Shopee is the leading e-commerce platform in Southeast Asia, covering markets such as Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam, and has cross-border business offices in Shenzhen, Shanghai and Hong Kong. In 2018, ShopeMV (gro merchandise volume, total transaction volume) reached US$10.3 billion, a year-on-year increase of 149.9%, with more than 200 million APP downloads and more than 8,000 employees worldwide. According to survey data from the authoritative mobile data analysis platform APP Annie, Shopee ranked first among the most downloaded shopping apps in Southeast Asia in 2018.
Southeast Asia is a large and fast-growing market. In 2018, the GDP of the Southeast Asian market reached US$2.894 trillion. Its high Internet penetration rate, youth, mobile and socialization are all its important characteristics.
1. Introduction to Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia SEA is located in southeastern Asia and includes Indochina and the Malay Archipelago. There are 11 countries in Southeast Asia, namely Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei, Philippines, and East Timor, covering an area of approximately 4.57 million square kilometers. Global statistics in 2014 show that the population of Southeast Asia has reached 625 million. According to the “Southeast Asia E-Commerce Report” jointly released by Google and Temasek in 2018, the six countries studied in the report (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam) had only 260 million Internet users in 2015, while in 2018 It already has about 3.5 billion users, and by 2020, the number of Internet users is expected to reach 480 million. With the popularity of smartphones and the rapid improvement in the speed and reliability of mobile communication services, this number will continue to increase.
2. The original inhabitants of the mobile Internet
Southeast Asia has an extremely prominent advantage in terms of the number of Internet users. In 2018, the number of Internet users in Southeast Asia has exceeded 350 million. It is expected that in the next five years, there will be about 120,000 new Internet users every day. In other words, there are basically close to 3.8 million users in the Southeast Asian market every month. As a result, Southeast Asia is likely to become the fastest growing Internet market in the world from 2015 to 2020.
In addition, unlike mainstream European and American countries, Southeast Asia has not experienced the PC era of the Internet, but has jumped directly into the mobile era. After the popularity of smartphones, Internet users in Southeast Asia spend approximately 36 hours per day on mobile devices. Among them, the number one Internet user in Thailand spends approximately 42 hours per person per day on mobile devices, followed by In Indonesia, the world’s third most populous country, each Internet user spends about 3.9 hours on mobile devices every day. It is worth noting that among the 625 million people in Southeast Asia, more than 50% are under the age of 30, and most of them are born in the 2000s. These millennials rely heavily on mobile devices to obtain information and make purchases. In addition, the local people in Southeast Asia love Facebook. Among the 350 million Internet users, 2.5 billion users are using Facebook. It is not difficult to see that the market has significant social characteristics.
The number of Internet users in Southeast Asia and the attributes of mobile Internet natives make Southeast Asia an emerging blue ocean market with huge business opportunities.
3. Southeast Asian markets with huge potential for cross-border e-commerce
The popularity of the Internet has laid the foundation for the growth of e-commerce, and the younger population has provided strong purchasing power. Public information shows that in 2016, e-commerce retail sales in Southeast Asia accounted for 1.3% of total retail sales, far lower than China’s 17.1%, and development is still in the “primitive stage.” Experts predict that by 2025, the total e-commerce market in Southeast Asia will reach US$102 billion, with a compound annual growth rate of 34%. The total e-commerce market in all Southeast Asian countries will exceed US$5 billion. Euromonitor International (Euromonitor) has predicted that for the six major markets in Southeast Asia, their overall consumer spending will increase from US$1,336 billion to US$2,758 billion between 2015 and 2030.
In Southeast Asia, Indonesia is definitely an eye-catching star market. According to data from Morgan Stanley, the Indonesian market grew at an annual rate of 50% in 2017 and 2018. In 2018, the Indonesian market size reached US$13 billion, and by 2025, it will develop to a market size of US$53 billion. In addition to the increase in smartphone penetration, lower data costs and the increasing number of people opening bank accounts are also key factors driving the continued growth of the Indonesian e-commerce market.