Line Thailand is aiming to become an open platform for developers and corporate users to leverage to develop innovations and services to tap revenue-making opportunities.
The company will rely on more local developers and communities to meet local users' needs with what it calls hyper-localised technology.
"Over a decade, Line Thailand has grown from 44 million to 54 million users, making us a leader in group chat platforms and part of people's lives," Phichet Rerkpreecha, chief executive of Line Thailand, said at a conference yesterday.
He said the company wants to expand from a chat platform to hyper-localised technology through an open platform by adding innovations and opportunities for entrepreneurs and consumers, including developers.
Norasit Sitivechvichit, chief operating officer of Line Thailand, said group chat is popular among Thais, with 56% growth over the past decade as people send a variety of message types, including images and audio and video files, surpassing the global average.
Line Thailand conducted research and found the most popular categories for group chats were friends (82%), family (80%), work (77%) and school (27%). Some 77% of users said family chat groups helped improve ties among family members.
Each Thai has an average of seven groups for friends, four groups for family, five groups for school and nine groups for work. Heavy use of group chats prompted Line to launch Groupwork solutions that provide features that balance work and life.
In the consumer segment, the company launched Line Stickers Premium, a monthly or yearly subscription service offering access to 9 million stickers and artificial intelligence predictive suggestions. The premium basic service is 69 baht per month, while the deluxe service is 139 baht.
Increasing revenue
Ratthi Chatdamrongsak, chief commercial officer of Line Thailand, said the company aims to increase revenue from corporate users, covering large firms and small and medium-sized enterprises, increasing revenue on top of its existing official accounts service.
There are 6 million official accounts, up by 2 million since the pandemic. The corporate sector is a major revenue contributor to Line and this segment continues to grow, said Mr Ratthi.
Weera Kasetsin, chief product officer of Line Thailand, said over the next three years, the company aims to become an open platform capable of integrating a wide range of cutting-edge technologies to create products and services that align with local consumers, businesses and partners.
By the second half of 2024, it will launch Line OA Plus Plug-in Store which will enable developers and corporate users to develop plug-in features or solutions that integrate seamlessly with the Line platform. Line will make revenue sharing with developers.
Line product development will be based on several key strategies, such as extensive plug-ins for integration with data solutions, data utilisation and performance marketing that will increase the effectiveness of marketing on the platform by strengthening data management and analysis.
The last strategy focuses on privacy by maintaining a strong commitment to user security and privacy, ensuring that these aspects are treated with the utmost care.
Line Thailand will enhance its capabilities to help businesses manage customer data more efficiently through MyCustomer tools. These include collecting first party data from consumers, granting businesses greater access and management of data with consumer consent.
Line plans to introduce MyCustomer for businesses looking to manage data for customer relationship management purposes in the future.
