hub of eastern Thailand, which includes Samut Prakarn, Bang-Na-Trad, Bang Pu and Bang Prakong, making it an attractive option for businesses across a broad range of sectors.

“This opening is an opportunity to improve and strengthen services to clients whilst providing businesses with easier access to a flexible office. Bhiraj Tower at Bitec offers attractive, spacious interiors not found elsewhere in the Bang Na area.”

Regus has 146sqm of coworking space, including 109 office rooms, 306 work stations, a 301sqm business lounge and two meeting rooms.

The space is fully furnished by Regus, offers high-speed internet and has a staffed reception.

Clients can choose between interior or window offices, or from several suites made up of a small office with meeting rooms.

Further flexibility is offered based on client’s needs, with a range of price points and options to add or reduce workspace as necessary, depending on the client’s current and future requirements.

“IWG is forging a new working culture across the world via the brands it operates. In Bangkok, Regus, part of IWG, the global operator of leading workspace providers, has already made great waves in the workspace revolution, with 18 locations in Bangkok and 21 across Thailand.”

He said Regus would also open an office in Chiang Mai this year.