Hybrid multi-cloud has become a key driver of digital transformation among enterprises that need a digital strategy to thrive in this difficult time, according to Tencent Thailand, a local unit of the international tech giant.
"The pandemic forced businesses to step into digital transformation early this year and cloud computing is the backbone of this digital journey," said Chang Foo, chief operating officer of Tencent Thailand.
According to global research firm IDC's info-brief, hybrid multi-cloud will be a key infrastructure strategy for digital transformation. By 2021, more than 90% of enterprises worldwide will rely on a mix of on-premises/dedicated private clouds, public clouds and legacy platforms to meet infrastructure needs for digital transformation.
The hybrid multi-cloud strategy will help reshape the workload landscape and bring in more scalability and agility to the business, it indicated.
Hybrid multi-cloud refers to the combined use of private and public cloud services on separate tasks.
Another research firm, Gartner, indicated spending on public cloud services in Thailand is expected to surge 17.7% to 18.3 billion baht in 2020 and rise 25.2% to 22.9 billion baht in 2021.
It said more companies are gravitating to using cloud services to facilitate business operations amid the pandemic. Cloud computing is anticipated to help save investment costs and support the pay-per-use model.
Mr Foo said Thailand offers huge prospects for growth, which is why Tencent established a data centre in Thailand in 2019, the first such an investment by the company in Asean.
"We are the first international company to establish a data centre in Thailand," he said.
By having a local data centre, this helps reduce latency and decreases by 30-50% bandwidth cost.
The domestic data centre also ensures data sovereignty in compliance with the Personal Data Protection Act and General Data Protection Regulation, Mr Foo said.
He said businesses in Thailand, particularly in leading industries, now embrace more cloud services.
Post-pandemic, the digital transformation is accelerating in various sectors with more companies adopting cloud technology in their business to enhance their capability and stay competitive.
They are also gearing up for the adoption of emerging technologies, such as cloud, artificial intelligence (AI), big data and Internet of Things as part of their digital transformation.
Tencent Cloud offers the first in-country interactive and AI-enabled cloud platform that drives innovative business and increases competitiveness, mainly in smart retail, banking, manufacturing, media and entertainment, and healthcare.
Banks, for example, can adopt the optical character recognition technology that provides printed and handwritten character recognition services for cheques, certificates and documents.
Tencent Cloud can support custom templates, which can improve data entry efficiency and reduce the cost of use.
Its facial recognition technology offers authentication features, such as liveness detection and 1:1 face comparison, meeting identity verification needs in industries such as healthcare, finance and insurance.
Retail business can apply the technology to evaluate user satisfaction and interest of buyers.
In the healthcare sector, Tencent can offer AI-powered image recognition to offload physicians' work and support telemedicine.
Speech recognition can support automated call centre services by detecting users' emotions. When a bot detects the unhappy voice of a customer, it can reach out to staff who can help solve problems.
Major global manufacturing players have now embraced technologies such as AI, 5G and cloud computing to make their operations faster, leaner, more responsive and more competitive.
Tencent Cloud has been working with leading manufacturers like Foxconn Industrial Internet Co (FII) on smart manufacturing since 2018. FII has more than 210,000 employees and three decades of manufacturing experience.
As a subsidiary of the world's largest contract manufacturer, FII has adopted a "smart manufacturing + industrial internet" strategy using sensors, smart logistics and automated industrial control systems.
Most of its production lines and factories are fully automated, including several "lights-off" factories that are run entirely via robotics. Enabled by the industrial internet and cloud computing, lights-out factories reduce costs, improve manufacturing quality, cut down on energy use and increase data and production safety.
Through the adoption of digital transformation solutions, Foxconn saved on two-thirds of personnel costs and improved production efficiency. The development cycle of precision tools was shortened by over 30% and pass-through yield reached 99.5%.
The company also engages in remote work solutions through Tencent's VooV meeting, a cloud conferencing tool designed for enterprises across more than 100 countries, including Thailand.
"We have a conference solution that supports organisations in terms of hybrid events -- a combination of virtual and physical events," said Mr Foo.
Tencent has extensive expertise in many industries, including social media, online video, games and music, and these can help customers gain a competitive edge.
The company offers quick solutions for common business scenarios across various industries.
Tencent Cloud assists business customers in creating innovations to strengthen the business and drive growth and sustainability in the new normal.
It is a secure, reliable and high-performance public cloud service provider that integrates the company's infrastructure-building capabilities with the advantages of its massive user platform and ecosystem.
The company's public cloud services can also be provided for organisations as a private cloud to meet their specific security needs.
It has technical and consulting teams to support cloud users in Thailand.
"After we receive requirements from customers, we can customise solutions to meet each organisation's needs and accommodate their digital journey through cloud services," said Mr Foo.
To tap startups and small businesses, the company is offering Tencent Cloud credit worth US$1,000 for product trials on Tencent's cloud platform, with a free trial of up to six months. Interested parties can sign up for the trial at Tencent.co.th until the end of November.
"Our cloud solutions can meet the diverse needs of industries with high performance and a highly secured network," he said.
Mr Foo suggested businesses engage with scalable cloud providers, which allow them to adjust their cloud usage with flexibility.
Moreover, businesses need to pay attention to edge intelligence, assisting them in data processing and protecting the privacy and security of data in the organisation, he said.
"Even amid a pandemic and economic recession, businesses need to invest for future growth as there are still opportunities out there in these challenging times," said Mr Foo.
Businesses need to embrace digital strategies and have teams that understand the cloud service environment, he said. They need to set an achievable goal for their digital strategies with more progressive and innovative models.
Mr Foo said he is aware of the intense competition among cloud service providers locally and internationally, saying the growth of the segment could push up revenue-sharing among players in the industry.