AWS customers welcome new AWS Region in Thailand

Amazon Web Services (AWS), an Amazon.com, Inc. company, has launched the AWS Asia Pacific (Thailand) Region. As part of its long-term commitment, AWS is planning to invest more than US$5 B in Thailand.

AWS Regions are composed of Availability Zones that place infrastructure in separate and distinct geographic locations. AWS estimates the construction and ongoing operation of the new AWS region will add approximately US$10 B to Thailand’s gross domestic product (GDP) and support an average of more than 11,000 full-time-equivalent jobs at external businesses annually. These jobs, including construction, facility maintenance, engineering, telecommunications, and others within the country’s broader economy, will be part of the AWS supply chain in Thailand.

“I would like to extend my appreciation to Amazon Web Services for investing in the development of data centres in Thailand,” said Paetongtarn Shinawatra, PM of Thailand.

“I am pleased that Thailand’s potential and readiness have been recognised by one of the world’s leading companies. I look forward to AWS playing a pivotal role, in partnership with the government, in advancing Thailand toward a more inclusive digital society and expanding access to digital services for all citizens.”

“We continue to see rapid cloud adoption across Asia Pacific as more customers unlock the full potential of the world’s most extensive, reliable, and secure cloud,” said Prasad Kalyanaraman, VP of Infrastructure Services at AWS.

“This new AWS Region in Thailand will help customers across all industries deploy advanced applications with a broad set of AWS technologies that offer both core cloud capabilities, such as compute, storage, analytics, and networking, and services that enable customers to rapidly evolve, such as artificial intelligence and machine learning. With today’s launch, AWS is proud to support Thailand’s digital transformation and help accelerate its role as a regional hub for artificial intelligence.”

With this launch, AWS has a total of 111 Availability Zones across 35 geographic regions, with announced plans to launch 15 more Availability Zones and five more AWS Regions including in New Zealand, KSA, and Taiwan. The AWS Asia Pacific (Thailand) Region consists of three Availability Zones located far enough from each other to support customers’ business continuity, but near enough to provide low latency for high availability applications that use multiple Availability Zones. Each Availability Zone has independent power, cooling, and physical security, and is connected through redundant, ultra-low-latency networks. AWS customers focused on high availability can design their applications to run in multiple Availability Zones to achieve even greater fault tolerance, AWS said.

Enterprises in Thailand choose AWS to innovate, drive cost efficiencies, and accelerate time to market. Thai customers using AWS include 2C2P, Ascend Money, Bank of Ayudhya, Charoen Pokphand Group (CP Group), and KASIKORN Business-Technology Group. Thailand public sector customers use AWS to help drive cost savings and better serve local citizens.

These customers include Big Data Institute (BDI), Digital Government Development Agency, the Center of Excellence in Digital and AI for Mental Health (AIMET), as well as the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET). Thai startups and small businesses, including BODA Technology & Consultancy, BOTNOI Group, Flow Account, Pomelo Fashion, and Sunday Technology, are also building on AWS to rapidly scale nationally in the Asia Pacific region and around the world.

Bank of Ayudhya Public Company, one of Thailand’s top banks, relies on AWS to address specific challenges such as enhancing customer experience, improving financial accessibility, and optimising operational efficiency. The bank utilises AWS cloud services, including data analytics, machine learning, and AI, to innovate and streamline processes.

“As our strategic cloud provider, AWS plays a critical role in driving the Krungsri cloud programme, which serves more than 12 million people. With a local Thailand Region, this will expand the Krungsri and AWS partnership tremendously and will significantly expand the possibilities,” said Pochara Vanaratseath, Head of IT, Bank of Ayudhya Public Company.

Charoen Pokphand Group (CP Group) is Thailand’s largest conglomerate, operating across agribusiness, food, retail, telecommunications, and e-commerce in over 21 countries. CP Group uses AWS to drive digital transformation, enhance operational efficiency, scale rapidly, improve data analytics capabilities, develop new digital products and services, and innovate across their diverse business units.

“This investment by AWS aligns perfectly with our commitment to implement cutting-edge technology to drive sustainable growth and improve lives,” said Thanasorn Jaidee, President of True Internet Data Center (True IDC), a subsidiary of CP Group.

“The new region will enable us to accelerate our digital transformation initiatives, enhance our data security and compliance posture, and develop innovative solutions more efficiently. We look forward to leveraging this local AWS infrastructure to better serve our customers and contribute to Thailand's digital economy.”

Established in 2016, KASIKORN Business-Technology Group (KBTG) is the technology arm of KASIKORNBANK, one of Thailand’s leading commercial banks, and relies on AWS to enable more than 400 applications to make financial services accessible, convenient, and inclusive to customers across Asia Pacific. “Building on AWS has been a game-changing strategy for us, enabling us to establish our leadership in the fintech industry,” said Tawan Jithavech, chief technology officer at KBTG. “We chose AWS because of its broad spectrum of services, deep expertise in cloud solutions, and the agility with which they can help us scale our operations. With the new AWS Thailand Region, we will easily enhance our network response times, be able to synchronize data more effectively, and consistently deliver superior financial services to our customers quickly and safely by relying on the world’s most secure, reliable, and available infrastructure.”

Thai government agency, the Big Data Institute (BDI), is leading the charge to transform Thailand into a data-driven nation through the development of the National Big Data Platform, which empowers government bodies to formulate informed policies that address key economic and social challenges. BDI launched several data integration initiatives, including Health Link, Travel Link, and the Thai Large Language Model (Thai LLM) platforms, all aimed at enhancing data accessibility and utility across sectors. “With the new AWS Thailand Region, we are excited to announce that the Big Data Institute will migrate Health Link, our decentralised health information exchange service, to AWS’s data centers in Thailand,” said Dr. Tiranee Achalakul, president and CEO of BDI.

“Health Link is set to provide effective patient care by enabling seamless access to health records without centrally storing sensitive information. We chose AWS as our primary cloud provider due to its renowned secure, robust, and highly scalable infrastructure, coupled with exceptional engineering and consulting support. As we expand our Health Link user base, maintaining a stable, secure, and efficient operational environment will be crucial – and we know we can do that with AWS.”

The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) has been Thailand’s primary securities trading venue since 1975, with its online trading platform supporting more than 3.6 million users. AWS provides SET with robust, highly scalable, and low latency cloud infrastructure for its online trading platform that can meet stringent security and compliance requirements. “With an increase in digital investors, it is vital for SET to adapt quickly to new market demands and offer services that cater to the appetite of this growing generation,” said Thirapun Sanpakit, senior executive vice president and head of the IT division at the Stock Exchange of Thailand. “Using AWS for SET’s online trading platforms helps us easily scale to accommodate 500,000 concurrent users, while maintaining maximum operational efficiency. With the new AWS Thailand Region, we will expand our low-latency market data offerings to further enhance the trading experience of our investors.”