Mrs. Chadatip Chutrakul, Chief Executive Officer of Siam Piwat Co., Ltd.
Siam Piwat celebrates 60th anniversary of success with quantum growth reinforcing position as leader Creative Economy in retail and property development.
Bangkok, Thailand – Siam Piwat Co., Ltd., the owner and operator of prestigious retail developments such as Siam Paragon, Siam Center, Siam Discovery, and joint venture partner of ICONSIAM, Thailand’s new mega-landmark, announced its commitment to be a leader in Creative Economy and take Thailand on to the world stage with its projects. The company revealed its key strategies for the next five years as well as noted the doubling of its revenue since 2014 and entry into the 60th year of successful operations.
Mrs. Chadatip Chutrakul, Chief Executive Officer of Siam Piwat Co., Ltd. said: “Throughout 60 years, Siam Piwat has been a thought leader always creating new prototypes and bringing new formats that have advanced the retail development sector. We have always been playing a part in driving the economy of Thailand. We have created revolutionary phenomenon after revolutionary phenomenon. And, we have made good progress in the direction we announced five years ago as can be seen in some of the extraordinary global phenomena that we have created, ranging from the transformation of Siam Center into a haven of trendy ideas to turning Siam Discovery – The Exploratorium into a hybrid retail destination. For the first time ever, retail developments in Thailand have received the very top awards from the world’s most respected retail and retail development associations. And, most recently, the opening of the mega-city ICONSIAM was a 2018 sensation for Bangkok as well as being held up as one of the world’s best projects by the retail and retail development sector. ICONSIAM is a game-changer. We have overcome all kinds of challenges to bring the project to life amid enormous political change and economic upheavals over the last five years. And we have developed a new paradigm for creating shared value in business on the Chao Phraya River. We brought city-centre modernity to combine it with the culture and beauty of Thainess along with multiple businesses that are turning this city of prosperity into a destination that people from around the world want to visit.”
She said, “Siam Piwat takes pride in the sustainable growth as well as the shared value and mutual benefit we create at all levels for all stakeholders, from business partners to suppliers, communities and society at large, and in being a contributor to the economy and the prestige of Thailand.”
“Siam Piwat has advanced beyond domestic competition to become a global leader in the Creative Economy, ready to enhance the competitiveness of Thailand at every level. Siam Piwat’s next goal is to help lead Thailand on to the world stage in its sector. We are still committed to being the first to offer innovative experiences and to create mega phenomena that have never existed before. We have planned a new strategy that will drive our operations and set our investment direction. The focus will be on sharing business opportunities with the rest of Thailand and joining hands to take business associates overseas. We will introduce superior innovations and technologies to drive our marketing strategy. In the next five years, we aim to grow the revenues of our group by 100 to 150 percent.”
With a strong and differentiated positioning, Siam Piwat’s key strategies that will underpin its 5-year business plan are as follows.
1. Create global mega phenomena to build on the success of OneSiam and ICONSIAM by developing world-class projects in Thailand and overseas
With the company’s city-building vision, each project to be built by Siam Piwat must be a large–scale development. It must represent a retail development revolution and be tailor-made. As a result of the success of all its past projects, Siam Piwat has been approached by businesses in Thailand and overseas to enter joint ventures or be project advisor to new endeavours worldwide. They seek to know how a development can integrate and project a nation’s DNA while at the same time also being a successful commercial enterprise. The knowhow and experience in the development of ICONSIAM is to be used as the foundation for large-scale national and global developments in the next five years. Siam Piwat plans to build large-scale projects that have innovative formats and concepts that go beyond expectations. Details of the projects are expected to be disclosed soon.
Siam Piwat is advancing OneSiam which integrates the power of Siam Paragon, Siam Center, and Siam Discovery to offer superior experiences and reinforce its position as the #1 destination in the hearts of visitors and as the only place in Asia and the world which is ranked in the Top 10 most popular destinations in the world with #1 ranking in Instagram for ‘check-ins’ and the #6 ranking in Facebook for ‘check-ins’.
At ICONSIAM, the global destination on the Chao Phraya River, the company will continue to add value to the project by opening additional major components such as True ICON Hall and River Museum Bangkok. True ICON Hall is a state-of-the-art and technologically most advanced auditorium of 12,000 square metres in Bangkok, suitable for international conferences and globally renown performances and shows, and will help strengthen Thailand’s position as a hub destination for the MICE sector. The River Museum Bangkok is the first museum built in Thailand to international standards and will collaborate with museums around the world to bring the world’s priceless art treasures for display in Thailand for the first time.
2. Team up with global partners to develop the retail and retail development sector
Siam Piwat has been trusted by many leading global companies who have chosen to partner and jointly invest with Siam Piwat in large-scale projects. In 2018, Siam Piwat announced a joint venture with global partner Simon Property Group, the world’s largest publicly traded real estate company. The partners plan to open their first international luxury premium outlet in Thailand later this year and will also open two stores outside of Bangkok.
Siam Piwat has been approached by many well-known companies in different countries intending to invest in Thailand. Its business approach allows Siam Piwat to work with any partner to develop mega-city projects, and some studies are already underway with locations being scouted in Bangkok and the provinces.
In the retail business, Siam Piwat remains committed to being the first to offer innovative formats, products and services, building on its past success from partnering with Takashimaya, the most prestigious department store group in Japan, that resulted with the opening of the group’s first store in Thailand at ICONSIAM, to a joint venture with iStyle Inc, the largest and most successful online beauty review site in Japan with the opening of the first @cosme store in Thailand. Among successes are also the expansion of franchise businesses such as Loft, currently with five stores, ALAND, Korea’s best-known fashion store, and the opening of ICONCRAFT at ICONSIAM as the first showcase for the best works by Thai craftsmen.
This year, Siam Piwat plans to further diversify its retail businesses by opening more franchise stores and entering into joint ventures with leading international companies to launch one or two additional lifestyle brands.
The company will also encourage Thai designers and SME operators to leverage fully Siam Piwat-managed distribution platforms that will allow small operators to keep their costs low and to use Siam Piwat’s data centre in their product development.
3. Expand into other businesses that strengthen core businesses
The company will invest in or acquire new types of business that support Siam Piwat’s core businesses. This includes buying properties, office buildings, logistics operations as well as suppliers of innovations and new technologies.
The company also plans to expand under four or five large-scale subsidiaries, such as setting up Siam Alliance Management Co., Ltd., to build on the expertise gained from managing Royal Paragon Hall to manage new conference centres and exhibition centres such as True ICON Hall. It will also invest in building facilities for events as well as holding concerts in new locations. Next to that, it will further support the comprehensive marketing services provided by Supremo Co., Ltd., which develops and promotes integrated marketing and world-class experiences beyond expectations such as the Amazing Thailand Countdown on the Chao Phraya River at the end of last year. Additionally, Siam Professional Management Co., Ltd., will expand its services to many property development companies to provide advice and building management services.
4. Launch massive data and intelligence management systems that were in development for more than five years to build differentiation and consumer relevance in our propositions and drive comprehensive marketing strategies in Thailand and overseas
With a customer-centric approach, Siam Piwat is committed to bringing the most advanced innovation and technology to improve its work systems, from studying customer needs to designing the customer journey, to providing services and sales promotion to best meet the needs of individual customers.
This year, Siam Piwat will launch a market intelligence system that took more than five years to develop. Costing more than Bht 500 million to develop, the system is ready to be fully deployed this year. The development of the system was supervised by by Ajarn Sanchai Thiewprasertkul, President of Siam Piwat and Asst. Prof. Dr. Peerapon Vateekul of Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University. The system will maximise the efficiency of Siam Piwat’s marketing initiatives. In developing the system, Siam Piwat used large databases from four of the most visited and most successful shopping and lifestyle complexes in Thailand to analyse consumer behaviour. It helped with the design of systems that are better able to meet customer needs. The company’s IT infrastructure and data management were also entirely overhauled.
The system is divided into two sections.
- At the front-end, Siam Piwat provides location awareness and member awareness through mobile applications. Marketing data is centralised through web centralisation. Electronic digital marketing provides better access to customers on different electronic devices.
- At the back-end, Siam Piwat developed its data infrastructure to collect data on customer behaviour in multiple dimensions and uses advanced data analytics to analyse the behaviour and needs of individual customers so it can prepare marketing promotional activities to meet the exact needs of customers.
Siam Piwat will expand its retail channels to online markets. Products available at its destinations will be sold online via e-commerce and s-commerce to reach customers with no access to its destinations. This will make it particularly convenient for customers in the provinces. The e-channels are a way of meeting the lifestyle needs of modern-day customers.
5. Strategy of creating shared value to achieve sustainability – joining hands with Thai enterprises throughout the country and readying to compete on the world stage, propelling ‘local heroes’ to becoming ‘global heroes’
Siam Piwat is firmly committed to driving its business to sustainable growth by adopting co-creation and creating shared value – two main concepts embedded in all of Siam Piwat’s developments.
The collaboration with all stakeholders from government agencies to young business operators to people with specialised expertise from around the world is fully evident in the company’s latest development – ICONSIAM. It is co-creation on a national scale that has never been attempted before, and unites the forces of the entire nation’s creativity. Siam Piwat works closely with outstanding people from across the country. They are from communities nationwide, private businesses, government agencies, and specialised disciplines from many countries – great and small. They are given the challenge to think out-of-the box and to do things they never tried before to maximise success.
Siam Piwat also works with the public sector to train capable young people in all fields of endeavour so they can be a driver of prosperity for Thailand. Among the initiatives sponsored by Siam Piwat are DEmark Show, Talent Thai & Designers’ Room and the opening of Objects of Desire Store (ODS) in partnership with the Ministry of Commerce’s Department of Internal Trade. Many of these projects aim to promote the works of Thailand’s young designers on a global stage in partnership with the Ministry of Science and Technology, provides comprehensive integration of OTOP products with science, technology and innovation; and, a partnership with the SUPPORT Arts and Crafts International Centre of Thailand for the promotion and development of arts and crafts. Siam Piwat also successfully collaborates with small business operators from around Thailand in its SookSiam initiative at ICONSIAM. This project helps products from distant villages and local communities increase sales and boosts their public exposure. Siam Piwat will continue to support these initiatives for the long-term and will look for opportunities to carry out worthy programmes in partnership with various organisations. This is to support Thailand’s talented young generation and to turn local heroes into global heroes so that they can compete with aplomb on the world stage and bring honour to Thailand.
Each of these programmes will spread prosperity. They are expected to benefit surrounding communities, promote care for the environment and the quality of life of people in the community, create shared benefits for society at large, as well as contribute to economic progress and bring honour to Thailand. Siam Piwat provides a stage to support Thai business operators and showcase the talent of Thais from all fields of endeavour so that Thais can be proud of fulfilling their potential and help to lift up the spirit of the nation.
6. Develop Siam Piwat Academy and groom Siam Piwat next-gen leaders
To support the group’s operations which have grown phenomenally from 15 to 46 companies in five years, and to facilitate business expansion, Siam Piwat plans to restructure and develop its organisation in the following ways.
Siam Piwat is grooming a new generation of leaders to strengthen its management and capabilities in driving the organisation in the future. In the past five years, Siam Piwat has set up a think tank whose members have worked closely with the CEO and with highly experienced senior executives who specialise in individual disciplines. These next-gen leaders are exposed to intensive training. They are given opportunities to show their full potential and grow, as well as be a part of every success of Siam Piwat.
The company also has Siam Piwat Academy which offers management training that shares Siam Piwat’s 60 years of accumulated knowledge in retail and retail development management. During the last three years, Siam Piwat collaborated with Thailand’s leading academic institutions, Chulalongkorn University and Thammasat University, to teach sustainable shopping mall management. The course received extremely positive feedback and Siam Piwat will extend its collaboration to other leading academic institutions including Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration. In the coming year, Siam Piwat will accelerate recruitment of high-potential younger people with multiple skills and understanding of the digital generation’s lifestyle.
Siam Piwat plans to create a centre of excellence that assembles experienced specialists. This central unit will supervise and support all subsidiaries of the group. It also plans to improve work processes by using technology to increase productivity. This includes the use of chatbot, robotics and AI to make Siam Piwat an agile organisation always responding promptly to customer needs and change.
“With Siam Piwat’s clear, powerful, and distinctive vision, we are confident that our strategies will further strengthen our position as a thought leader and as the icon of creative and innovative lifestyle in the future. It will help put all our businesses and our partners on a path of sustainable growth, being the leader of the Creative Economy, and supporting Thailand on the road to success on the world stage,” Mrs. Chadatip added.