True Corporation Bets on AI and Digital Ecosystem in Ambitious Three-Year Overhaul

 

 

Thailand's largest telco unveils its "4 Big Moves" strategy, targeting household dominance, enterprise growth and AI-powered operations by 2028.

 

True Corporation has unveiled a sweeping three-year strategic roadmap it calls "4 Big Moves," signalling a decisive shift away from traditional telecoms towards an AI-first, digitally integrated business model — and making the ambition unusually public in the process.

 

Speaking at a press briefing in Bangkok on Monday, Group Chief Executive Sigve Brekke said the strategy, developed over the first five to six weeks of 2026, was deliberately designed to be transparent.

 

"A good strategy is known by everyone," he told reporters. "Rather than keeping this secret on the shelf of the CEO's office, we take it out. And that has never been done before."

 

In a nod to the company's internal culture drive, Brekke noted that True had turned the strategy into a song, with him personally dancing with all 10,000-plus employees across the organisation in recent weeks. The theatrics, he insisted, were purposeful.
 

 

"That created the whole energy," he said.

 

 

 

 

The case for change

Brekke opened by citing three structural shifts reshaping the Thai digital landscape. Thai consumers now spend an average of eight hours per day on digital devices — well above the global average of six and a half hours — and consume around 29 gigabytes of mobile data per month, nearly twice the global norm.

 

AI usage in the country has quadrupled over the past year alone, with approximately 70 per cent of the Thai population having already tried it.
 

 

 

 

At the household level, connected devices are proliferating rapidly, while enterprise adoption of AI remains nascent. Some 73 per cent of Thai businesses say they plan to adopt AI, yet only 18 per cent have deployed it at any meaningful scale — a gap Brekke described as a significant commercial opportunity.

 

Regional growth patterns are also shifting. From fruit producers in southern Thailand entering e-commerce to animation studios in Chiang Mai serving global streaming platforms, and creative music enterprises in the north-east, economic activity is spreading well beyond Greater Bangkok, which currently accounts for around half of Thailand's GDP.

 

 

 

 

 

Move 1: Experience

True will invest in both its 5G mobile network — across the 2,300 MHz, 2,600 MHz and 1,500 MHz spectrum bands — and its fixed-line broadband infrastructure, which has historically received less capital attention.

 

With approximately 10 million broadband subscribers against a potential market of 21 million households, Brekke sees significant headroom.

 

The company also plans to break the country into roughly 6,000 localised clusters, each managed with granular data on income levels, network capacity, customer profiles and effective marketing approaches.

 

"You really need to have your data in order," Brekke acknowledged, "and you need to have an organisation that works this way and trusts that data."

 

AI will increasingly manage network operations autonomously — identifying faults before they occur and, in some cases, remedying them without human intervention.
 

 

 

 

Move 2: Growth

On the consumer side, True is pivoting from what Brekke called "winning individuals" to "winning the whole family," bundling mobile, broadband, content, smart home technology, cybersecurity and gaming under a single account proposition.

 

The company is shifting its key performance metric from average revenue per SIM card to average revenue per account, a change Brekke said better reflects the depth of household relationships True is seeking to build.

 

Its TrueX platform will serve as an AI-powered home hub, enabling voice-controlled management of connected devices. The company is also deepening its cybersecurity offering under the True CyberSafe brand, and expanding gaming services.

 

In enterprise, True is pursuing a "BASIC5" framework — Big Data Analytics, AI, Security, Integrated Platforms, Cloud Computing, and 5G Connectivity — targeting a market it considers chronically underserved. Enterprise and SME revenues currently account for around 7 to 8 per cent of True's total, compared with roughly 15 per cent at comparable operators elsewhere in Asia.

 

 

 

Move 3: AI

Brekke was emphatic that artificial intelligence would function not as a discrete product line but as a horizontal capability woven through every part of the business.

 

True has already deployed an AI virtual assistant called Mari in customer service, as well as hyper-personalisation engines and AI-driven network management tools.

 

The company has introduced what it describes as Thailand's first corporate Responsible AI policy, positioning itself as a regional standard-bearer on AI governance.

 

Brekke illustrated the practical ambition with three vignettes: a shop assistant equipped with AI tools to understand each incoming customer's history and tailor offers in real time; a call-centre agent freed from routine complaints — with AI targeting a 50 per cent reduction — to focus on upselling; and a network engineer redeployed from reactive maintenance to strategic planning, with AI handling fault prediction.

 

"AI will not replace their jobs," Brekke said. "AI will be their personal assistant — their best friend — to help them do their work much better."

 

True has also partnered with global hyperscalers, naming Google and Microsoft as strategic allies, with further partnerships expected to be announced in coming weeks.

 

 

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Move 4: People

True has committed to ensuring that 100 per cent of its workforce receives foundational AI training by the end of 2026, with 60 per cent reaching a basic proficiency level, 30 per cent an advanced level, and 10 per cent classified as AI experts.

 

Ten scholarships have been awarded for postgraduate study at institutions in the United States and China, developed in collaboration with MIT and Chulalongkorn University.

 

Brekke also emphasised the importance of what he termed "psychological safety" — building an internal culture in which employees feel seen, empowered to innovate, and secure regardless of seniority.

 

"If you can create that culture in the company, that's very difficult to copy," he said.

 

Beyond its own workforce, True has set a target of upskilling 12 million Thai citizens in AI literacy — though Brekke acknowledged that discussions with AI providers on the delivery model are still ongoing, with a phased target of one million users initially.
Outlook

 

The "4 Big Moves" strategy represents a fundamental repositioning for True, which last year reported its first-ever dividend payment alongside a return to profitability following its 2021 merger with DTAC.

 

The company expects revenue growth to come from deeper customer relationships, AI-driven personalisation, value-added digital services, and cost efficiencies from automation — rather than subscriber acquisition.

 

Asked about the pending divestiture of Telenor's 30 per cent stake — a transaction originally expected to close in March — Brekke said proceedings were "going as planned", with some minor procedural matters remaining.

 

On the broader competitive threat, Brekke was candid. True's primary competition, he argued, is no longer rival operators.

 

"Our main competitor is Line, Netflix, Google, Apple — all those companies that frankly have a much better customer experience than we do," he said. "If we don't move into that area, we will end up just owning a network while everything else on top of it belongs to someone else. I don't want to be there."