Boonsueb Chanchamsri, senior marketing manager, IT and mobile communications at Thai Samsung Electronics, said the company had always sought to fulfil customers’ lifestyle needs with its products.

“The company’s strategy to be No.1 brand emphasise three pillars – product innovation, brand love, and value-added and premium service,” Boonsueb said.

“At Samsung, we never stop to provide innovative products that not only elevate industry norms, but more importantly a product that fulfils our customers’ needs and lifestyles – especially for the young millennials.

“We follow the philosophy of ‘Do What You Can’t’ strictly because we believe in customers’ capability and this is why we never stop to make ‘what can’t be made’ so that our customers can do what they can never do before with our product.”

On branding, he said Samsung gives importance to every “customer touch points”.

“From Galaxy 10k Thailand Championship, Galaxy Studio to Samsung Brand Shop, we want to offer our customers a platform where they can touch and try, and gain first-hand experience with our products before they decide to buy,” Boonsueb said.

Samsung was named the Marketeer No.1 brand at the Brand Thailand 2017-2018 Awards, across many categories.

Sara Lamsam, president and chief executive officer of the Muang Thai Life Assurance Public Co Ltd, said that the company’s branding policy is customer-centric.

“The Marketeer No1 Brand Thailand 2017-2018 Awards in the life insurance category is the result of our working hard to know and to give the right service for the different needs of customers. And, we always bring innovation to insurance products,” said Sara.

He said the company recently set up the Fuchsia Innovation Centre to encourage creative thinking under the concept of thinking outside the box.

Wirawat Panthawangkun, senior executive vice president of Kasikornbank, said the lender was awarded the Marketeer No.1 Brand Thailand 2017-2018 Awards in the digital banking category.

Wirawat said that the bank has been working on digital transformation in every aspect since its organisation restructuring. Wirawat said the lender was building a creative mindset.

“For example, K PLUS is the result of the company’s vision to transform an application to be a lifestyle platform and then it becomes one of the most popular apps with having 1.8 million users,” Wirawat said.

Saharat Kanongsilp, True Corporation Plc’s head of commercial TrueOnline & convergence unit, said that True Group’s strength is its ability to offer the convergence benefits of its networks, products and services. Packages bundling TrueOnline with True Mobile Group or TrueVisions Pay TV services, have proven successful in terms of customer acquisitions and retention. Saharat said,

“True Group’s convergence strategy allows us to meet the demands of our subscribers’ lifestyles by building upon the complementary strengths of our communications services and solutions,” said Saharat.

TrueOnline won the No 1 Brand Thailand 2017-2018 Award in the category of Internet service provider awarded by Marketeer.

Saharat said that the award given to TrueOnline will further drive the company to take part in transforming Thailand into a regional digital economy hub.

SAM sold Bt1.375 billion worth of NPAs in the first quarter, up 50 per cent year on year from Bt880 million.

SAM has planned to buy a total of Bt10 billion in non-performing loans (NPLs)from commercial banks this year, of which Bt3.7 billion were purchased in the first quarter of the year.

Niyot says the company expects continuous growth this year , thanks to the recovery of the domestic and global economy and the government’s investments in state infrastructure, particularly the Eastern Economic Corridor.

Most of the company’s existing NPAs are located in potential areas, amounting to a total of Bt22 billion, of which 160 are large assets.

The price of a NPA does not go up quickly, unlike new assets, he said.

For example, the price of a NPA condominium is between Bt50,000 to Bt60,000 per square metre compared with Bt200,000 to Bt300,000 per sqm in the market.

This means property developers can still make profit from developing NPA assets.

The company will launch an aggressive campaign to draw customers this year and will allow them to make reservation of the targeted assets online at all times.

This will enable SAM to make quick sales of NPAs on a low cost basis and can serve customers anytime.

He added that SAM will not revise up the NPA sale target this year despite satisfying sales in the first quarter.

New players

He said the entry of new players in the asset management market has led to higher competition and pushed up NPL prices.

It has also benefited financial institutes that sell NPLs.

Saharatna Benyakul, SAM’s Executive Vice President for Property Management Group, said that in the first quarter many foreign investors purchased SAM NPAs in the EEC and the trend has continued.

Currently the ratio of SAM NPA in EEC is less than 10 per cent of its large NPA asset.

The mining, paper and logistics sectors showed the highest growth in net earnings at 281.3 per cent, 171.4 per cent and 141.4 per cent, respectively.

Electronic appliances, industry and machinery, and construction businesses saw overall year-on-year declines of 45.1 per cent, 42.8 per cent and 30.8 per cent in net profit, according to the research house.

These are the findings of Huobi Research, which published its “2018 H1 Global Blockchain Industry Overview and Prospects” report on Monday.

According to the report, crypto-asset crowd-funding exploded last year, with the amount coming in 23 times more than the 2016 level.

In addition, the report elaborates in-depth aspects of the crypto-assets market, including crypto-market regulation, the blockchain industry and blockchain technology.

Spencer Lee, director of commercial for airline, said the carrier had transported over 1.3 million passengers from Kuala Lumpur to Thailand across a variety of routes last year, and that Thailand is one of the most popular destinations for Malaysians.

Lee said he was excited by the launch of the Kuala Lumpur-Hua Hin route, especially as the inaugural flight secured a load factor of 85 per cent. The airline plans to attract Hua Hin’s many travellers to continue on to Kuala Lumpur to reinforce the route.

Pairin Chuchotethavorn, Thailand’s deputy minister of Transport, said the government has set plans to develop Hua Hin Airport with an aim to increase its ability to accommodate travellers and for commercial airlines to attract more tourists.