Finally, the brakes are off
The information superhighway opened by the advent of 3G will bring huge new opportunities for Thai business, says a trio of business leaders
Thailand held its long-delayed auction of the 2.1-GHz spectrum on Tuesday, ending a two-year wait after the Administrative Court suspended the last auction. Three bidders – AIS, Dtac and True – won a total of nine 5Mhz slots in the spectrum which will be used for 3G (third-generation) telecom and related services.
The new 3G network will serve as the country’s information superhighway on which data will be moved at an average speed of at least 2 megabits per second, which is four to five times faster than the current speed.
Dr Monsinee Keeratikrainon, country manager of IT consultancy firm Frost and Sullivan, says the new 3G network will greatly benefit the economy because the penetration rate of mobile phones is relatively high in Thailand at around 110 per cent, meaning that on average, every Thai person has more than one mobile phone.
Such a high penetration rate of mobile devices will open up new opportunities for various businesses and industries, especially those dealing with content which can be delivered at high speed on the information superhighway.
Over the past two years, some 3G services have been introduced in Thailand on an experimental basis at an average speed of just 0.3-0.4 megabits per second. In addition, the Internet penetration rate in Thailand is still relatively low at around 30 per cent of the population, so the new 3G network will have a better chance of reaching the majority of the population via mobile devices.
“It will be a new economic era of speed, digital media, online publishing, applications and content providers, who will benefit from the faster data transmission infrastructure. There will be no bottlenecks anymore,” Monsinee says.
“For Thailand, the new 3G network will likely add 1 to 1.5 per cent to the country’s GDP.”
Adilfilttree Praprugsutjarreat (Ajarn Ome), managing director of Index Creative Village, says advertisements on digital platforms will jump as consumers devour digital ads, whose value will increase rapidly from the current Bt2 billion, to Bt3 billion per year, or 2-3 per cent of the country’s total ad spending.
“Once the 3G speed is stable at 2 to 3 megabits per second, a wide range of multimedia content will be available on mobile and other devices,” Adilfilttree says.
“A study has shown that Thailand has a total of 18 million Facebook users and three out of five Thais use Facebook on their mobile devices.
“This ratio will rise further once we have the real 3G network. Thailand has competitive edges in some categories of software development such as games and animation as well as content for news and information, publishing and TV, entertainment and education.”
Supant Mongkolsuthree, vice chairman of the Federation of Thai Industries, says the demand for 3G-ready hardware will rise at least 20 to 30 per cent once the 3G network is in full service.
“The Thai market for ICT hardware is worth around Bt200 billion per year. The popularity of tablet computers and smart phones has outgrown other hardware, and sales of gadgets such as notebooks and PC face a slowdown. In fact, we are lagging behind several other countries who are already experimenting with 4G, or fourth-generation, technology.
“According to the National Broadcasting and Telecom Commission, the 3G licence holders are required to provide coverage to 50 per cent of the total population, or about 30 million people, within the first two years and 80 per cent of the population within four years.
“However, I think the timeframe for nationwide coverage should be shortened to something like 75-per-cent coverage within the first two years, so that the information superhighway can benefit the majority of Thais more quickly,” says Supant.
