Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Board of Investment, that is BOI. For those who are unaware, the Board of Investment in Thailand is empowered to provide concessions to certain types of businesses or enterprises in Thailand which are deemed to be beneficial essentially to the country.

What we are talking about here is especially in things like the tech sector, the pharmaceutical sector, certain aspects of manufacturing, things that Thailand wants to promote in its business sector, BOI can provide concessions like tax rates, certain concessions with respect to Work Permit issuance. Also, BOI boasts the so-called One-Stop system where everything works in one day; it is all consolidated. For those who are unaware when dealing with Business Visas and Work Permits and standard corporate matters, you have to deal with Immigration and Labour Department and there is some interaction associated with that. That can be a little clunky, somewhat cumbersome, somewhat nettlesome at times especially for those who are unaware of how to deal with it. BOI through One-Stop, if you qualify you can avail yourself of that and it definitely streamlines things although sometimes the qualification thresholds are a bit high. 

With respect to application though, I look at it two ways. You can essentially either go ahead and set up your business and then go ahead and apply and see what kind of BOI benefits you can get but most of the time we see this with folks that just say: "Look I am going to do this business. I would like to see what kind of benefits I can avail myself of or my company of but I am going to go ahead and do this." They go ahead and get started and we seek BOI benefits essentially on a Company set up. Under certain circumstances it is not always the most optimal. One can go ahead and try to get pre-approval to see what can be done; what kind of benefits one could expect if they were to be granted BOI or if they are going to be granted BOI Certification at all and if so what benefits that enterprise could conceivably get.

My opinion is, the hypothetical version, in our experience it is less reliable in the sense that one could end up expending a number of resources in something that really doesn't go anywhere insofar as to my mind and I think when dealing with an adjudication for certain concessions under BOI they definitely want to see that something is going to take place businesswise and if something already is taking place, all the better. There are different ways to deal with application for BOI and again I know I sound like a broken record, it definitely depends on the circumstances at play in the case at hand but yes application for a BOI can be filed it and it can be filed under different circumstances.