Siam Commercial Bank announced the establishment of SCB Abacus, a wholly owned subsidiary focusing on the development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology to enhance business operational efficiency and service quality. Positioned as an AI-powered analytics company, the first spin-off in the Southeast Asian banking industry, SCB Abacus strives to strengthen the capability of Siam Commercial Bank in meeting customer’s needs in a more customized, secure, and faster manner, as well as improving efficiency.  The company’s ultimate goal is to become a leader in AI technology to elevate the banking and financial industry in Thailand and Southeast Asia and to drive AI development in Thailand to the international level.

Mr. Arthid Nanthawithaya, President & Chief Executive Officer, The Siam Commercial Bank Public Company Limited, revealed that

“The crucial role of technology and innovation are becoming more visible in the banking and financial sector. Siam Commercial Bank has been aware of this changing trend and has continued to improve customer service to keep up with the digital evolution. This can be seen in the recent launch of the latest version of SCB Easy application and the newly launched Chatuchak Guide application. We will continue to take proactive steps towards innovation development. The establishment of SCB Abacus aims to leverage emerging AI technologies as part of 'SCB Transformation' mission to become ‘The Most Admired Bank’, with a focus on using AI and advanced data analytics to enhance business efficiency and service quality.  SCB Abacus is the first spin-off company in the financial sector in Thailand and Southeast Asia fully dedicated to AI, a key enabling technology that helps SCB build an exponential growth to its innovation and service development capacity, as well as better meet business and financial needs of diversified customers. SCB Abacus is a major milestone in the transformation of banking and financial industry in Thailand and Southeast Asia.”

According to Dr. Sutapa Amornvivat, Chief Executive Officer, SCB Abacus Co., Ltd.,

“Today AI technology has already been integrated into our daily life, Machine Learning technique, a branch of AI, has long been used to classify spam emails, to make personalized shopping recommendation on e-commerce platforms, and to recognize people using photos posted on social media. Similarly, in the banking industry, AI has been used to detect for credit card fraud, to make investment recommendation by the so-called robo-advisors, and to recognize faces via a facial recognition payment system. The role of AI in enhancing business competitiveness is becoming more apparent. With this in mind, SCB Abacus mission is to develop advanced technology using AI algorithms to unlock capability to gain insights and learn from the vast amount of data and to develop new products and services that meet the business needs of Siam Commercial Bank as well as other business organizations. We also look forward to forming partnerships with public and private organizations to drive innovation culture in Thailand towards the Finance 4.0 era and to generate sustainable growth towards the future.”

Key strengths of SCB Abacus that sharpens its competitive edge comprise of::

• Talent – a strong team of professionals with experience from world-class organizations
• Support from Siam Commercial Bank – high-impact projects to improve SCB’s service, allowing for best case learning and development of scalable solutions in the future
• World-class partners – partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), opening access to new cutting-edge technology still under development, an advisory panel including leading business gurus and veterans from various industries: Dr. Pailin Chuchottaworn, Dr. Thaweesak Koanantakool, Vilasinee Puddhikarant and Prof. Benjamin Van Roy, Ph.D., contributing to valuable knowledge and experience sharing in driving new innovations

“The fact that Siam Commercial Bank has a massive amount of data in possession means a strong advantage for SCB Abacus in extracting insights from further analysis, learning, and predicting true customer needs,” added Dr. Sutapa.

SCB Abacus has currently started development of several projects for SCB. This includes a recommendation engine for product and service offering integrated within SCB Easy application. Another project, a new service that adopts Internet of Things (IoT) and AI technology in designing personalized insurance product that promotes a healthy lifestyle by motivating customers to engage in physical and healthy activities. SCB Abacus is also working on the integration of AI into SCB call center to enable the system to predict the customer call issues in order to connect them to the right contact point, which levels up service quality and customer satisfaction.

“SCB Abacus is keen to develop AI innovation to elevate the service level of Siam Commercial Bank to a new level that can help banking customers achieve their goals through an entirely new experience that is more customized, secure, and faster services. The company also aims to further expand its technology into other business sectors to improve their growth and to lift Thailand’s innovation capability a step further into the international level. SCB Abacus stands ready to propel growth for SCB, riding on our readiness in data resources, strong talent, and world-class partners from a diverse background,” concluded Dr. Sutapa.

About SCB Abacus

SCB Abacus is a wholly owned subsidiary of Siam Commercial Bank focusing on the development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology to enhance business operational efficiency and service quality. Positioned as an AI-powered analytics company and the first spin-off in the Southeast Asian banking industry, SCB Abacus strives to achieve 4-E key missions – Expertise in advanced technology that reshapes banking industry; Experience building for a more customized, secure, and faster service for customers; Enhanced of Siam Commercial Bank standards in reaching world-class excellence; and Education igniter that spurs the culture of innovation in Thailand to embrace the digital age.

For additional information, please contact: Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide Ltd. Eakkapop Panthurat                           089 676 6234     [email protected] Supaporn Masiri                                  081 988 0123     [email protected]

The Siam Commercial Bank Public Company Limited

Duangporn Hutasevi (Kaew)               0-2544-4503 / 081-637-7367

Sudarat Chunharat (Lookmoo)            0-2795-4822