Sagar Naker, general manager, said:  “We have completed phase one with the refurbishment of 60 rooms. The next phase is scheduled to be finished by October where we will have a total of over 200 N’Rooms.

“This Bt120 million transformation will introduce the new N’room to our hotel. The N’ Room will be part of our deluxe rooms and will feature modern design with stylish artwork, comfortable beds, functional living space, 55-inch smart TV, and connectivity panel. This room has been designed to ensure that it suits the needs of all our guests.

“The N’Room concept is also a new one for the Novotel brand. The rooms are described by AccorHotels as simple but statutory, functional and emotional, both modern and timeless. Offering space, natural light and unique wall art, the N’Room is a place to live your many lives.”

“Each new room features a unique bed hub with ecologically designed bedding which combines quality comfort with well-being. Unique artworks by international artists adorn the backdrop of each room, giving the N’Room its own distinctive character. The new rooms have been strategically designed for modular living as the spacious living area is equipped with either a designer sofa or functional work desk where everyone can work, play, or simply relax like they do at home. Our new bathrooms come with refreshing rain showers and modern vanity lighting.

“Novotel Siam is the best value hotel in Bangkok. The family and business hotel is located in the Bangkok city center with easy access to malls such as Siam Paragon, Central World and MBK. With easy skytrain access, the hotel is a favorite for many of Bangkok’s returning guests.

“Our new deluxe room is available for stay with three configurations, queen, twin or corner. Room nights start from Bt3,800.”

The shopping research consultancy says the traditional “marketing mix” no longer works because technology is transforming people’s lifestyle in many ways.

Sarinporn Jivanun, managing director, Envirosell Thailand, a subsidiary of Index Creative Village, said: “Nowadays, technology plays quite an important role in our daily lives. It transforms consumers’ lifestyle in  differents way relating to interaction, communication, beliefs, sales and socialising.

“This forces marketing experts to change their way of thinking, their way of communicating and other marketing tools continually in order to meet the consumers’ demands at the highest level.”

According to her, the main five trends that will transform lifestyles in 2018 are:

Consumers will depend on interacting with technologies without any human support;

Consumers will change from believing in commercials, reviews, and word-of-mouth to using “genius” assistants;

They will take pleasure in engagement with games, where they can be buyers and sellers at any place and any time;

They will focus on livestreaming and “authentic experiences”; and

They will socialise more through screens and with “digital humans”.

“These changes forces marketing experts to change they way they approach consumers, since technologies are playing a more important role in consumers’ lifestyles,” Sarinporn said.

She said marketers would have to invest in technologies that meet consumer demand at the highest level, such as artificial intelligence, robotics and virtual reality.

Ruam Charoen Yont will open showrooms and provide customer support, services and spare parts in Petchaburi and Prachuap Khiri Khan.

Tata is expanding its dealer network to boost sales and after-sale services in Thailand.

The shipment includes nine yachts manufactured in the United Kingdom by one of the world’s leading builders, Princess Yachts, with sizes ranging from 62 to 100-plus feet.

“This very large shipment helps further solidify Boat Lagoon Yachting’s position as Thailand’s leading importer of luxury yachts and one of the largest in the region,” managing director Vrit Yongsakul said.

“It adds to the 200 boats we already have in the water throughout the region, giving us the economy of scale to further invest in the most comprehensive after-sales and maintenance facilities.

“We are seeing surging interest in the yachting lifestyle, especially in Thailand. It’s largely being driven by the appeal of the absolute privacy that luxury yachts provide an owner, together with giving the owner an ability to reach beautiful and uncrowded beaches at any time, at the owner’s pleasure. Because of the level of comfort and luxury of modern yachts, it’s like taking your own condominium with you, complete with living room, kitchen and bedrooms.”

Yongsakul called yachting “a very social sport where friends and family take several yachts out together to go cruising to islands in the way that owners of luxury sports cars or motorcycles will go out in groups during weekends, helping to cement long-lasting friendships”.

The new arrivals include a Princess 62, Princess 64, two Princess S65s, a Princess 68, two 80-foot Princess 75 Motor Yachts, an 88-foot Princess 88 Motor Yacht, and a 100-foot Princess 30M superyacht.

Prices range from Bt80 million to Bt450 million.

“The Princess 62 is the newest addition to the Princess line of luxury yachts and incorporates the latest ship-building technology to make the yacht lighter, stronger and more fuel-efficient and with an interior design that is bright and airy,” Yongsakul said.

Boat Lagoon Yachting has nine offices in Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore and Maldives, as well as five branches in Thailand – in Bangkok, Pattaya, Krabi, Koh Samui and Phuket.

The comaany said interested participants could join the promotion following thse simple steps: first log in to your ShopBack account, click on to the “Invite a Friend” tab, copy your link, share your link to friends via Facebook, Twitter, Line, email or other channels.

Both you and your friends must have at least Bt500 in the total cashback on a ShopBack account. By fulfilling all of the conditions, you will enable to reward with Bt3,000 bonus for inviting seven friends and Bt1,000 bonus for inviting three friends. Other conditions apply.

Kawin Prachanukul, co-founder and country general manager of ShopBack (Thailand), said that “to successfully penetrate Gen Y, who are the main contributors in the ecommerce market and also have high negotiation authority, you have to fulfill their needs in terms of innovation and branding”.

The new promotion would counter the consumer “pain point” with a “wow factor”, Kawin said.

“There’s no denying 2017 was a difficult year, with several issues affecting our community and our advertising partners,” YouTube vice president of display, video and analytics Paul Muret said in a blog post.

“The challenges we faced in 2017 have helped us make tough but necessary changes in 2018.”

Channels at YouTube will need to have at least 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time within the past year to be eligible for ads, according to Muret.

Previously, channels could be eligible for ads as part of a YouTube Partner Program by racking up 10,000 views or more.

“We want to take channel size, audience engagement, and creator behavior into consideration to determine eligibility for ads,” Muret said.

YouTube will closely watch for spam, abuse flags and other signals to make sure channels are remaining within the Google-owned video-sharing platforms policies regarding content, according to the post.

Muret said that manual reviews of video will be added to a Google Preferred system that brands use to place ads with popular YouTube content to better vet videos.

YouTube is also providing advertisers simpler controls regarding where ads appear and transparency including safety checks by outside parties, according to Muret.

The changes were expected to affect “a significant number” of YouTube channels eligible to run ads.

YouTube late last year pulled 150,000 videos of children after lewd comments about them were posted by viewers and went public with a vow to greatly increase the ranks of workers focused on rooting out content violating its policies.

The moves came as YouTube strived to assure companies their ads would not appear with offensive or inappropriate videos.

“We are passionate about protecting our users, advertisers and creators and making sure YouTube is not a place that can be co-opted by bad actors,” Muret said.

“While we took several steps last year to protect advertisers from inappropriate content, we know we need to do more to ensure that their ads run alongside content that reflects their values.”

It comes after a complaint by the association Stop Planned Obsolescence (HOP or Halte a l’Obsolescence Programmee) that followed Apple’s admission last month that it intentionally slowed down older models of its iPhones over time.

The investigation was opened on Friday and is being led by anti-trust and consumer protection specialists in the French economy ministry.

When contacted by AFP, Apple France gave no comment on the matter.

Planned obsolescence is a widely criticised commercial practice in which manufacturers build in the expiry of their products so that consumers will be forced to replace them.

It is decried by consumer groups as being unethical and is suspected of being particularly prevalent in the electronics industry, which produces mountains of unrecyclable waste each year

To tackle the problem, France passed landmark legislation in 2015 known as “Hamon’s law” which made the practice illegal and — in theory — obliged retailers to say whether replacement parts were available.

The law, named after former Socialist minister Benoit Hamon, stipulates that a company found to be deliberately shortening the life of its products can be fined up to five percent of its annual sales while executives can face up to two years in jail.

– ‘Wide-scale tax evasion’ –

Last month Apple confirmed what critics had suspected for years: that it intentionally slows performance of older iPhones as their batteries weaken with age.

The company said this was to extend the performance of the phone, which uses less power when running at slower speeds, and was to prevent unexpected shutdowns due to a low battery charge.

It denied incorporating planned obsolescence.

However in late December the company issued an apology for slowing older models and said it would discount replacement batteries for some handsets.

“We know that some of you feel Apple has let you down. We apologize,” Apple said in a message to customers on its website on December 28.

“We’ve always wanted our customers to be able to use their iPhones as long as possible. We’re proud that Apple products are known for their durability, and for holding their value longer than our competitors’ devices.”

Critics have accused Apple of nudging iPhone users to upgrade to newer models by letting them think it was the handsets that needed replacing, rather than just the battery.

HOP believes Apple could be liable for a fine in line with the value of all of its iPhone sales in France since Hamon’s law came into force on August 17, 2015.

The California-based group also faces a class-action suit in the United States.

In another headache for Apple in France, the company announced last week that it has filed a lawsuit against the Attac activist group after about 100 of its supporters occupied the tech giant’s flagship store in Paris last month, protesting alleged “wide-scale tax evasion” by the firm.

French prosecutors have also launched a probe into Japanese printer maker Epson for alleged planned obsolescence in its products.

The company estimated operating profits of 15.1 trillion won ($14.1 billion) in the October to December period, an all-time high for quarterly profits and nearly double the 9.2 trillion won posted a year earlier.

Samsung has had to overcome a bribery scandal that saw the company’s de-facto head Lee Jae-Yong thrown into jail as well as a damaging recall last year of its flagship Galaxy Note 7 smartphone over exploding batteries.

Lee, who was found guilty in August of bribery, perjury and other charges relating to payments made by Samsung to ousted president Park Geun-Hye’s secret confidante Choi Soon-Sil, is appealing his five-year sentence and says he is innocent.

Samsung Electronics’ financial performance has soared despite his travails.

Fourth-quarter sales were projected to have jumped 23.8 percent year-on-year to 66 trillion won.

Samsung said it expects its operating profits for the 2017 full year to hit 53.6 trillion won and to post full-year sales of 239.6 trillion won.

The company is set to release its final earnings report later this month.

Phillip Securities said on Monday that it was ready to provide trading services for investors who want to invest in Bitcoin via the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). It aims to provide investors Bitcoin investment services 24 hours day.

It claims to the first and only brokerage company in Thailand to offer Bitcoin futures trading in the CBOE and CME. Bitcoin futures could also be used to hedge risks, Phillip Securities said.

BOT assistant governor Chantavarn Sucharitakul expressed her concern over the company’s claim that it was the only brokerage company in Thailand offering Bitcoin futures trading service. “This statement might mislead investors into believing that its service had got approval from the BOT. The BOT has never legalised Bitcoin as a currency for financial transactions,” she warned.

She explained that the BOT allowed Thai investors to invest in foreign financial assets and they should be aware of the high risks associated with digital currencies.

Kesara Manchusree, president of the Stock Exchange of Thailand, however said that since Phillip Securities is a member of the CBOE and CME markets, which offer Bitcoin trading, it could provide the Bitcoin investment service to Thai investors. Thai investors, however, should understand well Bitcoin futures and its risks, she noted.

Meanwhile, Paralee Sukonthaman, assistant secretary-general of the Securities and Exchange Commission, also said the CME and CBOE are under supervision of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Hence, Thai brokerage companies could provide trading service in Bitcoin futures in those two futures markets. The CME and CBOT also are members of the International Organisation of Securities Commissions. Therefore, there was no fraud or money-laundering risk due to the high standard of supervision.

She said the risk of trading in Bitcoin futures is due to the high volatility of this crypto-currency. She advised investors to have adequate liquidity to prepare for margin call in case of any sharp fall in its value.