CAT in Korean partnership

CAT and SK Telecom, along with Korean e-payment service provider NHN KCP, launched their joint venture Tree Pay (Thailand) on Friday. 
It is CAT’s first joint venture with foreign strategic partners. 
Tree Pay was set up on March 25, 2016 with registered capital of Bt200 million. CAT owns 49 per cent of Tree Pay, while SK Telecom owns 29.97 per cent, KCP 19.98 per cent, and Cambridge Capital 0.1 per cent. 
Tree Pay chief executive officer Suvicha Nalita said that the new company would capture corporate customers and government agencies and small and medium-sized enterprises by being their e-payment gateway channel. 
Tree Pay has targeted hitting one billion payment transactions this year, with the figure expected to grow 10 per cent annually.
It aims to expand the service throughout Asean in the next three years.
“Tree Pay will offer a comprehensive e-commerce payment-gateway platform to businesses in Thailand. Drawing from the experience of all the shareholders, Tree Pay is geared to provide security, efficiency and practicality for its payment services,” Suvicha said. 
CAT president Colonel Sanpachai Huvanandana said during the Tree Pay launch event that CAT had developed businesses in response to needs in digital technology era. CAT and SK Telecom also developed an Internet of Things (IOT) platform for Phuket in response to the new government project “Phuket Smart City” to promote Phuket to be a smart city and smart start-up destination in line with the country’s digital economy and Thailand 4.0 strategies. 
CAT was assigned by the government to be responsible for the fundamental telecommunication infrastructure for related projects. Various parties have been working together to create Phuket Smart City by 2020. 
Inhyok Cha, executive vice president, IoT Business Division at SK Telecom, said: “The IoT platform that CAT and SK Telecom will develop and install for Phuket Smart City consists of three categories. Asset Tracking is the track and trace system which can access any eco bikes registered in the system real-time. 
“Asset Tracking includes Safe Watch, the smart watch that can connect to the application on a smart phone, which can also trace the location of the wearer real-time. Both options can give notifications when accidents happen and users need emergency assistance.
“The second category is the AMI Service, the smart metre that can be installed with any metre such as water and electricity [metres]. The data will be kept swiftly and can be checked, managed, and controlled online. Apart from the data management, it also offers e-payment as well.
“The third category is the Smart City Service, including Smart Light, which can be installed in any lighting devices in the city such as traffic lights, road lights and CCTV cameras. The light can be controlled remotely and equipped with sensors to monitor electrical usage, which will save energy. 
“This service also includes Smart Menhole, which will control and provide sanitisation such as sensors to capture temperature, humidity, gas and fire from the drain in order to analyse and prevent accidents.”
SK Telecom will be responsible for installation and connection of each system while CAT telecom will take care of the service and operations,” Inhyok Cha added.