AIBP C&E TH Day 2: From Baht to Bytes - Thailand's Digital Revolution in Cybersecurity, Banking and Consumer Innovation
Building on the momentum from Day 1, where industry leaders shared insights on data & AI, digital transformation and sustainability initiatives, You can read more about Day 1 highlights here.
Discussions on Day 2 focused on managing risks in the digital age, modernising banking, and consumer-driven innovations. Industry leaders shared their insights on cybersecurity, digital banking trends, and leveraging AI and data analytics to enhance customer experience and drive innovation.
Managing Risks in the Digital Age
As cyber threats become increasingly sophisticated, Thai enterprises are stepping up their cybersecurity efforts to protect their digital infrastructure and ensure business continuity. Dr. Chalee Vorakulpipat, Principal Researcher at NECTEC, and Dr. Somsak Wattanasri, MD, Consultant at DDC, discussed Thailand's leadership in health security with innovative QR code-enabled digital vaccine passports. Jon Lau, Director of Cybersecurity Strategy at A*STAR, highlighted quantum computing's potential to disrupt cybersecurity and the shift towards post-quantum cryptography.
In a panel discussion, cybersecurity leaders tackled the multifaceted challenges of cybersecurity in today's digital era. Key takeaways include:
Organisations must prepare not only for protection but also for response and recovery, including managing social media misinformation.
Gaining business leaders' support and financial commitment for cybersecurity initiatives is essential but often challenging.
Simple policies, procedures, governance, communication, and awareness can be as effective as expensive tools in reducing risk.
Cybersecurity should be justified and implemented based on business risk rather than just technical risk.
“We need to get prepared, right? Not only for the protection, but we need to prepare for the response and recovery as well. The most dangerous incident that I think we should be prepared for is about social management. Sometimes your organisation might not be attacked, but some people can create fake news, and publish it on social media and say, "Hey, your organisation is in trouble with cyber attack."”
- Chatchawat Asawarakwong, CISO, KASIKORNBANK (KBank)
Gaining the support and financial commitment of business leaders for cybersecurity initiatives is frequently an uphill battle.
“When we invest, it is not only about expensive tools that will solve the problem. Sometimes something really simple would work by having a good policy, procedure, governance, communication, awareness, that reduces the risk as well.”
- Athikom Kanchanavibhu, Executive VP of Digital & Technology Transformation, CISO, DPO, Mitr Phol
“Many times we cannot acquire a security budget from the CEO because we cannot justify to the CEO that our security countermeasures can impact business, we just show security countermeasures impact technical risk, but it's not business risk. So security should be considered based on business risk, not technical at all.”
- Dr. Chalee Vorakulpipat, Principal Researcher, Information Security Research Team, National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC)
The evolving cybersecurity landscape demands a multifaceted approach encompassing advanced technology, comprehensive policies, and strategic business alignment. Thai enterprises are increasingly recognizing the importance of integrating cybersecurity into their core business strategies.
Modernising Banking
As technology is evolving at a staggering pace, financial institutions must navigate the delicate balance between innovation and scalability and speed.
Highlights from this session include:
Eugene Tay, Director Solution Consulting SEA, Apptio, an IBM company, emphasised transforming IT into a value driver through aligning IT with business goals. He discussed Technology Business Management (TBM) as a structured approach for optimising costs and driving innovation, highlighting the importance of diverse perspectives and effective communication between finance and technology teams.
Shanmuga Sunthar Muniandy, Director, Data Architecture & Chief Evangelist, APAC, Denodo, shared insights on delivering data at the speed of business using logical data fabric. He focused on managing complex data ecosystems, eliminating redundancy, and ensuring secure, optimised data delivery to meet business needs.
The panel discussion, moderated by Nitipong Boon-Long, key topics included digital banking trends, AI, customer experience, and the importance of partnerships in driving transformation and boosting digital revenue. Key takeaways include:
Gaining users is not the sole purpose as the emphasis shifts towards measuring yield from digital products and platforms
Enhancing customer experience through user-friendly interfaces and seamless user journeys is crucial for engagement.
Open banking enables smaller banks to compete with larger institutions, fostering innovation and customer reach.
Ensuring platform stability and managing customer satisfaction are priorities for successful digital transformation.
“Now with the monetisation, we cannot focus on just the users. So what we see, if we make it simplified, you can see the reach, and you can get to the level of that in terms of customers per product. But then on the second part, if we focus on the application, how often does the customer go into that application, and how often do they get engaged? How often do they spend in the application? And then the last part, which is the most important, is the yield. So we have to measure the yield of everything, the product per customer, or the platform we use. And at the end, what we try to deliver for the bank is 25% digital revenue by next year (2025) so I think we are going towards that.”
- Pitiporn Phanaphat, Head of Digital Business, Siam Commercial Bank
“I think that is what we call customer experience. The merchant just clicks on the application, and we want first-time clicks throughout their journey. Hence the button needs to be bigger because sometimes the noodle merchant may not have very clean fingers to touch, so we have to ensure that our screen can accept that touch as well.”
- Suporn Sunthornrohit, Chief Business Innovation Officer, Infinitas by Krungthai Bank
“The ‘pro’ of open banking is that we can reach more customers very easily. And actually, when we do that, for the smaller banks, they can compete more with these larger banks, that is going to be the beauty of it.”
- Phitha Tanpairoj, Head of Products Division, Transaction Banking Group, Krungsri
“We have to manage how we rank customer satisfaction. So one thing about online banking, as I mentioned about this growing significance, is the platform itself. I think we look into some of the core banking, how we can make sure it (the core banking) is stable.”
- Voranuch Dejakaisaya, Executive Chairman, KASIKORN Business-Technology Group (KBTG)
Consumer-driven Innovations
Optimising customer experience with AI and data analytics for product development is essential in today's competitive business environment. Leveraging these technologies allows organisations to gain unique insights into customer needs and preferences, driving more effective and personalised product offerings.
Key Takeaways from the discussion include:
Companies are leveraging digital technologies like workflow automation, AI, and chatbots to improve employee productivity and experience, as well as optimise customer experience.
Adopting a customer-centric approach to product development and loyalty programs, using empathy-driven technology and data-driven insights, is important for meeting evolving customer needs.
Assessing and implementing emerging technologies requires aligning them with the organisation's innovation goals, while maintaining agility and adaptability to changing customer behaviours and market conditions.
While technology can help, there is still an important role for human critical thinking and analysis in translating data insights into successful new product development. More importantly, in different consumer-facing industries, regulations and customer preferences will still differ - there is no one-size-fits-all approach.
The retail sector is subject to legacy infrastructure for brick-and-mortar operations, which they seek to overcome by building in API gateways as much as they can. It is essential to evaluate whether the business model is cost-effective or profitable.
For us, insights mean you know something that your customer didn't know, you didn't know before, and your competitors either. This is the only thing you know for yourself, that is the insight. You cannot look at the trend, the trend is in research, reports, and everybody can read. It's not the insight for your business. We use a lot of techniques, and combine a lot of research from different institutions. In the FMCG (fast moving consumer goods) sector, you have a very big department called consumer insight who does that. But they only give you the trend, the possibilities. What they didn't give you is the implications. What does that imply for your next product? You still need to think critically, incorporate the human touch to produce the right products.
- Pajaree Saengcum, Head of Supply Chain & Digital Technology, Osotspa
For Big C online, we still utilise our stores (for fulfilment) we need to deliver the last mile to our end customer. At the beginning, the coverage area is run by radius, where there will be some households that could be served by multiple stores, making the routing less optimised than it should be. So we came up with AL/ML for service area determinations of a store - optimising the distance, the number of orders. (A customer) marks their household in the app, which will automatically select the store that optimises the routing as much as it could. We are expected to save around 10 million on last mile delivery this year, and also we improve our customer satisfaction, because they get their goods on time.
- Surachai Hirannitichai, EVP - Digital Technology & Transformation, Big C
In the age of Gen AI, enterprises are also cautious about security and protecting their assets as much as they can. While there remains a focus on keeping customer data secure in their data-driven strategies for players in the retail sector, the heavily regulated banking and financial services sector have added responsibilities amidst the regulatory, risk and legal controls in place, amidst which SCB strives to be nimble and keep their focus on their mission to be a digital bank.
In the example of Gen AI and LLM, we usually notice that there's a high risk of hallucination. So using LLM purely just for investment advice or customer service requests might not be the right fit. So when we go through this kind of thought process and exercise, we usually involve a lot of teams around compliance, legal and also the IT technology solution and combine efforts. What is the right way to do it? … How do we mix an LLM, plus our own proprietary solution and model to make it actually work for different use cases. So it's about being proactive in engaging the risk team, the people that are relevant, and also to make sure that we I know that we don't like to fail, but try to fail as fast and as cheap as we can.. Try and build small pilots, POCs, to prove if it works and to find loopholes to refine further.
- Anak Tangtatswas, Head of Customer-Centric Operating Model, Siam Commercial Bank
The maturity of an organisation in terms of digital literacy is crucial; while anyone can learn, the challenge lies in enabling and motivating them to do so. Additionally, while the agility of leadership is critical, this agility must be reflected across all functions and operations to ensure true organisational autonomy and effectiveness.
We hope that the discussions have provided valuable insights into the evolving landscape of digital transformation across various sectors in Thailand. As we continue to explore these critical topics, we look forward to further engaging with industry leaders and stakeholders across ASEAN in the coming months.
Find out more about our 2024 AIBP Conference and Exhibition in ASEAN
46th Edition, AIBP C&E Indonesia, Ritz Carlton Mega Kuningan, 6 - 7 August 2024
47th Edition, AIBP C&E Malaysia, W Hotel KL, 4 - 5 September 2024
48th Edition, AIBP C&E Philippines, City of Dreams Manila, 17 - 18 September 2024
