Technology is becoming increasingly integral to daily live: Seminar
Technology has and will continue to be an integral part of our lives and people should not resist new developments, speakers told the seminar "Digital Life Forum 2023" at Siam Paragon in Bangkok on Thursday. The event was organised by Spring News, which is part of Nation Group.
The emergence of digital TV a decade ago caused many “old fashioned” broadcasters to stop their businesses, said Nation Group vice chairman Somchai Meesen.
Somchai also said that artificial intelligence (AI) is playing an increasingly important role in people's daily lives, and that it is even being use for trading stocks.
"AI carries out stock trading better than large investors because it focuses on gaining stable returns," he explained.
Restaurant operators are also using quick response (QR) codes because we are moving towards a cashless society.
“We have to continue adjusting without resistance because technologies are developed by people to facilitate living,” he said.
Innovations can all make people rich, but those who believe that technology is destructive will not be able to adapt, Somchai said.
"For example, washing machines enabled us to do other things rather than washing clothes, which takes a lot of time," he said.
AI is an opportunity for further development, he added.
Buranin Rattanasombat, chief new business and infrastructure officer at PTT, said technology is a product of science and engineering and it has an impact on the economy, society and national competitiveness.
Buranin said the evolution of technology can be divided into four eras: Industry 1.0 (before the 1900s), 2.0 (1900-1970), 3.0 (1970-2000) to 4.0 (2000-present).
Digital technologies are important to both business operators and consumers and are being integrated in all industries, he said, adding that innovations are reaching scale faster than ever before.
It took less than two months for ChatGPT to be fully adapted, Buranin said.
ChatGPT was developed by the American AI research laboratory OpenAI and released in November last year. Its name combines “Chat”, referring to its chatbot function, and “GPT” which stands for “generative pre-trained transformer” – a type of large language model.
ChatGPT supports many languages, including English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Arabic, and Chinese.
Digital technologies pose difficulties to those who will not keep up with them, Buranin said.
In 1935, companies could be listed on the Standard & Poor (S&P) 500 Index for 90 years, but now that can only be listed on the index for 20 years, he said.
"Technologies made a change in companies' competitiveness over time," he said, adding that 50% of CEOs thought of new businesses to open within five years instead of existing business.
Key technology trends in the future include clean energy, mobility, bioengineering, and space technologies, he said.
Traditional businesses are being forced to adopt new technology to operate, he said, adding that technologies can generate a large sum of revenue for the economy.
PTT is focusing on applying technologies to achieve its net-zero carbon emission goal. It is investing in renewable energy and creating an electric vehicle ecosystem, he said.
