JULY 2019 FORBES INDONESIA | 57Theethanat at Yuanta. “I expect strong growth this year.”
Investors appear to agree. Osotspa’s new shares ended
up pricing at the top of their offer range and surged 20%
on their first day of trading in Bangkok. Since the list-
ing, they have climbed 25%. Petch plans to use the money
raised to fund further expansion, especially in neighboring
countries such as Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar, where
many of its energy drinks and health products are already
market leaders. Osotspa exports its products to these and
nine other countries from 10 plants in Thailand. It’s also
exploring expansion into China and Vietnam.
About 20% of the IPO funds are earmarked to build
its first overseas factory, in Yangon, which is scheduled
to start producing M-150 and other Osotspa drinks for
Myanmar’s market by the end of the year. Osotspa’s Shark
energy drink already dominates that market, with a 38%
share. But, notes Petch, “we have plenty of room to grow
there. It’s like the size of Thailand and experiencing great
growth.” Myanmar’s population of 53 million is roughly
three-quarters the size of Thailand’s, but incomes are still
where Thailand’s were in the late-1980s and growing fast
as the nation opens. The energy drinks market there is
growing 60% a year, according to Frost & Sullivan.
As for his music career, Petch says no more records
are likely. Instead, he plans to release a collection of
short stories this year, he says, “stuff I’ve written for a
while, some quite erotic.” FArtists and art lovers have been
buzzing about Petch’s museum plans
for years. “Petch is a modern renais-
sance man,” says Whitney Ferrare,
senior director at Pace Gallery in Hong
Kong, where Petch is a regular at the
city’s Art Basel every March. “He’s
really involved. He visits the studios
and talks to the artists. He’s an artist
himself and genuinely admires art.”
Petch credits his father for helping
to inspire his own passion for art. After
attending Babson College in Massa-
chusetts, Surat Osathanugrah returned
home to run Osotspa but remained a
lifelong photographer and art collector,
focused on ceramics. He was renowned
in his later years for both passions, ex-
hibiting his street scenes and publish-
ing several books. His ceramics make
up the core of 15,000 pieces housed in
the Southeast Asian Ceramics Museum,
which opened in 2005 at the university
the family founded, Bangkok University.
Petch wouldn’t be the first Thai
business leader to build a contempo-
rary art museum. Boonchai Benchar-
ongkul, chairman of Thai telco DTAC,
in 2012 built Bangkok’s Museum of
Contemporary Art, while Eric Booth,
assistant managing director at Jim
Thompson, in 2016 opened the
MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum in
Chiang Mai with his stepfather, Jean
Michel Beurdeley.
Both those museums, however,
feature only Thai art. But world capi-
tals, says Petch, are distinguished by
their museums, and while Bangkok’s
art scene has grown tremendously in recent years—the
first Bangkok Art Biennale was held from October last year
through February—it has no international museum of mod-
ern art. “You cannot be world class if you collect only Thai
art,” he says. “Contemporary art is global.”
Not that he plans to neglect Thai art. “Petch is a great
patron of art,” says Udomsak Krisanamis, one of Thailand’s
best-known artists. “He is a free spirit. He collects whatever
he likes.” Booth is more effusive. “We are all impatient and
excited about his museum,” he says. “Students of the arts
would benefit so much to have his collection available for
viewing to the public. And it will be so important for Thai-
land and Thai contemporary art.”
Source: Frost & SullivanMARKET SHARE OF ENERGY DRINK MAKERS IN THAILANDOSOTSPA CARABAO RED BULL (TC PHARMA) OTHERS2013 2014 2015 2016 20173.5% 5.8% 6% 6.4% 7.1%15.8% 15.9% 15.8% 14.9% 15.3%19.8% 21.6%21.9% 23 .1%23.2%60 .8%56.6% 56.4%55.6% 54.4%COMING DOWN
Competition is slowly eroding Osotspa’s dominance of Thailand’s energy
drink market.