On the last day of 1998, Orientation added a Thai country
portal to its rapidly growing international network of portals.
“This is the perfect culmination to a feature packed year for Orientation,”
said company spokesman Phil Ingram. “We have launched six regional products
and six country products in six months – that is an average of two a month.
The rate will go up next year.”
Valiant Corporation, a Thai Internet company specializing in cybercafes and
commercial Web development, will manage Orientation Thailand under license
from Hong Kong’s The Black Box, creators of the global network.
“Orientation Thailand will play an important role as a catalyst in the
further development of the Thai Internet market,” said Kuthep Narula,
Valiant’s marketing director.
Thailand currently has approximately 100,000 dial-up accounts and is
projected to expand to 300,000 subscribers by the year 2000.
“Thailand has as many Internet users as Singapore and more room to grow in
the long run, the financial crisis notwithstanding,” Ingram said. “If the
big US companies can’t see past Hong Kong, China and Singapore, then we
will see past for them.”
According to Ingram, the Thai portal will feature an extensive collection
of content about the Southeast Asian country in both English and Thai
including local news sources such as The Bangkok Post, The
Nation and Thairath.
Like the network’s other sites, Orientation Thailand will contain an index
produced by The Black Box’s much heralded robot search technology.
Moreover, the portal site will have an array of travel information
published in conjunction with the popular Lonely Planet online guide as well
as a currency converter and five-day weather forecasts for Bangkok, Chiang
Mai and Phuket.
Orientation also has country portals for Costa Rica, Sri Lanka, Romania,
Kenya, and the United Arab Emirates and regional portals for Asia, Africa,
Central & Eastern Europe, Latin America & the Caribbean, the Middle East
and Oceania.
