Strategic alliance in the areas of smart cities, startups and innovation between the Vienna Business Agency and Thailand’s National Innovation Agency (NIA).
Vienna (OTS) – The delegation trip to Bangkok, led by City Councilor for Economic Affairs Peter Hanke, culminated in the signing of a groundbreaking “Memorandum of Understanding” between the Vienna Business Agency and the National Innovation Agency of Thailand (NIA). This is intended to intensify international exchange between Bangkok and Vienna. The aim of the new cooperation is to strengthen the innovation landscapes of both cities equally. Vienna and Bangkok also share a reputation as thriving tourism destinations, which are also gaining increasing recognition for their robust startup and tech scenes.
“Vienna scores points worldwide with the highest quality of life and is increasingly perceived as the location of a growing high-tech scene. This shows that our strategy of specifically promoting innovation and at the same time focusing on people’s well-being is working. From this new “By working together, companies on both sides will benefit enormously.”
the city council is convinced.
“This week we saw first-hand how much Thailand wants to drive innovation, growth and the internationalization of the startup and smart city sector.”
said Gerhard Hirczi, Managing Director of the Vienna Business Agency. “Our partners at the National Innovation Agency of Thailand are doing inspiring work and we are pleased about this step that brings our innovation ecosystems closer together.”
The agreement was signed by Dr. Krithpaka Boonfueng, the deputy executive director of the National Innovation Agency (NIA) and Gerhard Hirczi. The ceremony at the NIA headquarters in Bangkok was attended by City Councilor for Economic Affairs Peter Hanke, the Austrian Ambassador Wilhelm Donko and Dr. Chaiyatorn Limapornvanich, Director of Innovation Strategy at NIA.
The new partnership is already bearing initial fruit: After winning a joint startup pitch event in Bangkok on Wednesday, the up-and-coming tech company Botnoi was awarded an exclusive “Startup Package” from the Vienna Business Agency. This package offers Thai founders a cost-effective opportunity to get to know the Viennese startup ecosystem intensively, to network and to integrate into it.
Botnoi holds several patents for its software in which video avatars provide near-simultaneous translations between languages. What is unique is that their product is capable of decoding and translating dialects – a valuable tool in Thailand, known for its large and diverse dialect landscape. The developers intend to test their technology with Austrian dialects.
The Thai company will also take part in the international startup festival ViennaUP 2024. In 2023, ViennaUP attracted several hundred investors and over 14,000 visitors from 96 countries to Vienna with more than 50 events from 35 local and international partner organizations. ViennaUP 2024 will take place from June 3rd – June 9th, 2024.
Questions & Contact:
Mag. Roberta „Louis“ Kraft
Media spokesperson City Councilor Peter Hanke
Phone: +43 1 4000 81211
roberta.kraft@wien.gv.at
Uschi Kainz
Communications Vienna Business Agency
Phone: +43 699 1408 6583
kainz@wirtschaftsagentur.at
