Huawei sees big potential in ASEAN’s shift to digital economy
The Asia-Pacific region is fast becoming a leader in the transition to digital economy, driven by investments in artificial intelligence (AI) and other technologies, a top executive from Huawei said.
Chen Lei (Leo Chen), president of Enterprise Sales for the Chinese technology giant Huawei, said on Monday that this leadership is thanks to Asia-Pacific’s readiness to adopt AI. The value of the AI market has the potential to reach US$87.6 billion (3.24 trillion baht) by 2028 compared to $22.1 billion in 2022. Chen was speaking at a seminar at Bangkok’s Centara Grand Hotel.
“Many countries in the region, like Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia, are introducing national AI strategies and action plans for a digital and intelligent future,” he said, adding that the region’s advanced intelligent economy could be valued at $18.8 trillion by 2030.
He noted that digital and intelligent infrastructure, which includes the development of network, storage, computing and cloud, is necessary to accelerate industrial intelligence and boost the growth of the Asia-Pacific digital economy.
“One of the keys is that AI can store, evolve and process data efficiently and accurately,” he said. “We also firmly believe that the region’s rollout of digital and intelligence infrastructure will determine where to move up in the global intelligence era.”
Chen added that Huawei is ready to provide technologies and knowledge to support the region’s digital growth and address challenges in the transformation, including cloud, big data and AI platforms.
“We are establishing Asia-Pacific as a pinnacle of digital and intelligent infrastructure and breaking new ground to bring about another Asia-Pacific miracle,” he added.
ASEAN’s digital journey
ASEAN’s digital economy was valued at approximately $300 billion in 2022, and is projected to reach $1 trillion by 2030, said Nararya S Soeprapto, deputy secretary-general of ASEAN for Community and Corporate Affairs.
He said the ASEAN Digital Economic Framework has been launched to boost the potential of business and society with innovative business models, maximise economic scale and unleash the full potential of digital services. Negotiations between regional digital ministers should be concluded by 2025, he added.
Despite advancements in digital transformation, Soprapto noted that the digital divide in society remains a major challenge to the region in its path to a thriving digital future.
“Addressing critical challenges, it requires government, private and relevant stakeholders to adopt an approach to serve digital connectivity, raising digital disparities among the ASEAN member states, enhancing the trust in the digital ecosystem, digital skills and transformation to ensure that it is fair and equal,” he said.
Thailand’s digital economy plans
Digital Economy and Society Minister Prasert Jantararuangtong said his ministry was working to promote Thailand as a digital economic hub in a bid to stimulate the economy, ensure strong cybersecurity and boost confidence in electronic transactions.
He added that there were many digital economic development plans his ministry aims to complete this year. They are:
• Cloud-first policy: Developing cloud infrastructure to enhance the government’s potential in serving the people through the utilisation of big data.
• National service platform: This platform will gather AI solutions to help people receive government services, as well as support the development of large Thai language models for AI training.
• Digital ID: This solution will act as an alternative to access government services. The ministry aims to help 50% of Thais get their digital IDs by this year before expanding to 100% next year.
• Digital manpower development: Attracting digital talent through the digital talent visa programme, producing 50,000 digital personnel, and deploying volunteers who have digital literacy to create awareness among people.
• Eliminating online scams: Adopting AI to deal with online scams, such as launching notifications to warn mobile users at risk of cybercrimes.
“The ministry is accelerating digital transformation in every aspect, from infrastructure development, boosting the government’s potential on providing services, accelerating adoption of technologies and smart solutions to creating awareness among stakeholders in society,” he said.
Prasert said support from the private sector is also necessary to accelerate the growth of Thailand’s digital economy, such as the ministry’s collaboration with Huawei on the development of digital infrastructure, AI and human capital.
