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Thailand: Outbreak spurs recognition of e-signing format
The coronavirus outbreak is spurring the adoption of e-document signing as more people work from home during the pandemic, says e-commerce pioneer Pawoot Pongvitayapanu.
“E-signing has become the new normal over the past two months,” said Mr Pawoot, co-founder of local startup Creden, which provides online authentication using e-KYC (electronic Know Your Customer) technology.
Mr Pawoot is also founder and chief executive of e-commerce platform Tarad.com and a former head of the Thai E-Commerce Association.
In March, the number of e-document signings jumped 200% from the normal period, driven by adoption by schools, corporations and hospitals.
The National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) recently signed a memorandum of understanding to provide financial support for 12 public hospitals in the fight against the coronavirus through the e-signing system.
“This helped speed up the process, compared with traditional agreement signing,” Mr Pawoot said.
The NBTC in March indicated it would set aside 1 billion baht from its budget to support hospitals and public health agencies in combating the pandemic.
The recent roll-out of the royal ordinance to ensure the legality of e-meetings will also be a boon for adopting electronically signed documents as well as e-KYC tech, which can identify who signed the documents.
Creden is also working with the Electronic Transactions Development Agency (ETDA), which provides e-Timestamping service, meant to certify that an e-document had been prepared and was in existence prior to the time stamp.
Mr Pawoot said Creden is offering a freemium e-document signing service. If the number of users rises to a certain level, it will start collecting a small fee from them, he said.
The company’s main revenue comes from corporates who use its e-KYC solution and e-document signing service as well as cloud-based service.
Mr Pawoot said the e-KYC solution is increasingly adopted in the gold trade and direct-sale businesses, which use the technology to identify membership online.
In the post-coronavirus era, economic woes would also increase demand for credit analytic rating.
By May, Creden will launch a business credit scoring by analysing the performance of businesses and their directors, Mr Pawoot said.
Source: https://www.bangkokpost.com/business/1909728/outbreak-spurs-recognition-of-e-signing-format