Starting June, All first-year students at nearly 27,231 public schools across Thailand will be able to use tablet PC to access high-speed internet from their classrooms using the government issues tablet PC scheme.
The Thai Ministry of ICT has recently signed a binding contract with CAT and TOT Telecom (state-owned) to cover the 27,231 schools with high speed Wi-Fi network to help support the One Tablet Per Child scheme.
The two state owned telcos and MICT will work with local operator to establishing a high speed joint-venture with the total estimated budget of about THB 1.76 billion. The high speed network is estimated to equip the schools speeds of 4-10 Mbps.
The BOI recently promoted Inceva company to help develop mobile applications for the Tablets and will also assist in providing courses to teach students the basics of programing using HTML,CSS and Javascript.
Off the 27,231 schools, TOT will be responsible for maintaining the network of nearly 26,889 schools, while CAT will provide network services to another 344 schools. The project is estimated to be finished within 300 days after the initial signing the contract.
Starting next year the MICT plans to expand the total network coverage for nearly 43,000 schools nationwide with an estimated budget of about THB 4.25 billion. The high speed network will be built the existing network of the Thai Education Ministry that is often referred to as ‘MOENet’. Authorized users of MOENet will include all staff, teachers, students, and the general public who register under the ICT Free Wi-Fi program.
