AOT executive vice president Wichai Bunyu said AOT had approved the three contenders’ qualifications after inspection.

A fourth potential bidder, Central Department Store Co Ltd (and DFS Venture of Singapore), that had previously purchased the bidding envelope, did not submit a bid.

“The next step is to get their technical proposals on June 5 and their proposed financial returns on June 10. Then, the selection committee will come to a conclusion about which will be forwarded to a committee that will review income together with the duty-free shop project and the commercial areas at Suvarnabhumi Airport on June 12,” Wichai said. AOT has scheduled 3pm on June 5 for presentations of the technical proposals.

The bidding result will be proposed to the AOT board on June 19.

Wichai declined to elaborate on the bidding, saying only that all projects details would be disclosed publicly after the board meeting on June 19.

King Power Duty Free scored the highest in its bids for the duty-free shop project at Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Vitavas Vibhagool, chief executive officer of Grande Asset Hotels and Property Plc and a representative of the Royal Orchid Sheraton (Thailand) bidding consortium, came in person to submit their bid. The consortium includes WDFG UK Ltd, which is No 1 in the world’s duty-free shop sector.

“We’re confident about this bidding. We will talk to our partners in detail about the AOT’s pick-up counter project, which will be launched next. We’ll participate in [bidding on] all projects,” Vitavas said.

Both King Power Duty Free and Royal Orchid Sheraton have asked AOT for detailed scores of the previous bids for the duty-free shop project at Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Of the three contenders, King Power Duty Free was the only stand-alone bidder. The other two bidders were consortiums. The first, the Bangkok Airways-Lotte Duty Free consortium, includes Bangkok Airways (49 per cent), Hotel Lotte Co Ltd (49 per cent) and Bangkok Airways Holding (2 per cent).

The third bidder, a consortium headed by Royal Orchid Sheraton (Thailand), includes Royal Orchid Sheraton (36 per cent), Empire Asia Group (15 per cent) and WDFG UK Ltd (49 per cent).

ADB’s deputy director general Christopher Thieme said the bank supports infrastructure development in Asia countries. This project will improve the mass transit system in Bangkok and reduce cost of living for residents  in the city.

Northern Bangkok Monorail Co Ltd will operate the pink line stretching from Bangkok to Karai Nonthaburi, totalling 34.5 kilometres.  Eastern Bangkok  Monorail Co Ltd  will  manage the 30-kilometre yellow line from Bangkok to Sam Rong Samutprakarn province.

He also hoped that a new and stable government could be set up within this month.

He said the group has slashed by half its sales growth forecast for the year – from 5 to 6 per cent, due to unfavourable economic conditions.

He said that in the past the group had focused mainly on manufacturing products but from now on its focus will also cover other areas such education and services in response to fast-changing technology, lifestyles, and demand of the new generation.

It will open King’s College International School Bangkok in partnership with King’s College School Wimbledon, England.

It will also focus more on adopting advanced digital technology to enhance its operational efficiency and enhance customer experience.

Saha Group will sign a number of memoranda of understanding and deals with foreign partners on June 27-28.

The group declined to elaborate details of these projects, only revealing that one of them is a plan to join with Japan’s Tokyu Corporation to develop a hotel and condominium project.The hotel will be set up in Sri Racha.

The other one is a plan to join with Japan’s Sojitz Corporation to seek potential customers to invest in Saha group’s industrial parks in Kabinburi, Mae Sot as well as Lampun.

Saha group will hold the 23rd Saha Group Fair from June 27 to 30 at Bitec Bangna.

The fair will offer varieties of products from the group.

The event will unveil its vision “Path towards the Future” and feature a full range of products and services enhanced with digital technology as well as cultures, negotiate trade deals with investors, showcase innovations and offer exclusive sales promotions of leading products at their exhibition booths.

In addition, Saha Group will jointly work with the Commerce Ministry to invite more than 30,000 Thong Fah (Blue Flag) Pracha Rat stores nationwide to participate in the event.

Sathapon Patanakuha, managing director at Smart Contract Thailand, said the firm aims to provide the health care industry with its S-curve business, including their blockchain solution.

That solution is a health information exchange and personal health records platform using blockchain technology and designed for hospital and government healthcare organisations.

The platform, Sathapon said, could help patients, medical practitioners, as well as hospital and healthcare service providers in the areas of the Nationwide Health Information Exchange, e-referral and e-claims, universal personal health records and health literacy and awareness.

The firm has also developed an electricity distribution system based on peer-to-peer solar energy trading using blockchain technology.

The firm moreover also provides an identity management platform, tokenisation platform and smart contract management platform to support both enterprise and government markets.

Their identity management platform offers eKYC (electronic know your customers), identity sharing, fraud prevention and consent management.

Meanwhile, the tokenisation platform is a new technology platform related to energy, bonds, shares and securities, as well as property.

With the contract management platform, the firm offers supply chain and logistics solutions to support enterprise and government markets.

“We are a local development team that developed S-Curve technologies to support the local and international market,” said the managing director.

Sathapon added that the firm is under negotiations with business partners to provide its technology solutions to support international market such as Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong.

The firm expects that by the end of this year it will generate a revenue increase from last year of around 150 per cent.

“Our developments are disruptive technologies, including blockchain. We also saw that emergent technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics would change business processes and daily life for people as a whole,” said Sathapon.

IDC has also reported their expectation that spending on blockchain solutions within Asia Pacific excluding Japan (APEJ) would reach nearly US$523.8 million (Bt16.49 billion) in 2019, an increase of 83.9 per cent from the $284.8 million spent in 2018, according to the latest update of the IDC Worldwide Semiannual Blockchain Spending Guide.

Furthermore, IDC forecasts that blockchain spending in APEJ to grow at a robust pace during the 2018-2022 forecast period with a five-year compound annual growth rate of 77.5 per cent and total spending of $2.4 billion by 2022.

“Networked integrity, distributed power, value as incentive, security, privacy, rights preserved and inclusion are the seven basic design principle of the blockchain economy,” said Ashutosh Bisht, senior research manager for customer insights and analysis at IDC. “And they provide the confidence for industry leaders to accelerate their adoption of this maturing technology.

“We have reached an inflection point where implementation is moving quickly beyond the pilot and proof of concept phase for the adoption of Blockchain in APEJ,” said Bisht.

“Blockchain, which emerged out of the financial sector, is more well-established in this vertical industry. The financial sector accounts for about half of the spend throughout the forecast period.”

This programme is run by The FinLab, in collaboration with the Digital Economy Promotion Agency (depa), National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) and the Office of SMEs Promotion (OSMEP).

The 15 SMEs, selected from close to 150 applicants in Bangkok, come from a diverse range of sectors such as food and beverage, retail, travel, logistics and manufacturing. They were chosen in recognition of their acute awareness of their business constraints and challenges, as well as for their openness to explore new ideas and to use digital tools for scaling new heights in their business.

Through the Smart Business Transformation Programme, UOB (Thai) and The FinLab aim to help these SMEs tap digital solutions to enhance their online marketing efforts and to streamline their business processes. This will enable them to reach more customers in Thailand and expand into new markets.

 The SMEs will attend a series of workshops on various topics conducted by industry experts from May to June 2019 to gain the know-how and to learn about the digital tools they can use for their business. They will then be matched with The FinLab’s curated list of solution providers to pilot solutions that are relevant to their individual businesses. Each SME will receive Bt1 million worth of value through the workshops, professional training, mentorship and publicity garnered from the programme.

“We started our services one year ago, with a specific focus on the installation and repair of air-conditioners, washing machines and refrigerators. And now we have just launched our mobile app to bring the smart experience to this industry,” he said.

The firm launched Zeddite application last week, aiming to see a substantial increase in its customer base. Customers can now enquire or order Zeddite’s services through a variety of channels – app, website, Facebook page and direct call.

Since its first day in business, the firm has enjoyed a growth rate of around 70 per cent, he said, and provides one-stop services to more than 300 customers on a monthly basis.

“With the launch of our app, we expect to grow at around 100 per cent in the near term. In the next 12 months, we aim to achieve 200 per cent growth and around 3,000 orders every month,” said Nyan Lynn Htet.

He said the firm eyes further simultaneous growth in both B2B (business to business) customers and the mass market. While maintaining AC as its main target, Zeddite will expand its service portfolio to CCTV installation from this month on.

In order to ensure the fastest service within three hours of receiving an order, the firm has partnered with more than 20 professional technicians from different townships in Yangon’s municipal area.

“We have covered the whole YCDC [Yangon City Development Committee] area so far, but we still have more than 120 technicians on our waiting list. Later on, we will expand our geographical coverage after testing their quality and professional performance,” he said.

According to the executive, the firm is also eyeing expansion of its service areas to improve women’s involvement in the business.

“The current service lines are not that convenient for female technicians. We are also looking at computer hardware and software services to create more job opportunities for women,” he said.

During the interview, Nyan Lynn Htet explained why he decided to establish Zeddite with three other co-founders.

“People usually have to spend their time outside. So, they want to have the appliances repaired at a convenient time for them, particularly when they are at home. If they contact only one service centre, it is really hard to send a technician to their home at a time convenient to them, due to the limited number of skilled technicians,” he said.

“On the other hand, when we reached out to service centres, we found out that they usually do not have a specific staff member to accept the customer’s order. This may lead to misunderstanding and inconvenience for customers. We tried to solve that pain point.”

He said it is really hard for technicians to draw up an effective schedule and routes, when they accept orders from different townships.

“For example, even if a technician has the capacity to repair four air-cons, perhaps he can service only two if he is tied up with logistics and drawing up the schedule,” he said.

Additionally, it is really difficult for people living in Yangon to find the right service, one that guarantees quality during a certain period of time.

“For customers, it is usually hard to know whether or not the [service technician’s] quality is good enough. Another thing is that many people usually hesitate to bring strangers to their houses for safety reasons,” he said. “As a third party, we mainly take care of an efficient management system to ensure punctuality, quality and security.”

In a bid to raise funds, the firm is currently in discussions with four potential investors, including some foreign firms. It expects six-digit investment in US-dollar terms from the fundraising.

Meanwhile, AOT Plc today opened up bidding for the private sector to submit its qualifications and technical and business plans to manage the commercial and tax-free areas of the three provincial airports.

The committee will then review the qualifications of bidders before considering technical and business plans. Those that make it that far will then have their bid price opened on June 10, with the committee announcing the winner for all three airports on that day, said Wichai. The winner would then be proposed to the company’s board for consideration on June 19.

He added that the company believed that the four private groups that purchased an auction envelope last month would today send in their proposal.

King Power Duty Free Co Ltd, acting alone, was among the four groups to purchase the auction envelope. The next group was Bangkok Airways Plc who joined with South Korea-based Hotel Lotte Co Ltd and Bangkok Airways Holding Co Ltd. The third group was Royal Orchid Hotel (Thailand) Plc jointly with Empire Asia Group and WDFG UK Ltd. The final group was Central Department Store Co Ltd with DFS Venture Singapore Co Ltd.

According to the bid rules, up to 80 per cent of the score will focus on the technical and business plan, with the remaining 20 per cent based on the monetary return to the AOT.

Wichai said that AOT has continued to maintain the revenue to be shared with AOT to not less than 20 per cent, which was the same rule for the previous bids to manage the commercial area of Suvarnabhumi International Airport. That contest was won by King Power Suvarnabhumi Co Ltd, which offered returns to AOT of over Bt2 billion a year.

Under the revenue sharing rule, the private firm that is chosen to manage the commercial area of the three provincial airports must pay at least 20 per cent yearly over a 10-year contract, he said.