Mr Tawan, 43, is the third generation to run leading publishing house, Aksorn Charoen Tat, founded by his grandfather. His success disproves the old Chinese proverb that says the third generation would wreck the business.
Tawan Dheva-Aksorn, chief executive of Aksorn Education Plc, looks relaxed in his office on Tanao Road near Bangkok's City Hall. He smiles when looking at a pile of textbooks and some colourful educational tools on his desk.
His goal to transform his grandfather's textbook publishing empire into an integrated education company is on the right track.
"I'm satisfied to see my hard work and effort to transform Aksorn Charoen Tat into Aksorn Education has been achieved. We've come a long way but there's much more work to do in the future," he says.
Mr Tawan, 43, recalls that he joined the family business, Aksorn Charoen Tat, the country's No.2 textbook publisher, in 2007. His father spent years encouraging him to work in the family business.
Mr Tawan is not just a supplier of textbooks for children. He also spends time visiting kindergartens and chatting with the children.
In the beginning, the former investment banker did not know much about the textbook business. He had no clear idea of how to develop the 81-year-old company.
"During my initial period here, I felt the textbook business was no fun and I had many challenges and pressures. I'm the third generation and the Chinese proverb believes that this part of the family wrecks the business," says Mr Tawan.
The company began when his grandfather had the opportunity to print sermon texts on palm leaves for Wat Suthat in 1935. It then expanded to publish school textbooks with a single printing machine. The business grew strongly to eventually claim a 20% share of the textbook publishing market by 2007.
But to prove that he could take the company to greater success, Mr Tawan spent a lot of time thinking of ways to improve Aksorn Charoen Tat. The company was stable and produced textbooks from kindergarten to secondary school levels with its ACT (or Aor Chor Thor in Thai) brand familiar to students.
"The company's working atmosphere at that time was not exciting. It was quite difficult for a person like me who wanted to do something to create an impact on the economy or society," he says.
Mr Tawan resolved to visit bookstores and schools that used the company's textbooks across the nation and ask them what Aksorn Charoen Tat could do to improve. His frequent travels took him to more than 100 schools where he received several valuable answers.
He found students did not just want textbooks, but a whole educational system. Teachers wanted simplified teaching guidebooks to help them clearly and efficiently teach and communicate with students. Bookstores wanted new and attractive educational products.
"With all this insight, I decided the company needed to restructure from a textbook publisher to an education company," says Mr Tawan.
He adjusted its textbook publishing, marketing, sales and distribution. Many education experts were brought in to develop textbooks and teaching guidebooks. Then the company began developing education toys and tools.
Mr Tawan's commitment to build an education company led him to many developed countries such as the US, Germany, the UK, Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong to observe their education systems.
He picked up many ideas about good education systems and used some of them to improve the company's textbooks and develop education tools.
Aksorn Charoen Tat creates a variety of education tools, including Thai alphabet flashcards.
"My work became fun and I had a clear mission for Aksorn Charoen Tat. I wanted to help improve the Thai education system. I invited new talent who shared the same idea to work together here with me," Mr Tawan.
Technological changes also influenced the publishing industry. The emergence of the internet and digital media persuaded Aksorn Charoen Tat to develop e-learning solutions.
In 2014, Aksorn Charoen Tat entered into a partnership with Twig World Ltd, a worldwide resource for educational documents and infographics. Their goal was to bring a new dimension to Thai education by creating a "Learning Media Ecosystem", centred around Twig content. This ecosystem is meant to raise the level of Thai education.
In the first phase of the partnership, Aksorn and Twig aimed to integrate a few thousand schools into its ecosystem in 2015. Aksorn Twig has more than 2,000 documents covering mathematics, science and social studies.
Thai students can watch Aksorn Twig documents on their school tablets, says Mr Tawan.
Aksorn Charoen Tat's textbooks and some colour educational tools for the kindergarten.
He says the company also organised several training courses for the country's 500,000 teachers. Some 70,000 teachers have already trained with Aksorn Charoen Tat. Thailand has about 10 million students and 500,000 school classes.
"Teachers are very important. We should help equip them with new knowledge, inspiration and teaching ideas. They can't change overnight but they are ready to change and teach students," says Mr Tawan.
In his view, Thailand has invested very little to develop the capacity of teachers, who are not empowered and lack new teaching know-how. Last year the government spent 400 billion baht to support 30,000 state schools, but this budget rarely went to support teachers, he says.
"Teachers do not have enough resources for their classes and have no freedom to adjust the classrooms to fit students. That is the classic problem for the Thai educational system," Mr Tawan says.
Teachers should focus on critical thinking and adaptive and knowledge-based teaching. They should inspire students, he says.
Aksorn Charoen Tat rebranded and modernised its logo to A+ from ACT in 2014 and was renamed Aksorn Education in 2015 when its mission changed to being an education company.
The old logo of Aksorn Charoen Tat, the country's No 2 textbook publisher established in 1935.
Nearly a decade after he took the helm and began its transformation, Mr Tawan says the company is an integrated education company with a new work culture and staff DNA that reflects dynamic, critical thinking.
Aksorn Education is one of the largest education companies in Thailand, providing a variety of educational products, from school textbooks, library books and e-learning solutions to educational toys, science lab supplies and teacher training.
The company's content team includes 500 veteran staff, academic lecturers and education experts.
It commands a 40% market share of the 5-billion-baht school textbook industry. Aksorn Education's total revenue is forecast to reach 2 billion baht this year.
Mr Tawan's next big challenge is listing the company on the Stock Exchange of Thailand in the near future. Its operations are split into three major units: school textbooks, support education tools and printing.
"I can't disclose more details about the listing plan as everything is on hold, given the sluggish economy," he says.
Mr Tawan stands proud with the selection of books produced and sold by his company. There are about 10 million students in 500,000 school classes nationwide and many of them use textbooks produced by Aksorn Charoen Tat.
But Mr Tawan has a new idea to help small education companies in Thailand: he recently set up Aksorn InnoEd to act as a venture capital fund to support investment opportunities in education startups with a 30-million-baht budget.
Aksorn Education is talking with a foreign venture capital fund about dual investment in education startups overseas and expects a deal to be signed soon.
Mr Tawan visits Aksorn Education's warehouse for textbooks and educational kits in Nonthaburi's Bang Yai district.
A teacher uses Aksorn's education textbooks and toolkits to teach pupils at a school in the Northern province.
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