At the same time, TRIS Rating assigns the rating of “AA” to CPNREIT’s proposed issue of up to Bt16,250 million in senior unsecured debentures. The proceeds from the new debentures will be used to repay the trust’s Bt14,456 million outstanding bank loans and for normal operation.

    The “negative” outlook reflects concerns over the lingering high level of leverage. In addition, the size of the project backlog and the recent operating performance of NWR are both below expectations.

Raushan Yesbulatova, Ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan in Thailand, and Tevin Vongvanich, President & Chief Executive Officer, PTT Plc, presided over the contract-signing yesterday.

The Fifth Transmission Pipeline Project Phase 2, with a main pipeline of approximately 200 kilometres, is expected to be completed within 2021. It is one of PTT Group’s projects under the Integrity Pact of 2017, ensuring that procurement processes as well as the disclosure of important project information are transparent and handled in a bribery-free manner under the observation of independent observers.

The service, using 2300MHz, will be ready in Chiang Mai and Phuket by early July and in other 37 provinces by the end of this year, DTAC said. The company opened the service in Bangkok on June 6.

In Khon Kaen, the service is now reportedly available in Na Mueang Road, Srichan Road, Banglamphu Market, Kaen Nakorn Lake, Ton Tann Market, Pratunam Khon Kaen and Khon Kaen Walking Street.

They hope to solve frequent jams in the signalling system, which took place from Monday to Wednesday.

The study will examine if switching the signalling to a new radio communications equipment and using other spectrum bands, instead of the current 2400MHz, will help. The change of the equipment and the use of the new frequency is due to be finished tonight.

As part of the monitoring, the NBTC will send its radio frequency vehicles to check frequencies along the route.

The BTSC said the problem was likely to have been caused by its signalling system experiencing interference on the telecom spectrum.

The NBTC watchdog on Wednesday suggested that the Skytrain operator shift to use 2480-2495MHz as a long-term solution.

The BTSC has intended to finish installing the new radio communications equipment and move to the NBTC’s recommended band tonight.

TOT will switch off its 2300MHz cellular base stations along the Skytrain routes on a temporary basis until BTS finishes implementing the change.

TOT has granted the 2300MHz to DTAC to provide wireless broadband in a business partnership deal.

Chief marketing officer Voralak Tulaphorn made the announcement this week alongside Jakkrit Keeratichokchaikun of Power Mall, Be Trend and Sports Mall, Anat Julintron of Gourmet Market and Home Fresh Mart and Jennifer Fall of Boutique and Beauty Hall.

The Mall Group will not be providing plastic bags to customers that day at all branches of The Mall and at the Emporium, EmQuartier and Siam Paragon.

Instead, each customer will receive 10 M Points that can be redeemed for e-vouchers on M Card applications, thereby reducing paper use.

Cloth totes are available for Bt19 or 99 M points, and more M points will be awarded for using the cloth totes instead of plastic bags.

Beginning on July 16, shoppers will receive 10 M points for every plastic bag they decline.

Loxley GTECH demanded compensation after the GLO cancelled the contract to provide the lottery game service system signed in 2005.

The Japan-based company, which made its name in social media with its popular messaging application, also said it would keeping moving forward with its range of services that cover media, entertainment, business and commerce.

At its annual Line Conference in Japan, the company said it would do so by redesigning its existing services to become more focused on customers. This user-centric approach would be applied to the roll-out of services in the future, the company said.

The company said that, for the financial sector, it would “build a payment revolution” through its Line Pay platform as well as create new financial infrastructure built with blockchain.

It announced the Line Token Economy concept, which uses blockchain technology custom-developed by the company to reward users with Line’s own currency for reviewing services. The company plans to spread this token economy out into other, non-Line services.

The company also announced plans for a cryptocurrency exchange, Bitbox, on which users can make exchanges with digital currencies in countries around the world, except Japan and the United States. The exchange will support more than 30 types of digital coins and will be available in 15 languages. The platform is due to start next month.

Takeshi Idezawa, president and chief executive officer of Line Corporation, said that the company is moving forward with full-scale research and development efforts into blockchain technology.

In April, it established the Line Blockchain Lab, a research organisation within Line for designing and developing dApp services, and has established Unblock, a subsidiary for designing the token economy.

In May the company entered into a global blockchain project called Icon and established Unchain, which is for developing token economy-related technologies.

Hisahiro Chofuku, director and chief operating officer of Line Pay Corporation, said that the company aims to turn Japan into cashless and wallet-less society under the company’s “Line Pay revolution”.

Cashless payments in Japan account for 18.4 per cent of transactions. Chofuku said Line Pay would create “a new flow of money among Line users (peer to peer) and between users and companies”. By May, Line Pay saw 125,214 million monthly transactions worldwide, including countries and territories such as Japan, Thailand, Taiwan and Indonesia.

The company aims to increase the number of merchants accepting Line Pay to more than 1 million locations in Japan alone. To achieve this goal, it has joined with QuicPay to expand the Line Pay service via near field communication (NFC) to around 720,000 locations in Japan.

NFC is the newest payment service from Line Pay, apart from Line PayCard, and QR/barcode payment. It also launched the Line Pay app for merchants without transaction fees for three years from August 2018. It offers incentive of around 3 to 5 per cent of transactions coming back to the merchants that use Line Pay via QR and barcode.

On the AI front, Line continued to promote its virtual assistant Clova in the market.

Jun Masuda, director and chief strategy marketing officer of Line Corporation, said that Clova will come in more characters such as Doraemon and Minion, and it will be more connected to home appliances for the smart home concept. The company has joined with Toyota to launch Clova Auto as an AI assistant for drivers.