Innovation districts to be set

The National Innovation Agency has devised a six-pronged strategy to develop 12 innovation districts nationwide, which will help grow the number of Thai tech start-ups and provide a dedicated ecosystem for innovation around the country over the next five years.

NIA director Pun-Arj Chairatana said the agency had been allocated a budget of more than Bt300 million to carry out the plan. 

He said the strategy entailed developing and creating area-based innovation; enhancing the innovation supply chain; building an innovation network so that clusters of innovation are created “to connect the dots”; developing innovation capability to create and provide literacy and develop human resources such as chief innovation officers in organisations; market innovation to facilitate business innovation matching in both the domestic and international markets; and informatics-driven innovation. 

As the first step, the agency will focus on area-based innovation, which is an emerging concept beyond the classical industrial cluster and traditional regional innovation system, Pun-Arj said.

Under area-based innovation, the NIA will work on establishing mega-infrastructure, city development and local-communities linkage that will generate a value system for each area. 

As to mega-infrastructure, the agency will provide mobility, land utilisation, an innovation corridor, spatial informatics and investment promotion as a facilitator of tax privileges for businesses and investors, he added. 

Meanwhile, at the city-development level, the agency will provide various measures and areas such as an innovation index, city innovation challenge, chief city development, and innovation zones and innovation districts. 

The director said his agency planned to set up 12 innovation districts nationwide. 

It will firstly join hands with the government, private and education sector to establish three innovation districts in Bangkok in the first years of the five-year strategic plan – in Yothi and Klong San, and at Siam Centre One. 

The agency will also provide a demonstration project and create awareness among people located in innovation areas and innovation districts, he added. 

Yothi innovation district will focus on medical tech, government tech and city tech, while Klong San innovation district will focus on ‘bohemian’ tech, biotech and food tech, and Siam Centre One will concentrate on financial tech (fintech) and the Internet of Things. 

The agency already has partners for the development of innovation districts, including Chulalongkorn University, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thon Buri, SCG, Kasikornbank and local government offices. 

These efforts will create a cluster of innovation around the country and promote innovation to improve the quality of life for people in communities, and enhance the business sector as a whole, he said. 

Lastly, local-communities linkage will provide social and economic inclusion, institutional engagement and sustainable and social innovation, he added.

Somchet Thinapong, chairman of the National Innovation Agency board, said the planned area-based innovation would focus on how a space can induce innovation activities in relation with mega-infrastructure, city development and linkages with local communities. 

“The system is merely a concept to physically develop space to attract people and engage them into developing the national 

innovation ecosystem,” he said. 

 

Key role for local communities 

The quadruple-helix system – comprising the government sector, private sector, academic sector and community sector – has already been introduced, but in Thailand, local communities play an important role in area development as another sphere of the Kingdom’s innovation system, he explained. 

“This shift entails not only various mechanisms of local-community engagement and the development path of innovation, but also a rethinking of our main models for conceptualising innovation, including innovation systems. 

“The NIA has initiated this new concept and included area-based innovation as a new strategy that will build up the overall foundation of an innovation system,” Somchet said.

The agency will accelerate the interactions among the government, industry, academia and community sectors to co-create an innovation ecosystem within five value systems – economy, equitability, education, environment and ethics – with the focus on innovation-driven mega-infrastructure and city development and inclusiveness, the chairman said. The NIA has prepared support programmes such as innovation districts, smart cities, innovation zones and innovation corridors, in order to support the planned area-based innovation development, he added.