Thailand becomes the company’s sixth Asian market for the phones, following recent launches in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, the Philippines and Vietnam.

The move follows Acer’s acquisition of Taiwanese smart-phone manufacturer E-Ten last year, a purchase that enabled Acer to shortcut its tapping of the global market.

Aymar de Lencquesaing, Acer senior corporate vice president, said it was the right time for Acer to jump into the smart-phone market, as the global mobile-phone market is about 4 billion units, of which only 300 million are smart phones.

Meanwhile, the trend in mobile-data use has been increasing rapidly, which is expected to drive the global smart-phone market to grow by 15 per cent annually over the next five years. This means there are great opportunities out there, said de Lencquesaing.

He admitted the company’s move into smart phones was a big one, as it is a totally different business and market from that which Acer has traditionally been involved in.

However, with the strong Acer corporate brand and dedicated teams overseeing the hand-held business and 500 global research and development engineer resources, he believes Acer has the capability to take its place among the top five smart-phone players in the world within three to five years.

“Our ambition is to become a leader in the mobile-data market. The launch of smart phones is to complete our product lines and encourage us to meet our goals. Acer has already reached No 2 in the worldwide notebook market and is No 1 in the global netbook market,” said de Lencquesaing.

He said Thailand was a highly attractive market for Acer’s hand-held business. The company also targets being among the top five in this market within three to five years.

“In the initial stage, the dedicated team – the Smart Hand-held Business Group of Acer Computer (Singapore) – will take care of smart-phone business in Thailand, but we will certainly have a local dedicated team to oversee this new business unit soon,” said de Lencquesaing.

The company plans to bring more than 10 smart-phone models to Thailand this year, of which five were launched yesterday: the Acer DX900, DX650, X960, M900 and F900.

“We plan to launch more products continuously to the Thai market. We believe the global smart-phone market can grow by more than 15 per cent per year if there are more good-performing and reasonably priced phones available,” he said.

Roger Yuen, Asia-Pacific vice president of Acer Computer’s Smart Hand-held Business Group, said the key to successful distribution of Acer smart phones to a wide Thai market was having good local partners.

Acer has therefore appointed major IT retailer IT City and leading IT wholesaler SIS Distribution’s Qdist to be its distribution partners for the devices.

“With the market capability and readiness of Thailand, we think we can reach the goal of becoming one of the top five smart-phone players earlier than our projection of within the next three to five years,” said Yuen.

IT City president Ekachai Sirijirapatana said by next month, Acer smart phones would be available in about 10 IT City outlets, with all 34 outlets stocking the devices by year-end.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotnews/30103963/Acer-models-enter-the-fray

School started a week ago, but students at the Tessabal Ban Khaotao School in Prachuap Khiri Khan’s Hua Hin district only have social science textbooks so far, prompting teachers to use old textbooks and assigning homework in hand-written sheets.Ads by Google
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However, the Muang Hua Hin Municipality said they were pushing for the delivery of textbooks within this week.

The Nation visited the school yes+F6terday following complaints from parents.

Acting school director Lamun Preyanont said the school, with 260 students from Kindergarten 1 to Prathom 6, had received other supplies but no textbooks so far. Students in Prathom 1 to 6 only had social science textbooks, Kindergarten 2 had some of the books in the curriculum, while Kindergarten 1 had nothing to study from.

Some schoolteachers, who asked not to be named, said textbook delivery is often delayed though it should not have happened this year because schools opened on May 18, instead of May 12. They added that many parents were concerned that their children would fall behind due to the delay.

Deputy Mayor Dr Rungroj Sileungsawat, who has been put in charge of the matter, said the curriculum had changed this year so new textbooks were needed. Besides, he said, this is the first time that schoolchildren will be given free textbooks according to the new government policy on education. Plus, he added, the extended public holidays this year had delayed the bureaucratic procedure and delivery.

Rungroj said he had already instructed contractors to speed up the delivery and get the books to schools within this week. He added that teachers had been told to use last year’s textbooks in the meantime.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotnews/30103708/Students-in-school,-but-nothing-to-study-from

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In the near future Khao Yai will not only be the site of Thailand’s oldest national park, but a consortium of developers hopes it will also be to Thailand and Asean what Silicon Valley is to the United States: a hub for development of information and communication technology.

Real estate developers and local authorities are planning to establish an International Software Park at Khao Yai, about 80 kilometres from Pak Chong, in Nakhon Ratchasima province, and 200km from Bangkok, making it a “Siam Cyber City”.

Khon Kaen University’s E-Saan Software Park is serving as a consultant to the project. Its director Panupong Wanjantuk said the project, which aimed to become a focus for information and communications technology and software development, was the brainchild of real estate businessmen and local government.

A development and survey team was set up last year to plan the establishment of the international software park. At present, there are plans for local government bodies to provide the project’s physical infrastructure. Development of the software park itself will be divided into three phases.

Panupong said that in the first phase, the development team would inject money to set up the International Software Park, a training centre and an incubation centre so that they would then be able to invite overseas investors and international software companies to set up businesses in Thailand. There are currently three international software companies interested in setting up businesses in the project, he said.

In the second phase, an International University will be established at the software park, with residential areas to support businesses and provide human resources for the project, as well as creating a high quality of life for people involved.

“The development team plans to set up an international university so it can create an international software curriculum for students that will give them the ICT skills and the ability to develop software to support the demands of industry and business. It will also promote Thailand’s software industry and local software development on global markets,” Panupong said.

In the final phase, the International Software Park will be expanded to cover the entire area of land available on the Pak Chong site.

Panupong said the project’s management expected to invite about 200 companies, both local and international, to set up businesses at the International Software Park within five or 10 years. They will develop software to support both local and international markets.

“Nakhon Ratchasima now has around 50 of the 300 software companies located in Thailand’s northeastern region, and these companies have high potential for growth in meeting the demand for software from the local market,” he said.

Panupong said the project would be unable, in the near future, to develop sufficient skilled and ICT-literate workers to meet demand in the Northeast. However, it will transfer technology from overseas countries for the benefit of the local workforce and local software companies, and expects that eventually it will be creating skilled human resources at a rate of about 1,000 graduates per year.

“I think this project provides a good opportunity to establish an International Software Park at Khao Yai that will become a hub for the software industry in Indochina as well as the ‘Silicon Valley’ of Thailand and Asean,” Panupong said.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotnews/30103740/Khao-Yai-an-’ICT-hub-for-Thailand-and-Asean’

Funding will be diverted from the Somchai Wongsawat ministerial administration’s e-learning project to support the extension of distance learning via satellite -
to improve 12,000 small schools nationwide, Education Minister Jurin Laksanawisit said yesterday.

Jurin affirmed the ministry was focusing on IT to elevate the educational standard of the schools that often suffer teacher shortages.

HM the King had initiated distance learning via satellite which could be extended widely this year, he said. Top level teachers would be recruited for the satellite broadcasting from Wang Klai Kangwon School.

Jurin has also instructed the basic education commission survey how many small schools already have satellite dishes, for later consideration on whether the ministry should extend the project. Currently about 10,000 schools are equipped with satellite dishes for the project, he said.

Jurin reasoned that as the project was already in place and could be implemented right away, there would be a saving on budget. He said a study of Suphan Buri schools already in the project showed that students’ O-Net scores had improved.

Jurin said the budget for such project development would be from the interactive e-learning scheme via MOE television that the ministry was scrapping. It had a Bt30 million budget from fiscal year 2009.

The e-learning project, initiated while Somchai Wongsawat was education minister, managed education via satellite and a high-speed Internet system from a head school to other schools in its network.

The four-year scheme to cover Prathom 4 to Mathayom 3 students in some 3,000 schools nationwide had its first phase last year as a pilot project to 12 schools with the collaboration of the ministry and Samart Corp.

The second phase this year expected 280 schools to join the scheme. A third phase would extend to 1,200 schools and another 1,300 schools would join in the fourth phase.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotnews/30103190/Push-to-boost-learning-via-satellite

Students in grades 5-9 are thrilled with Japanese, Korean ‘knowledge’ cartoons; those in grades 10-12 prefer Thai ones.

Young teenagers are more interested in Japanese and Korean “knowlegde cartoons” than Thai ones as these contain fewer interesting characters and hardly any drama or plot, though the beauty of the cartoons are similar to their foreign counterparts, according to a study.

“A sample of students studying in primary levels of grades 56 and secondary levels of grades 79 told us Korean and Japanese knowledge cartoons are more fun to read than those by Thais,” said Warat Karuchit, associate dean of Sripatum University’s Faculty of Communication Arts, during his research presentation at TK Park on Friday.

Most of the Thai cartoons feature few conflicts or drama unlike Korean and Japanese ones, which arouse readers and make them feel they want to read more or follow what happens next, said psychiatrist Prasert Plitponkarnpim during the discussion.

“Also, Thai knowledge cartoons have no remarkable characters, which is different from Korea’s,” said Watanachai Winitjakul, TK Park’s academic manager.

Focussed on academics

On the other hand, the study found that a sample of older teenagers in grades 10-12 focussed on academic content and preferred Thai knowledge cartoons because these contained more academic knowledge than their Korean and Japanese counterparts.

Thai knowledge cartoons contain up to 40 per cent of academic content compared to 20-30 per cent for Korean and Japanese ones.

“The group of older teenagers even told me they wanted the Thai cartoons to feature more academic content because the cartoons helped them remember events and things,” Warat said.

But there is shortage of these cartoonists, while the government has yet to promote the cartoons, said Nubthong Thongbai, a lecturer at the faculty. “As cartoonists earn little income, it is hard to find new ones. They should be paid more so that new faces appear on the scene.

“Publishers should set up an information department – like South Korea and Japan have done – to seek academic content for cartoonists. This will help give the content more variety.”

The government, she added, should conduct contests and provide opportunities for cartoonists to compete in international competitions so they improve their capability.

Another discussion participant, Assoc Prof Tiranan Anawatsiriwong from Chulalongkorn University, suggested that the Basic Education Commission to support providing more award winning knowledge cartoons in school libraries.

TK Park, in collaboration with the Cartoonthai Institute, will train young people in knowledgecartoon scriptwriting in July.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/worldhotnews/30102876/Cartoon-mania