Hitachi targets Lumada Centre as Asean hub
HITACHI HAS invested more than Bt50 million to set up the Lumada Centre at Amata City industrial estate in Chon Buri province to support customers in the Southeast Asia region. The firm expects to generate Bt60 billion revenue in Thailand in fiscal year 2018 and achieve Bt90 billion by fiscal year 2021.
Toshiaki Higashihara, the president and chief executive officer of Hitachi, said the firm had opened the Lumada centre located in Amata City, Chon Buri, which is the hub of Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC). The centre is also integrating successfully Internet of Things (IoT) solutions from countries around the world including Japan, China and USA.
The Lumada IoT platform is designed for people to connect, cooperate and co-create solutions with its partners to create new value in order to support industries and businesses.
“Thailand is very important to connect at all levels. The centre will also transfer knowledge and know-how to Thai staff in order to provide IoT solutions to customers in the region. The centre can contribute smart solutions across domains of manufacturing, urban development, healthcare, logistics, factories, smart cities and home appliances across the country and region,” said the president.
In the first stage, the firm has invested more than Bt50 million into the Lumada Centre Southeast Asia and the firm will continue investment in the centre to make it a hub for various industries in Thailand and Southeast Asia. “The Amata City industrial estate has industrial parks not only in Thailand but also in Vietnam. We will expand this connection to Asean countries.
We will connect not just factory to factory, but industrial park to industrial park and global factory to global factory. Also we will connect factory to logistics centre and data centre, which are also important. We will focus our business in Southeast Asia based on Lumada. Thailand is very important in this region,” said the president.
He said that Hitachi in fiscal year 2017, ending on March 31, 2018, earned 500 billion yen (Bt145 billion) revenue in the Asean region and expected to gain 700 billion yen by fiscal year 2021 with 50 per cent coming from Thailand.
“The Asean market has a higher growth rate compared to the rest of the world, and is rapidly advancing towards both digitalisation and urbanisation. We recognise Thailand as a key focal market in this region. Presently, Thailand takes up the bulk of our group sales in Asean, accounting for 35 per cent. We are looking to expand this number. Hitachi will continue to contribute to Thailand’s development towards realising the 4.0 vision, through co-creating various solutions at Lumada Centre,” said the president.
Somsak Garnjanakarn, general manager at Hitachi Asia (Thailand), said that Hitachi in fiscal year 2018 in Thailand expects to generate Bt60 billion revenue and achieve Bt90 billion by fiscal year 2021. Of the total revenue in 2021, more than 10 per cent is expected to come from the Lumada platform.
