Kattiya Indaravijaya, president of Kasikornbank (KBank), said people are depositing more money in their accounts now than before, boosting the CASA ratio to 78 per cent of total deposits from last year’s 60 to 70 per cent.

Investment slowdown and temporary shift to bank accounts reflects depositors’ lack of confidence in seeking returns amid relatively high uncertainties, especially in equities and bonds.

Current and savings accounts allow investors and depositors to make quick deposits and withdrawals, providing a flexible and legal way to park money while waiting for a better time to invest.

Kbank’s fast rise in low-cost accounts originates from local uncertainties, including investment fluctuations. Some customers have chosen the bank as their main point for transactions, including deposits, withdrawals, transfers and payment.

“A high number of current and savings accounts could benefit the bank as we will have customers information on record. We can offer credit cards and working capital more easily. This information would not be accessible to us if they used cash. So, what the bank has to do is promote digital banking,” Kattiya said.

Meanwhile, the current and savings account ratio should stay at 60 to 70 per cent, as the bank is encouraging investors to park their money until they are ready to invest. In order to do this, Kbank has to devise suitable campaigns or promotions using QR codes, electronic digital capture (EDC) or digital banking, she added.

Anuwat Luengtaweekul, executive vice president of Thanachart Bank (TBank), said the shift to bank deposits indicates that customers are paying more attention to the banking industry and using it as the key means for financial transactions. This is a good sign for the banking sector, as competition has been relatively high among commercial banks for depositors, with banks requiring customer identification for transactions and to offer financial services.

TBank’s current and savings account ratio has risen to 48 per cent of total deposits from last year’s 30 to 40 per cent, due to customers opting more for online transactions, he said. TBank hopes to record a higher current and savings account ratio and is targeting for 50 per cent this year.

“When the CASA ratio rises sharply, it partly means that customers prefer to park their funds in banks. This also means they have confidence in CASA, as it allows quick transactions without having to pay attention to deposit rates. Hence, every bank wants current and savings account holders, given the low cost of management,” Anuwat said.

The government’s plan to split the up-front licence fee for the 900MHz spectrum over several instalments will relieve some cash flow pressure amid rising capex. However, the telcos will have to acquire 700MHz spectrum in the pending spectrum assignment as a key condition for the payment extension. The National Council of Peace and Order issued the extension measure last Thursday.

Fitch expects the new payment schedule will ease the ratings headroom for AIS and DTAC, as their largest spectrum payments were originally scheduled for 2020 and 2022, respectively. An agreement to apply for the new spectrum payment term could reduce AIS’s projected funds from operations (FFO) adjusted net leverage by around 0.5x to 1.4x in 2020, while that of DTAC could be lowered by around 0.4x to 2.3x in 2022. Fitch has negative triggers of 2.0x for AIS and 2.5x for DTAC.

Under the 900MHz payment extension term, AIS’s remaining spectrum payments for 900MHz of Bt64 billion could be spread out equally at around Bt10.6 billion a year over 2020-2025, from the previous Bt4.0 billion in 2019 and Bt60 billion in 2020. Meanwhile, DTAC will be paying around Bt3.7 billion a year over 2020-2027, compared with the former payment schedule of Bt2.0 billion a year in 2020-2021 and a lump sum of Bt25.8 billion in 2022.

Investments in 5G have been selective, with only a handful of 5G trials taking place in the Asia-Pacific region, underscoring the unproven business case for 5G and limited device availability. Fitch believes that the 4G technology should be sufficient to support Thailand’s growing demand for mobile data in the medium term. The uncertain business case for 5G investment in the absence of a complete ecosystem will widen negative free-cash flow and weigh down telcos’ balance sheets. The regulator has yet to announce details on the 700MHz spectrum allocation.

It expects to achieve new mortgage loans of Bt28 billion by year’s end, the bank’s executive vice president Onanong Udomkantong said recently.

Meanwhile, the bank also offers customers a fixed interest rate for the first five years at 4.99 per cent a year.

“We expect our campaign will boost our mortgage to achieve Bt28 billion in the end of this year,” she said.

The firm is also investing Bt500 million to expand its data centre at Amata City Industrial Estate.

Manabu Kahara, president of NTT Communications (Thailand), said that the firm has moved to set up Innovation Lab in order to showcase various innovative solutions to support manufacturing and the security insurance industries in order to help them improve the efficiency and productivity of their businesses. He added that the firm within this year will invest around Bt500 million in order to set up the third-phase expansion of the Bangkok 2 Data Centre at Amata City Industrial Estate. When it opens in July, the centre will boast a high-density 1,200 square-metre space with 2,000-kilowatt power facilitates to support Thailand’s investment policy in Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC).

The large investment will enable equipping the centre with a high level of stability and data security, as well as being able to provide customers with comprehensive services. The centre’s latest phase will retain the benefits of Nexcentre with its focus on quality, flexibility and cost-efficiency in responding to the business expansion and industrial investment in the EEC area.

IDC reported that by 2022, 15 per cent of public cloud computing in Thailand will be based on non-x86 processors (including quantum). By then, organisations will be spending more on vertical software as a service (SaaS) apps than on horizontal apps.

By 2024, AI-enabled user interfaces and process automation will replace one-third of today’s screen-based apps in Thailand. Also, by 2022, 20 per cent of enterprises will use conversational speech tech for customer engagement. And by 2023, some 25 per cent of servers in Thailand will encrypt data at rest and in motion; over 20 per cent of security alerts will be handled by AI-powered automation, and 3.5 million people will have blockchain-based digital identities.

“Thailand offers the highest potential growth for our business in this region,” said Kahara. “The Thai government is still driving and supporting the Thailand 4.0 scheme and the EEC project. The top three business services that generate revenue to the company are networking, the data centre and cloud services. We will also focus on providing a hybrid cloud to the market.”

By the end of fiscal 2019, the firm expects to generate revenue growth of 10 per cent over last year, he noted, adding that it has around 1,000 enterprise and business customers. Around 50 per cent are Japanese companies, with local companies making up the rest, including international branches of US and European companies. Local companies are expected to reach 60 per cent of customers over the next three years.

In an exclusive interview with The Nation, he said the firm would focus on establishing a digital ecosystem for Myanmar’s restaurant industry in the first phase of its commercial operations.

“Everybody loves food, so it is like the centrepiece of everything. We expect the industry to grow further as the economy grows. So, we are trying to bring restaurants and customers together,” he said.

“Our aim is to get all things connected in a fully-integrated ecosystem. We believe we can make it happen, but it may take time because the industry has yet to reach the mature stage. We are waiting for the market to fully develop.”

Established in October 2012, Code2LAB initially started as a software development company for offshore development. It later refocussed on product development in response to a growing demand for business solutions in Myanmar.

In March 2013, the firm launched SmartSales, a restaurant management system with tablet-based point-of-sales (POS). With that product, Code2LAB emerged as the winner for Startups Season 2 organised by Singapore’s Channel News Asia.

“We are the first to introduce this kind of digital solution in Myanmar. Many international and local franchises are now using it to save costs and time, improve efficiency and ensure convenience,” he said.

To date, more than 200 restaurants including big names like BreadTalk, Shwe Palin, FoodStreat, Mont Zay Tain and Happy Noodles are using Code2LAB’s solution. The firm expects to grow its customer base to more than 350 restaurants by the end of this year. The solution includes the development of PayMal, a cashless payment service for food courts that was introduced in January 2017 – another first of its kind in Myanmar.

The firm also introduced another key produc,  DoeMal, which later emerged as the No 1 foodie platform in Myanmar. Available to restaurants through a web platform or through a mobile application, DoeMal connects restaurants with potential customers by enabling the users to make a reservation and order online while also providing information about several restaurants.

“For restaurant owners, it is a platform we provide them to engage with consumers. We bring in our cross-disciplinary experiences to deliver successful and innovative business solutions, and DoeMal is one of them,” he said.

The platform currently has more than 40,000 active users, and sales transactions have enjoyed steady growth over the past several months. The executive expects the user base to grow to half a million users, and the transaction rate to grow at least 15 per cent by the end of this year.

“Currently, the POS business [SmartSales] is our main revenue generator because it is a B2B [business to business] solution. But, we also foresee a bright outlook for the mass market [DoeMal], which is growing over time,” he said.

“Next year, we expect the number of restaurants using our management system to grow to 1,000 and the [food order] transactions to grow to seven-digits in US-dollar terms. We are now restructuring our business model to achieve our target.”

In November 2016, the firm raised its first round of seed funding worth US$500,000 (Bt15.88 million) from Japan’s Globalway Inc to further capture the market and product development. Code2LAB now has nearly 40 staff on its team, and was valued at $1.7 million last year. Active discussions with four local and foreign investors are underway for funding-raising to expand its business in other cities.

Code2LAB has partnered with Huawei Technologies Co to utilise the Chinese giant’s Cloud service since last year in order to save data and ensure restaurant owners see real-time updates of their businesses.

Min Zeya Phyo also takes pride in saying that the firm plays a critical role in the digital transformation of Myanmar’s restaurant industry by making efforts to change the behaviour of restaurant owners and customers, and to encourage the use of cashless payment solutions for convenience and personal hygiene.

On the challenges, the executive said, “It usually takes at least three to six months for a restaurant to grow. And the competition is tough, given that we have around five key competitors in this market.

“Our strength is that we are not diversified. Instead, we mainly focus on a single industry and provide excellent after-sale service. This has set us apart from our main rivals.”

According to the executive, the growth of Myanmar’s food industry would largely depend on the development of cashless payment solutions, as it will improve efficiency and convenience. To this end, Code2LAB is now holding discussions with leading private banks about cashless payment solutions.

“We are helping our clients solve many parts of their HR [human resource] issues so that they can become replicable businesses,” he said.