AISEAN / OVERVIEW
ASEAN AI Intelligence Hub
Open-source database tracking the AI ecosystem across Southeast Asia — companies, funding, policy, models, infrastructure, jobs.
AISEAN AI Readiness Snapshot — July 2026. Global readiness ranks reflect the Oxford Insights Government AI Readiness Index 2025 (195 countries, published December 2025), cross-referenced with the Microsoft AI Diffusion Index (Q1 2026) and Coursera AI Maturity Index 2025. LLM entries denote the primary sovereign or nationally anchored open model for each state. Key stats are sourced from Microsoft, AISG, Oxford Insights, ASEAN Foundation, and Digital in Asia (Q2 2026). The ASEAN digital economy is on course to grow from US$300 billion to US$1 trillion by 2030; with 660 million people — nearly one-third under 20 — responsible, well-governed AI adoption is the region's most consequential policy challenge. AISEAN publishes this snapshot to close the information gap between ASEAN's frontier leaders and its emerging markets, and to accelerate sovereign AI development across all ten member states.
ASEAN Member States — AI Readiness Rankings (Global)
| Country | AI Highlights | Rank | Key Stat | Sovereign LLM |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🇸🇬 Singapore | Ranked #1 globally on the Coursera AI Maturity Index 2025 and #2 on Microsoft's Q1 2026 AI Diffusion Index (63.4% workforce adoption). National AI Strategy 2.0 (NAIS 2.0) drives ambitious targets; enterprise AI adoption surged from 4.3% in 2023 to 23.5% in 2025. SEA-LION v4 (multimodal, reasoning-capable, built on Qwen3-32B) tops the SEA-HELM open-source leaderboard. SEA-Guard safety models and SEA-LION-Embedding both launched in early 2026. Ranked #1 in Counterpoint Research's 2025 Global AI Cities Index. | #2 | 63.4% workforce AI adoption (Q1 2026, Microsoft) | SEA-LION v4 (Qwen-SEA-LION-v4, AI Singapore) |
| 🇲🇾 Malaysia | Oxford Insights 2025 rank: ~#23 (consistent with prior-year benchmark). National AI Roadmap 2021–2025 active; ILMU domestic LLM achieved world-leading Bahasa Melayu performance, outscoring GPT-5 on MalayMMLU per the AI in Asia 2026 report. AI projected to add US$29 billion to the economy. Bahasa Melayu also covered by SEA-LION training data. Cloud hyperscaler investments (AWS, Google, Microsoft) cementing Malaysia as a regional data-centre hub. Digital Nasional Berhad 5G rollout underpins AI infrastructure. | #23 | US$29B projected AI economic contribution | ILMU (Bahasa Melayu sovereign LLM) |
| 🇹🇭 Thailand | Oxford Insights 2025 rank: ~#37. National AI Strategy and Action Plan 2022–2027 in full execution. Typhoon LLM, developed by SCB 10X (Siam Commercial Bank's venture arm), is Thailand's flagship domestic model; joint research with AI Singapore produced SEA-LION-TH-Audio for Thai-language cross-lingual tasks. AI adoption grew 36.2% between H1 2025 and Q1 2026 — among the fastest in Asia. Bangkok is an emerging ASEAN AI startup hub. | #37 | 36.2% AI adoption growth H1 2025–Q1 2026 (Microsoft) | Typhoon (SCB 10X) |
| 🇮🇩 Indonesia | Oxford Insights 2025 rank: ~#42. Recorded the world's highest workplace AI adoption rate at 92% (AI in Asia 2026 report). Sahabat-AI — a 70B-parameter LLM supporting Javanese and Sundanese alongside Bahasa Indonesia — is deployed by GoTo (Gojek/GoPay) via the Dira AI voice assistant. Digital economy projected to reach US$360 billion by 2030, the largest in ASEAN. First Indonesian NVIDIA DGX A100 AI infrastructure deployed by Telkom. | #42 | 92% workplace AI adoption rate (AI in Asia 2026) | Sahabat-AI 70B (GoTo / AI Singapore SEA-LION ecosystem) |
| 🇻🇳 Vietnam | Oxford Insights 2025 rank: ~#59. Ranks 6th in the WIN World AI Index 2025. Law on Digital Technology Industry enacted January 2026 — first comprehensive AI legal framework. Nearly 90% of students and 80% of educators already use GenAI tools. VinAI's PhoGPT (4B parameters, 102B-token Vietnamese corpus) is the domestic open-source model. FPT Corporation, Viettel, VNPT, and Zalo AI (VNG) are key national AI actors. | #59 | ~90% of students actively using GenAI (ASEAN Foundation 2026) | PhoGPT (VinAI / VinGroup) |
| 🇵🇭 Philippines | Oxford Insights 2025 rank: rose 7 places (est. ~#58). Assumed the ASEAN Chair in 2026 — positioned as a key voice in shaping the 'ASEAN way' for AI governance. National AI Strategy active since 2021; over 80% of students report active AI usage. Hosted the 3rd AI Ready ASEAN Regional Policy Convening in Manila (Feb 2026). Large BPO sector accelerating enterprise AI integration. Sovereign LLM programme (AISAT initiative) in early development. | #58 | >80% of students actively using AI (ASEAN Foundation 2026) | AISAT (early-stage, DOST / UP collaboration) |
| 🇧🇳 Brunei Darussalam | Oxford Insights 2025 rank: ~#74. Published its own Guide on AI Governance and Ethics aligned with ASEAN principles. Formal national AI strategy in progress under the 2025 Digital Economy Masterplan, prioritising infrastructure, talent, and innovation. Personal Data Protection Law being finalised. High digital literacy (score above 80, among only two ASEAN states alongside Singapore). Small population (450K) limits scale but enables agile policy deployment. | #74 | Digital literacy score >80 (one of only 2 ASEAN states) | SEA-LION (via ASEAN regional ecosystem; no standalone sovereign model yet) |
| 🇰🇭 Cambodia | Oxford Insights 2025 rank: jumped from #145 to #118 — biggest ASEAN improver. Draft national AI strategy public consultation launched June 2025. AI Forum Cambodia signed MoU with AI Singapore (Jan 2025) to build a Khmer variant of SEA-LION 7B — the first official Khmer integration into the regional foundation model family. Angkor Intelligence's domestic Khmer LLM (7–13B parameters, Apache 2.0) targeting deployment. Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications flagging AI infrastructure as foundational. | #118 | Jumped 27 places in Oxford Insights 2025 (145→118) | Khmer-SEA-LION 7B (AI Forum Cambodia × AI Singapore MoU) |
| 🇱🇦 Laos | Oxford Insights rank: ~#136 (prior-year benchmark; 2025 full detail not publicly disaggregated for Laos). No dedicated national AI strategy yet; twenty-year digital vision (2021–2040) guides policy. Legal frameworks in development targeting transparency, accountability, and data privacy. Claude.ai explicitly cleared for Laos by Anthropic. Sailor LLM (Sea Limited) covers Lao language. Participates in regional AI efforts via ASEAN guide framework. | #136 | 20-year digital vision 2021–2040 adopted; AI strategy in drafting | Sailor / SEA-LION (regional coverage; no standalone sovereign model) |
| 🇲🇲 Myanmar | Oxford Insights rank: ~#149 (prior-year benchmark). Cybersecurity Law No. 1/2025 indirectly addresses AI and digital platforms. e-Governance Master Plan 2030 sets the digital government vision. Digital literacy score of 10.45/100 — the lowest in Asia (ASEAN Foundation data). ChatGPT Go expanded to Myanmar in October 2025; Anthropic and Gemini availability remain limited. No dedicated national AI strategy or agency; political instability constrains investment. | #149 | Digital literacy score 10.45/100 — lowest in Asia | SEA-LION (regional coverage only; no sovereign model programme active) |