Sipa’s name change signals expanding role in economy

The Software Industry Promotion Agency (Sipa) will be renamed the Digital Economy Promotion Agency in a move aimed at broadening its organisational role to serve the development of the digital economy.

The name change, expected in April, is to comply with the restructuring and renaming of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Ministry to the Digital Economy and Society Ministry.

Methinee Thepmanee, the ICT Ministry’s permanent secretary, said Sipa would be under the national digital economy subcommittee, which is under the national digital economy and society committee.

The renaming signals the expansion of its role from promoting the development of software to encouraging innovation related to hardware, digital content and applications as well as gaming and digital TV content in order to promote the country’s intellectual property.

After the renaming, Mrs Methinee said the Digital Economy Promotion Agency could enter into joint ventures with the private sector or provide financial aid to small and medium-sized enterprises.

Suwimol Taewasilchaikul, Sipa’s acting director, said the agency aimed to promote the development of digital-related activities in order to attract foreign investment, further develop creative locally-made items and agricultural products and promote tourism via the use of digital tools.

Promoting the use of ICT among SMEs to reduce costs and improve operational efficiency will be another area of focus.

Mrs Suwimol said Sipa planned to triple the number of staff to 300 after the name change. Most new employees will be transferred from the National Science and Technology Development Agency.

She said Sipa would allocate 28 million baht from the fiscal 2015 budget of 285 million baht to promote the use of basic accounting and inventory management software among SMEs.

Sipa is also in talks with the Tourism Council of Thailand to run training courses for tourism providers, noting that the tourism industry plays a crucial role in the country’s economic growth.

Around 26 million foreign tourists travel to Thailand each year.

Mrs Suwimol said Sipa next month would announce a collaboration with the Open Source Education and Development Association and Linux Professional Institute, a non-profit organisation that provides vendor-independent professional certification for Linum system administrators and programmers.

The Linux Professional Institute Certification provides a qualification that can be used to indicate that someone is competent to a certain level.