After serving only eight months as deputy transport minister, academic-turned-politician Chadchat Sittipunt has leapt to the ministry's top post in the recent cabinet shake-up.
Chadchat: Playing with high stakes
The speedy ascent shows a high level of trust in Mr Chadchat from Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, and marks him as a key member of the government.
The Transport Ministry job is highly sought after, but Mr Chadchat faced scant opposition during his rise to the top post.
Mr Chadchat has said his academic background has helped him rise to the top.
He graduated with a bachelor's degree in civil engineering from Chulalongkorn University with first-class honours.
He then received the Ananda Mahidol scholarship to pursue his master's degree in structural engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a doctorate degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
He worked as an engineer in the United States for two years before returning to Thailand to become a lecturer in engineering at Chulalongkorn University.
Mr Chadchat, the son of former Metropolitan Police Bureau chief Saneh Sittipunt, started his political career when he was invited to help work in the Transport Ministry under former ministers Pongsak Rattapongpaisal and Santi Prompat.
In the Yingluck administration, Mr Chadchat was persuaded to lend a hand to then-transport minister ACM Sukumpol Suwanatat. He was then posted to deputy minister following the first reshuffle.
"It didn't take long for me to make the decision," he said, calling his entry to politics a "once in a lifetime" opportunity.
Politics runs in Mr Chadchat's blood. He is the grandson of Pol Gen Phichai Kunlawanich, former deputy national police chief and former deputy agriculture minister.
His father, Pol Gen Saneh, is also widely known to have close connections to former premier Thaksin Shinawatra.
Mr Chadchat, however, said he did not personally know Thaksin or Ms Yingluck before he entered politics.
His ministerial post could be the result of his strong academic background and past experience in helping political officials, he said.
"Becoming a minister has changed my life," he said.
"What I decide will have a huge impact on many people."
"Politics is uncertain," he said, adding he will approach his job without fear or favour.
During last year's floods, the premier asked Mr Chadchat to explain flood prevention measures to Japanese investors, who needed assurance. Since then, he has been asked to explain to the public the complicated issues involving the flood prevention plan. He was assigned as a spokesman of the Water and Flood Management Commission (WFMC) and as a chairman of a committee working on a water management bidding draft.
Apart from an ability to make complicated things understandable, Mr Chadchat is seen as a quick decision-maker and an effective and efficient project planner.
In this regard he has certain qualities in common with Thaksin, according to Pheu Thai party members, which has garnered Mr Chadchat the nickname "Thaksin Junior".
He often shows up at weekly party meetings to hear what MPs relay from their local constituents.
Today, the stakes for Chadchat's nascent political career are high, as he is in charge of mega-projects worth hundreds of billions of baht.
One priority is to push ahead a project for 10 skytrain lines to meet the party's election campaign promise, which also suggested a 20-baht train fare across all lines.
He also has to handle high-speed train projects linking Thailand to neighboring countries, and various infrastructure projects under way as part of the Asean Economic Community, which takes effect in 2015.