The transition to “ASEAN Economic Community” at the end of 2015 has more or less alerted many countries in ASEAN. It is out of the question that this will create “Melting Pot Community” which combines a diversity of culture, ethnicity, religion, language, specialization, living, and entrepreneurship together. The most important thing to lead to the successful Melting Pot is to create ASEAN level of integrated knowledge including building good foundation of IT to connect countries in ASEAN together. Currently ASEAN members are expediting to develop and prepare themselves. Nevertheless, the true “ASEAN Economic Community” cannot be made possible if each country aims at developing only its own one. Gladly today C asean, center of integrated knowledge of business, arts, culture, and “Young Startups” or “Young Blood Entrepreneurs” incubation was born. In this Techno Society magazine, we have an opportunity to talk to Dr. Karndee Leopairote with her new role: Managing Director of C asean. You will find out what C asean’s vision and mission are.

Q: What are C asean’s role in Thailand in particular for Young Generations who want to do business but still lack in experiences, knowledge, and budget?

Dr. Karndee: “C asean’s vision is “Collaboration for the Better of ASEAN’s Connectivity”. We will be area of collaboration for a better regional connectivity. We see powerful young bloods and young entrepreneurs who will be important machine to steer ASEAN to grow. C asean’s goal is being “Hub of ASEAN Entrepreneurs” or Center of Young Blood Entrepreneurs in ASEAN. Although starting from the location in Thailand, its vision and scope of work are initially set in ASEAN level. We want this center to be “Networking Platform”, emphasizing on “Young Startups” or Young Aged Amateur Entrepreneurs. This group of people will be the future of ASEAN and drive this region to grow. Furthermore, at the moment the government has been continuously supporting SMEs. As representative of private sector, we can see that there are people who are even smaller than SMEs and have a chance to grow and can help develop and move country and region forward. They aspire to start up business but still lack in idea. Therefore it is our responsibility to build ASEAN and Global Visions for them since the beginning stage. It is great that today we have many supporters from both public and private sectors and we also consider them as C asean Founders who will develop C asean along with us.”

Q: What is “DNA of ASEAN”?

Dr. Karndee: “What clearly signifies DNA of C asean is its logo. It consists of the words “Business”, “Arts”, and “Culture” and they well represent C asean. From the survey, it is found that if we collaborate merely for business or for commercial purpose, in the end we cannot survive. What will remain is the competition among each of us in ASEAN. This is not our goal of being ASEAN. Instead, it is how we grow together and at the same time build “ASEAN Citizenship”. We must run business while comprehending both arts and culture of ASEAN.”

Q: After the coming of ASEAN Economic Community at the end of 2015, what will be the direction for Startups?

Dr. Karndee: “From a survey conducted by C asean, it is found that young entrepreneurs in Thailand have positive thinking towards AEC. However they still do not know how to extend their business plan nor utilize existing resources within the region. Meanwhile those in Singapore hold different point of view. With a rather small country and limited resources, they have regional level mentality or vision at the beginning stage i.e. analyzing where they can bring and utilize the resources or even looking for business location abroad. As a result having courage to go out of the country to the region or world is not a problem. Another interesting group is Malaysia. In digital field they are prompted however business DNA (readiness and capability) is still after Thailand whereas in Vietnam there are many who aspire to be entrepreneurs but they are not initiators as there is fear of risk. Thereby they prefer to be employees.”

Difference as a Challenge

Dr. Karndee continued, “Different entrepreneurial identity of each country can lead to “Equilibrium” and complete “Ecosystem” which are C asean’s target of bringing “Strength” in ASEAN supply chain to utilize and “Fulfill” each other. For example, Vietnam is good at Engineer Software Coding and Thailand is good at Commercializing and Digital Marketing. Hence, the business can be in form of Multi-National Company i.e. one company can consist of a diversity of skillful persons and ethnicities.”

“if we collaborate merely for business or for commercial purpose, in the end we cannot survive. What will remain is the competition among each of us in ASEAN. This is not our goal of being ASEAN. Instead, it is how we grow together and at the same time build “ASEAN Citizenship”. We must run business while comprehending both arts and culture of ASEAN.” 

Q: What are C asean’s service provisionings?

Dr. Karndee: “We try to portray C asean as “Networking Platform” by having least rules and regulations. For young blood entrepreneurs, we want to make C asean a center of continuous activities. Our highlighted projects for this year are 1. Startup Runway and 2. C asean Acedemy. For the former project, the concept “Think - able, Do - able, and Commercializable” means we will call those young bloods with idea to share and exchange (Think - able) with experts from worldwide as mentors. Interesting idea will be selected and transformed (Do - able) for a “Commercializable” business either the budget is via Funding, Venture Capital, or Crowd Funding. The latter project C asean Academy is to build “University of Life”: an area of teaching and learning by startups themselves who have knowledge and progressive idea to create integrated knowledge. We will have School of Language for persons who want to learn different languages including English and ones in ASEAN. We have communicated with embassies to offer Coaching, emphasizing on real usage. Furthermore we have School of Entrepreneurship, a stage for entrepreneurs to share and exchange idea. This school will not contain Classroom but will be Workshop focusing on practicality. Thailand has many smart devices waiting to be commercialized or transformed into money. For us, we have collaborated with universities starting from Thailand with Bangkok University as pilot project.”

Q: What technology does C asean apply within this center?

Dr. Karndee: “C asean perceives the modern lifestyle and the application of technology within everyday life therefore designed C asean to fulfill people’s life in Digital Age. With special attention to Digital Economy which the government focuses on IT, C asean offers E - Library or online library, Solar Cell which helps produce electricity in the center, and we will also pilot the highest speed Wifi in Thailand. This also includes other IT infrastructure in C asean. All of these are supported by TCC Technology (TCCT). We utilized technologies in this center to serve young generation’s lifestyle to be easier and more convenient.”

Q: What are your feelings and impression on being C asean executive?

Dr. Karndee: “It is such a delightful role and I am in love with this job everyday. From being a lecturer of Service Innovation, Lean Manufacturing, and Research of ASEAN for a long time, today I have an opportunity to do experiment on every theory taught. I put down these theories and do the f ield works. What we can practically use is considered an achiev ement of my Main Objective: “Helping Society to be Better and Smarter” by creating new innovation which is C asean: a learning center. For my other roles such as wrapping up economic news in the evening and doing ASEAN documentary, they are run as usual. This is because doing things makes me always learn. It is a good way to be open to new experiences.”