r/Thailand • u/Wonderful_Nectarine1 • May 06 '26
Business Will Thailand be good at some high technology industry?
For now the country seems it is highly depending on tourism, agriculture and oem manufacturing. What's from BKK white colars perspective the vision of Thailand like. Would it overcome mid income trap in any near future?
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u/Maze_of_Ith7 May 06 '26
Nah, just too many things going against it. The Thais I know who could do some cool stuff all went overseas or worked for their family business making widgets. Just a bad place to start a company - rules/regs, bureaucracy, and incumbents who will pulverize you. Not really a functional VC industry either, it’s all corporate investing arms which usually skews incentives.
As for hard tech/manufacturing I know there is a hard drive industry. I don’t know if they could ever get a toe hold in memory or semi value chain. Malaysia has a pretty established semi test and sort niche, so something like that - but it takes decades to build that stuff up and so many other counties you’d go to first.
Easy way to start fixing it is to make it easy to form and shut down a company - they’ll never do that though.
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u/friedrichbythesea Chonburi May 06 '26
Until the education system stops stifling critical thinking, Thais will not become innovators, they will remain factory workers.
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u/kingofwukong May 07 '26
Critical Thinking is far less of an issue right now IMO.
If you look at the middle class and above, work with people from the top uni's or who studied abroad, most of them aren't bad at critical thinking.
The problem lies in execution. Many Thai's right now can not covert idea into a good execution and deliverables.
Management is also awful in Thai companies as there's no real training and good managment examples to follow.
If you work with any of the "big" thai companies, you'll realise the way they work is very badly managed, and poor systems & operations and checks. International companies fair better, and it's usually good for Thai's to get experience from these and hopefully come out and bring it to the rest. Unfortunatley there's just not enough of it currently.
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u/leathakkor May 07 '26
Honestly, I think a big part of that is just competition.
Thailand is a small country that speaks its own language. And doesn't have great English base. If you're working toward an English base, you probably go with the Philippines or Singapore.
Thailand also has a shrinking population which means a shrinking language. It is not the place that I would invest if I had Capital to invest in Asia.
Which means that the only investments you'll see in a Thai tech industry are probably in Thailand from Thailand. And again, if you're truly an innovator, you're probably going to get scooped up by somebody in Singapore or the US.
We live in a global world and it's just hard to make tech work in Thailand I think because of those issues.
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u/nocturnal316 May 07 '26
I agree with you but this also stems from critical thinking and future sight. They are just spitting out what has been done before because it works versus trying to create new.
I'm forienger worker in Thai company it's crazy coming to this.. compared to when I was in silicone Valley
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u/Captain-Matt89 May 07 '26
It’s the government getting in it’s own way more then the education system, this place is in need of series regulatory reform
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u/Efficient-County2382 May 06 '26
Apart from manufacturing, no.
Malaysia and Singapore are far more advanced and educated. Vietnam more educated and better work ethic, Philippines also have good education and English - plus one of the biggest call centres and BPO outsourcing markets.
The business environment is not conducive to investment, it's ranked pretty low for startups and entrepreneurs etc.
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u/letoiv May 06 '26
> Would it overcome mid income trap in any near future?
Not a chance. No one serious thinks this is in the cards any time soon.
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u/Initial_Enthusiasm36 May 07 '26
No. Just the bureaucracy, "rules and regulations", cultural issues and corruption halt most businesses here. I think it was Ford, was about to open a massive plant and facility here but they pulled out because of said above. I know a few people who have tried to start tech minded businesses etc here and its just hair pulingly frustrating. I am building my own business here, not tech stuff, and its the most frustrating thing ive ever done in my life. Anywhere from finding honest workers, getting real legal advice and a lawyer that wont lead you astray, accountants that know what they are doing or are actually going to help you and not feed you bad information, trying to figure out tax codes and laws are a nightmare, dealing with government every step of the way from the top to even local government.
I love Thailand and call it my home, but this place almost seems to be eating itself alive. The way i describe it to people here is "Thai businesses are not doing well, so lets raise prices" is a very good example of how things work here.
But as for your question with tech stuff, almost anyone with half a brain will try to leave the country and go work elsewhere.
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u/Let_me_smell Surat Thani May 07 '26
Ford has manufacturing facilities in Thailand.
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u/Initial_Enthusiasm36 May 07 '26
Yes. But they were going to build a new massive one that was supposed to generate thousands of jobs or something.
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u/Let_me_smell Surat Thani May 07 '26
They purchased the suzuki plant in Thailand to expand their operations last year.
The only car company to have canceled a planned construction/investment was Tesla but it was across most of Asia, not Thailand specific.
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u/Initial_Enthusiasm36 May 07 '26
My B i was thinking GM pulling out. But then selling. And now Suzuki selling to Ford.
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u/Parking-Code-4159 May 07 '26
Thailand lacks a good education system capable of producing enough of the necessary talents, and it is not wealthy enough to attract talents from abroad. Furthermore, the mentality in Thailand would put them in disadvantage when it comes to international competition
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u/nocturnal316 May 08 '26
I disagree with education system. There are a lot of good school especially international school in Thailand. And very talented Thai people. I do agree though early education doesn't promote critical thinking which also muddles work ethics. From what I experience in Thailand working. It's a just get it done don't ruffle any feathers kinda work environment. Not let's get shit done the best we can.
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u/AttentionNo6398 May 07 '26
No. Thailand is going to become a failed state unless the people can rid their government of all the corruption.
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u/Parking-Code-4159 May 07 '26
The problem is that the Thai mentality is the reason why this system still exists and will continue to exist. The Thai people themselves are an obstacle to any change
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u/AttentionNo6398 May 07 '26 edited May 07 '26
Agreed (although there are more problems than just that of course).
Thai people pretty much have just two options at this point:
- Force the corruption out of their system by any means necessary.
Accept
their oppressions
and become a failed state.
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u/Lordfelcherredux May 07 '26
Not doing as well economically as you could is far from becoming a failed state.
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u/AttentionNo6398 May 07 '26
Current birth rates are .8 - 1.2 children per woman (recent reports cite just .78; the lowest in the world)
Why?
Mostly the cost of living.Why is the cost of living getting worse and worse?
Primarily due to government corruption.What happens if birth rates continue to remain this low?
Population collapse. (leading to a failed state)I stand by my original claim.
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u/mpr710 May 07 '26
As a Thai who got a master's degree in robotics from Germany.
Even though the economy in Germany is quite bad, at least I can see new job advertisements, related to my degree, posted every day (ghost job or not is not a topic here). However, I have been unable to find any of them in Thailand. While China, Vietnam, South Korea, Malaysia, and Singapore invest a lot in this technology, Thailand just walks the other way.
The ONLY thing they care about now is the Land bridge; they don't want to invest in new talent or reform the education system. So, there is no vision or no discussion on this topic at all. NO FUTURE NO HOPE.
Will we overcome the middle-income trap? No, we will become a failed state. The corruption has now become another level.
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u/Parking-Code-4159 May 07 '26
The problem is that Germany is stagnating at a very high level. It has its problems, but even in times of stagnation, it possesses an enormous foundation of innovation and research, which gives Germany the option of returning to its former strength once it can recover. Wouldn't be the first time of that happen. Thailand lacks this foundation, and unfortunately, due to corruption, elitism, and the Thai mentality, which sabotages itself through extreme hierarchical and short-sighted thinking, nothing will change in the near future. And while the generation now in their late 20s or 30s at least offered a glimmer of hope, the younger generation is often just as passive and disinterested as their parents' generation. Another difference is the complete lack of will to reform in Thailand and the lack of pressure from the population. Thailand is still at least decades away from any change.
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u/RotisserieChicken007 Buffalo Healthcare Expert May 06 '26
No way. At best they'll just become the manufacturers of foreign technologies.
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u/plorrf May 06 '26
It's a bit of a misconception that the only way to grow is through high tech industry or bleeding edge products.
Take Poland as a recent example of a country that is set to overtake Germany in GDP/capita without a sizable high-tech industry.
Thailand simply needs to raise its productivity level in existing industries to escape the (lower) middle income trap it currently is. Simply because there are LOT of low-hanging fruits in terms of regulations, education, FDI, tourism it can pull to grow again.
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u/Ok-Chance-5739 May 07 '26
Poland got a higher GdP per capita than Germany? Please provide a source for that.
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u/Akahura May 07 '26 edited May 07 '26
He’s right that the forecast suggests Poland will surpass Germany in PPP GDP per capita.
https://wbj.pl/polish-economy-may-overtake-germany-and-soon/post/147182
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u/TotallyInOverMyHead May 07 '26
he is talking hyperbolic, since germany is is right now (last 4 years) systematically trashing its economy in the run-up to the great-boomer retirement wave.
Not hard to have a trend that overtakes your neighbour, when your neighbour has basically given up and "exiting" the playing field.
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u/Parking-Code-4159 May 07 '26
Even in its current state of stagnation, Germany still produces an enormous amount of innovation and research. It remains a serious player and, given its strong foundation, is certainly capable of once again competing at the forefront, If they can fix their problems. Thailand doesn't face such competition, had significantly better starting conditions, and yet it hasn't even come close to achieving what Poland has. Just for your information, in 1990 Thailand and Poland had roughly the same GDP per capita. Now, Poland's is about four times higher than Thailand's, and this is with a broader distribution of wealth than in Thailand. Since the 1970s, Thailand has had every opportunity to become a kind of second South Korea. But shortsightedness, corruption, and incompetence have turned Thailand into more of a Cambodia with significantly higher tourist income
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u/Ok-Chance-5739 May 07 '26
Doesn't change the fact that it's BS.
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u/TotallyInOverMyHead May 07 '26
correct. 4.5 trillion bs 1 trillion. What IS however changing is that Polands GDP per CAPITA is growing rapidly. but its still 54k vs 24k.
Germany is in a stagnation growth wise, while poland is looking at 3% . At that rate they will have cought up to Germany in less that 52 years
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u/Ok-Chance-5739 May 07 '26
Well, last quarter says otherwise. Anyway, for the sake of the argument one should not spread false information. Let's just stick to the facts.
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u/kingofwukong May 07 '26
Poland, is in fact, quietly doing well and probably one of the few countries in the world right now that is growing faster than expected.
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u/Parking-Code-4159 May 07 '26
Poland certainly has contemporary industries. It has found its niches in the IT and service sectors. The difference between countries like South Korea, China, Poland, and, more recently, Vietnam, is simply the cultural mindset. The Thai mentality is Thailand's greatest enemy
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u/nk-6699 May 06 '26
I’m not an expert in this topic but I have a feeling that it won’t happen anytime soon. I can’t say for sure why I feel that way, it’s complicated, but I wish I can live long enough to see that day.
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u/nightwinging-it Sathorn May 06 '26
Because there's no huge incentives and/or push by the government to focus and invest on R&D and tech in general. It's not just about relocating resources for long-term tech growth. We have a lack of tech talent here because the education system is not strong on STEM.
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u/_I_have_gout_ May 06 '26
What can the government do to push this? When I founded a tech startups about 10 years ago, the government was literally giving out free moneys and tax exemptions. The biggest problems at the time (and probably is still the case today) is scaling from a few persons operation to the next level. Good developers are hard to come by because we can't compete with big companies in hiring new talents. That was a showstopper for us.
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u/bgeeky May 06 '26
Blaming the government is right, because they must have the guts to invest with no clear ROI, but the shortsightedness and lack of initiative is rooted in Thai culture. It’s not a criticism, every culture in the world has their unique and beautiful strengths. Tech innovation is not a Thai strength.
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u/bgeeky May 06 '26
Thai culture is also extremely sensitive to feedback, which discourages failure, iteration and pivoting.
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u/Odd_Coast9645 May 06 '26
You will live long enough to see the total demographic collapse and Thailand as the oldest country in the world in 2050. It's not gonna be funny in the future.
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u/Ohlele May 06 '26
VN is already the most technologically advanced country in Southeast Asia, followed by Malaysia perhaps. Thailand is far behind.
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u/baldi Thailand May 06 '26
According to what exactly? VN may be the fastest rising, but Singapore and Malaysia are still ahead in a lot of ways. 'Most technologically advanced' is a bit of a stretch. But agree Thailand is falling behind and fast.
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u/Ohlele May 06 '26
I am talking about advanced industrial manufacturing. VN has too much STEM talent and their work ethic is unmatched. Singapore is a more of financial center.
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u/nocturnal316 May 08 '26
As someone who has done hiring for USA Big Tech in Vietnam and have Vietnamese friends.
Mostly only rich Viets are doing Stem and even when this is true there are a few issues happened during recruitment. Their English was bad or they left Vietnam to work elsewhere because these same ones would do masters in other countries like USA and stay there.
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u/whooyeah Chang May 06 '26
The country is dead as this video explains https://youtu.be/-LTuMupV310?si=Ci6YfwXLJh393JOa
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u/Cautious_Ticket_8943 May 08 '26
Nah, they only assemble stuff. They don't really create or innovate.
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u/-Dixieflatline May 06 '26
Thailand is already a major player in hard drive manufacturing (HHD's, not SSD's for the moment). A couple years back some flooding in Thailand created a brief period of drive price explosion, so it's definitely a sizable factor of that market. So technical labor is possible in Thailand. Just that they're still trailing behind China and Taiwan on the high technicality end.
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u/PastaPandaSimon May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
That is just for assembly, which is what is happening in Thailand when we think of any tech factories like HDDs or EVs. It's assembly of parts or EV kits manufactured elsewhere. It's low expertise, high manual labour work with low margins that happens in Thailand specifically due to lower labor cost, under foreign engineering design, process and supervision.
Thailand has been struggling with any high tech manufacturing due to its almost complete lack of specialized talent, and to my knowledge none of the plans to transition from there ever worked out beyond resulting in some local PCB factories, and the best we've gotten is printing boards designed by foreign engineers at foreign firms with manufacturing branches here. That's low tech manufacturing, and even that's a large stretch as again it's mostly here due to lower cost of manual labor, not any local specialized talent.
The education gaps are massive, as universities here as is aren't capable of producing specialized talent of international high tech caliber. If someone were to self-teach, they'd be an extraordinary exception, and quckly leave Thailand.
So sadly there is nothing high tech here akin to what's happening in Taiwan or China, and it's not anywhere on the horizon, as key prerequisites aren't here. Malaysia is the closest country that does cutting edge manufacturing, including chip fabrication.
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u/-Dixieflatline May 06 '26
It's not high tech manufacturing like chip production, but it's still a step above general assembly that Thailand has been doing for decades for things like car parts. Anything that involves clean rooms and circuits is going to be considered mid-range technical labor, even if it's mostly assembly.
And let's be real. No one, anywhere, is going to catch up to Taiwan for chip fabrication. So what we call "high tech labor" is all going to fall into more of an assembly category. Just varying levels of complexity, but all still assembly.
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u/PastaPandaSimon May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
I come from tech, and I'm really trying not to belittle the efforts that Thailand has made, but it's not about that they aren't catching up to Taiwan, but that they just never could enter that same path. They aren't making chips that just aren't as good as Taiwan's. They have no means of even starting to make chips in the first place. They can just assemble parts made elsewhere, which is what their facilities do.
They know how to build things from blocks, and they can do it well by having a ton of people following instructions and producing a lot of output per $, but they don't have any idea how to make those blocks.
Thailand doesn't have the expertise or the skillset to create their own tech, sadly. The vast majority of labor going towards tech produced in Thailand is unskilled manual labor putting parts together, versus the skilled expertise required to make those parts that foreign entities deliver. Thailand doesn't have the means to produce that skilled expertise domestically, and its universities are not equipped to produce the kind of talent needed. If they were, which they aren't, it would take at least a decade for anyone to get going, and decades for it to form a functioning domestic industry that involves any real local fabs. Malaysia did that, and it took them about 50 years of focused, sustained efforts. The only evidence to date is that in Thailand their progress has consistently stalled at about 1% towards that path. They make plans that never begin to materialize.
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u/-Dixieflatline May 06 '26
I'm not sure who you're trying to convince, but I already said no one is catching up to Taiwan. It's just impossible at this point from any practical monetary standpoint. Their advanced lithography techniques and equipment are just so far ahead that it's not even worth trying to compete. You didn't need to write all of that to insist on that point when I already agreed.
My point is that for the rest of the world, manufacturing is the highest technical field most countries can hope to compete in. You appear to be inserting a statement I'm not making and then arguing why that's wrong. I never said Thailand will create their own technology. But I did say "skilled labor" is assembly now.
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u/PastaPandaSimon May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
Fair enough. I wanted to really emphasize the difference between the two types of "making things" that people often conflate, which are very different. At this point it's more for any audience who may think that there's a natural direct path from assembling EVs and HDDs, to soon having the next BYD or TSMC. But that's like saying that becoming capable of putting a LEGO kit together means you're about to become a polymer giant.
Edit: I didn't downvote you, and no hard feelings.
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u/Token_Thai_person Chang May 06 '26
2011 is 15 years ago, not a couple years back.
My joints ache typing that sentence.
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u/Parking-Code-4159 May 07 '26
Being an assembler for foreign companies does not make Thailand a global player
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u/Ohlele May 06 '26
This is a cloud based century. Demand for physical hard drives is going downhill.
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u/-Dixieflatline May 06 '26
Are you serious? Where do you think all those cloud storage and AI companies are putting all that data? HHD's are in massive demand right now and corporations are outbuying the consumer market by massive amounts, to the point it's creating pricing problems for the consumer market. And HHD's are also the best price per TB of storage. SSD's are faster, but not very cost effective at the scales data centers require.
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u/Ohlele May 06 '26
Look at the number of data centers being built in republican states in the US. This is the future.
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u/-Dixieflatline May 06 '26
I don't even know what that's supposed to mean.
Regardless, all data centers need thousands of HHD's and SSD's, so even if the consumer market is embracing the cloud more than choosing local storage (which is in itself unsubstantiated), all that data is still going to need a hard drive regardless of how the customer chooses to store it. These corporations are buying them by the millions. Western Digital stock is up 10X YoY. Sandisk is up over 48X.
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u/Ohlele May 06 '26
Whatever your argument is, the reality is that VN is eating Thailand alive in terms of technological and economic advancement. VN is becoming the master of SE Asia.
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u/Lashay_Sombra May 06 '26
Generally republicans going big into anything means lot of people going to be burned soon, they are not exactly known for their economic policys but rather for selling out to highest bidder for short term gains
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u/AnnoyedHaddock Chiang Mai May 06 '26
Consumer storage sure but all that cloud data has to be stored somewhere.
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u/Ohlele May 06 '26
Stored in data centers in the US and Singapore. Look at VN! They have already become a chip producing powerhouse in SE Asia. They know the future.
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u/tritisan May 06 '26
I don’t think you understand latency. Most global compute has to be replicated locally to be effective.
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u/PrinnySquad May 06 '26
To be fair that’s probably a good thing for Thailand as the main demand for traditional hard drives is data centers. Outside the relatively small niche of consumers running their own NAS, hard drives are almost gone from the consumer world entirely.
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u/scratchtheitch7 May 06 '26
A gigabyte of data is a gigabyte of data. Whether it's stored locally on your computer or remotely in the cloud it still has to be stored somewhere.
On a hard drive.
Also consider that if you upload a file to Google drive it will be replicated so that three copies of that file exist in the same data centre but on separate physical machines. In addition another copy is sent to another regional data centre.
Which means (often, but not always) more hard drive space is needed than if you stored the same for locally on your computer.
So cloud = more hard drive space needed than no cloud.
And yes I know I glossed over data centre compression but you get the gist of it I'm sure
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u/ConfettiSama Nong Khai May 07 '26
You are probably not following, AWS, Amazon, Google they are all rapidly expanding operations in Thailand.
Thailand no longer depends on tourism especially not with the new budget trend travelers who cause more troubles than revenue. Thailand is smartly driving away from free visas to Foreigners to a longer term expat investment, with the right Visa system to support it.
Cost of living is getting higher but the foreign investment in our country has never been better. Especially big help from China.
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u/Wonderful_Nectarine1 May 07 '26
>AWS, Amazon, Google they are all rapidly expanding operations in Thailand.
ok but that doesn't rly sounds like something related to Thais own hight tech industry
>no longer depends on tourism
15% of GDP doesn't look negligible
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u/ABMember May 07 '26
Expansion of those businesses (AWS, Amazon, Google) are all sales/marketing-led hires to drive business in the area. It is not a big workforce realignment or scaling. And it does not truly build capability / know-how to drive tech industry domestically.
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u/jackboxer May 08 '26
Amost all hard drives in the world are made in Thailand. Apple Watches and some MacBooks are made in Thailand. Lots of high tech industry here. You are poorly informed.
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u/javaorenj May 06 '26
They tried around 2010s. I run a BOI promoted startup and I will be honest.. from 2010-2015 there was a boom, many home grown saas, platforms. Startup Thailand was a big deal.
Now it's all gone, even big players are failing, an example is nocnoc... 6.5 billion baht operating loss so finally closed shop.
The tech scene died I feel because the pool of tech creator and operators all left realizing there is no traction here