SK Nexilis, as part of SK Group’s Electric Vehicle (EV) value chain, has announced a proposed investment of RM2.3 billion to set up its first overseas production base in Malaysia in January 2021.

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SK Nexilis is building a copper foil manufacturing facility base located at Kota Kinabalu Industrial Park (KKIP) in Sabah.

The commercial operations will kickstart by 2023, and the new facility will increase SK Nexilis’ copper foil production capacity by three times its current global capacity to about 100,000 tonnes.

SK Group subsidiary SoCar to set up an EV platform in Malaysia

This comes in line with the recent announcement that its Malaysian subsidiary SOCAR Malaysia Sdn Bhd (SOCAR) has closed a $55 million Series A round of investment. EastBridge Partners led the deal, a leading private equity firm focused on Asia and the Pacific region investments, joined by strategic investor Sime Darby Berhad.

The company is planning to set up an EV platform in the country to deploy hundreds of EVs in the next five years.

Socar and Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) have also recently signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to leverage shared demand data on EV usage in Malaysia as part of efforts to speed up the adoption of EVs.

The MoU outlines TNB’s plans to leverage Socar’s data on travel behavior and vehicle usage to identify locations along key travel routes to install charging infrastructure.

“TNB is set to take a leading role in driving EV adoption in Malaysia, especially among fleet management operators, and one of the key steps to achieving this is by establishing more EV charging zones that would be utilized optimally based on known travel routes,” said TNB chief retail officer Datuk Megat Jalaluddin Megat Hassan.

“This recent collaboration with Socar is more extensive, compared to our initial partnership back in December 2019 when TNB became the enabler for SoCar’s first two EV zones in Cyberjaya with the introduction of the first-ever EVs in their fleet”, he added.

Strategic investment into BigPay

In addition, the company made a strategic investment of up to $100m into BigPay, a leading regional fintech company based in Malaysia. The August 2021 investment into BigPay is SK Group’s first step in entering the fast-growing fintech sector outside Korea.

In a statement, SK Group said that the investment into BigPay was a testament to the ability of Malaysian fintech companies to grow not just domestically but also regionally and become a significant player in Southeast Asia. 

SK Group said it was also joining the AirAsia Group Bhd’s e-wallet unit BigPay to apply for Malaysia’s upcoming digital banking license.

“The company intends to expand its product sets and grow the model to new markets with the funds”, said BigPay co-founder and chief executive officer Salim Dhanani. 

Chief Representative of SK Malaysia, Jung Kyu Kim said, “We are confident that SK’s experience in financial tech services will contribute to successful digital bank ecosystem in Malaysia and further growth into the ASEAN region.” 

The post SK Group to invest US$700m in EVs, environment in Malaysia appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

In fact, just Southeast Asia alone is predicted to reach a US$1 trillion digital economy by 2030, according to Google, Temasek, and Bain.

It might even overtake the West’s digital economy, and this is quickly showing potential with just how cross-border trade is flourishing in the region.  

According to a new report by Deloitte published yesterday, the ‘Technology-empowered Digital Trade in Asia Pacific’, the firm predicts that digital trade will further accelerate, and leapfrog the region into the golden age of digital trade in the next three years.

The report accounts for this dramatic shift through increased dynamic cross-border e-Commerce activities, strengthened regional cooperation through the RCEP, increased digitalized lifestyles, and ongoing development of digital infrastructures.

According to Taylor Lam, Vice-Chair and Technology, Media & Telecommunications Industry Leader at Deloitte China, the combination of the Covid-19 pandemic together with these other factors will see new development opportunities in digital trade.

“Digital technologies enable global sellers to participate in global trade without any entry barriers,” said Gary Wu, Deloitte Global Lead Client Service Partner.” 

Wu also added that the continuous improvement of digital infrastructure will effectively resolve the two major constraints affecting cross-border trade: logistics and payments, with blockchain technology also “creating a new space of imagination for digital trade.”

Digitalization, mMNEs will drive cross border trade

The report highlighted some key insights for the Asia Pacific, with the first revolving around key technologies and the important role they play. 

According to Deloitte, data factors will feature prominently alongside how other critical infrastructure such as 5G, which will help build data distribution platforms and new network architectures and facilitate the Internet of Everything (IoE). Unsurprisingly, AI will continue working alongside big data to bring deeper insights for better decision making. 

Secondly, the report identified and analyzed various APAC markets for the development and maturity of digital trade across two dimensions: cross-border e-Commerce (60%) and digitalization (40%).

Deloitte classifies the markets as follows: 

• Mature markets: China, South Korea, Singapore, and Japan;
• Developing markets: Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines;
• Early-stage markets: Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, and Brunei.

Comparison of the three market types in terms of development (IMG/Deloitte)

Thirdly, there is a substantial rise of micro-multinational enterprises (mMNEs) in the region, which has been identified as the main driver of the transformation of digital trade across the Asia Pacific.

With the help of digital platforms, entrepreneurs and small businesses have become mMNEs as they are engaged in cross-border e-commerce across global markets.

mMNEs provide diversified “locally-made products” and light customization services for global buyers while contributing to over 85% of Asia Pacific’s cross-border e-commerce activities.

Here are the main characteristics of an mMNE:

• More adept at leveraging digital platforms
• Small in scale, typically with fewer than 100 employees
• Globalized operations with an average of 3.56 overseas outlets

Regional cross border business opportunities 

Invariably, the degree of digitalization differs across markets, depending on their maturity stage. As digitalization is a yardstick by which market maturity can be measured, it is crucial to track the development of digitalization across developing and early-stage markets.

Matured markets generally fared better in terms of sales, payments, and logistics, whereas developing markets tended to lead in production and trading. 

Understandably, early-stage markets are still in their nascent stages of digitalization across all facets of cross-border e-Commerce. 

Vietnam, as expected, leads digitalization in terms of production, whereas Indonesia leads in trading. Singapore, a mature market, leads in digital payments as well as logistics digitalization. 

However, this isn’t always linear. 

Degree of digitalization in cross border e-Commerce verticals (IMG/Deloitte)

Interestingly, the report found that Malaysia, classified as a developing market, leads the APAC region in e-Commerce market size at US$6.3 billion. This is a whopping 61.4% of the total e-Commerce market size in China. 

The Southeast Asian nation of 32 million also has the highest penetration rate for sales digitalization for cross-border e-Commerce, at 65.7%. However, Malaysia suffers from bottlenecks such as logistics and production (20.2%). 

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At present, cross-border consumption only accounts for 42% of the market size of the internet economy in Malaysia, which is much lower than mature markets.

Although Indonesia leads digitalization in trading, they are still lagging far behind in production, sales, payments, and logistics. Indonesia has been pointed out by experts to lead the Southeast Asian region in terms of the digital economy. 

Vietnam seems to be steadily rising and doing decently in digitalization across most other facets of e-Commerce, whilst also leading digitalization in production. 

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For these developing markets to move towards maturity, these areas, especially logistics, would need to see more work in terms of development and sophistication.

But at the same time, this presents huge opportunities for private players to come in and develop these industries in these countries.

The state of e-Commerce: Opportunities and analyses

Deloitte expects that the e-Commerce consumer market in APAC will continue increasing in line with continuous digitalization penetration. Here are other key takeaways:

• Singapore: Within Asia Pacific, Singapore continues to act as a central hub for many cross-border e-commerce platforms in Southeast Asia, with companies such as Shopee, Lazada, Amazon, and Zalora setting up their headquarters there. The e-commerce market in Singapore is predicted to double in size in 2025 compared with 2020, with gross merchandise volume (GMV) amounting to US$8 billion.
• Indonesia: Demographic dividend, internet penetration rate, and consumer habits create great potential for developing e-commerce and cross-border e-commerce in Indonesia. Social e-commerce is thriving, and consumers are fond of trading on social media. Indonesian consumers like buying in-expensive products, and the average transaction is low at US$36, much lower than Malaysia (US$54) and Singapore (US$91). Users also prefer e-commerce platforms in their local language, which greatly affects their shopping experience.
• The Philippines: E-commerce has huge growth potential but is constrained by a low internet penetration rate and an undeveloped e-payment industry – the penetration rate of e-commerce users only accounts for 39% of the total population.
• Thailand: The penetration rate of cross-border e-commerce in Thailand is relatively high and has a certain digitalization foundation, but their degree of development is limited. However, quality improvements of internet infrastructure will raise the efficiency of information exchanges and unleash the vitality of e-commerce platforms.
• Vietnam: Although high logistics costs are almost the biggest challenge in cross-border e-commerce in the APAC, 61.8% of the surveyed enterprises in Vietnam believe that the largest challenge is the difficulty in customs clearance inspections, with more than 60% of businesses focusing on green development goals.
• Brunei: Brunei takes the lead in internet penetration rate in Asia even though early-stage markets have a relatively low overall level of digitalization, and generally have no sophisticated infrastructure and platforms in place to develop the digital industry.

The post Asia Pacific’s golden age in cross border e-Commerce has begun: Here are the opportunities appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

According to an EY FinTech Australia Census 2021 survey, there is growing industry employment and rising entrepreneurship in the country. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been stronger overall growth in capital raising, with more startups moving to a post-profit phase.

Australia’s fintech sector growing rapidly

According to EY, Australia’s fintech sector has continued to “mature rapidly” despite the pandemic, catalyzing digitalization. This has driven fintech innovation and increased revenue generation from overseas markets, as well as created new jobs.

Government incentives, industry collaboration, global talent acquisition, and increased diversity will be critical to sustaining the sector’s global growth trajectory, added the consulting firm.

Minister for Trade, Tourism, and Investment Dan Tehan said the Morrison Government was supporting jobs and opportunities in fintech.

“Australia’s proximity to Asia, the Fintech Bridge Agreement with the United Kingdom, and our international regulatory agreements make us an attractive destination for foreign investment, which is supporting growth and job creation in Australia’s fintech sector,” said Tehan.

According to Tehan, the government is working to establish more robust global digital trade rules as well. These include a regional digital trade agreement that will enable Australian businesses to take advantage of new opportunities, increase their resilience along global supply chains, and streamline regulatory processes.

“We have delivered the Australia-Singapore Digital Economy Agreement that sets new global benchmarks for trade rules and paves the way for Australian businesses and consumers to benefit from digital trade and the digitization of the economy.”

Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services, and Digital Economy Jane Hume said Fintech has led the way for Australian innovation, digitization, and of course, an increase of local jobs.

“Leveraging Australia’s unique combination of competitive strengths such as our highly banked population and discerning user base of early adopters, fintech has become a key and growing export for Australia”.

Move comes on the back of pressure to further digitalization

In 2021, the EY census found a 25% increase in the proportion of fintechs whose capital raising expectations were either met or exceeded, as compared to last year’s (57%). Additionally, they found that there is lower reliance on founder funding, as well as higher raised amounts. 

Recently, the Australian Academy of Science and the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering jointly issued an urgent call to action, asking the government and industry to recognize the importance of emerging digital technologies.

In their recommendations, digital technologies such as AI, IoT, AR & VR, among others, ought to be recognized as independent growth sectors. These technologies are heavily used by startups and entrepreneurs.

Earlier in August, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey bought over the nation’s largest BNPL (buy now, pay later) company, Afterpay through Square Inc, a financial payments company known for its popular Cash App.

This move, according to experts, will give Dorsey the capability to build one of the world’s most important payments networks.

Additionally, the country has one of the most well-regulated environments for cryptocurrencies, with recent neobank Volt being the world’s first to partner with a crypto exchange.

The post Australia’s fintech sector to see more government support appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

According to the organization, this move aimed to rally the industry to come together to develop a framework for digital trust and enable companies to provide products and services using data, that are compliant with data regulations. Additionally, it aims to educate and raise awareness of its importance amongst businesses and consumers.

What is Digital Trust?

Digital trust is the “confidence users have in the ability of people, technology, and processes to create a secure digital world”, according to Tech Target. 

When companies show that they can provide safety, privacy, security, reliability, and exercise data ethics with their online programs or devices, consumers will have high digital trust in that brand or company. 

Speaking at the event, Singapore Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat said that the digital revolution can only succeed if there is digital trust. “There is a huge amount of digital data being generated daily, and we must ensure that these data are adequately protected and appropriately used. This requires us to build up digital trust capabilities.”

The committee will be chaired by Mr. Philip Heah, with initial members including the likes of Alibaba, Credence Lab, Drew and Napier, Eden Strategy Institute, Experian, IBM, KPMG, Totally Awesome TV, and TÜV SÜD.  

Digital trust not just important for companies

“Companies engaging with consumers are leveraging customer data to provide services. The web of partners and suppliers in the digital economy also means that practices must be in place to safeguard sensitive data throughout the value chain. Digital trust will play an increasing role in ensuring that businesses demonstrate top-notch accountability and governance,” said Heah.

In recent years, Singapore has been hit by multiple cyberattacks, some of which have had very disastrous implications for those affected. In August this year, eye clinic Eye & Retina Surgeons (ERS), was hit by a ransomware attack that put the data of over 73,000 patients at risk. 

In 2018, SingHealth, Singapore’s largest group of healthcare institutions, suffered a data breach. Seen by many as possibly the worst data breach in the republic’s history, it affected 1.5 million SingHealth patients, including politicians and Prime Minister Lee Hsein Loong himself.

Digital trust is important as it separates the wheat from the chaff — that is to say, dependable services from corrupt or unreliable ones. 

Entities with high digital trust help consumers decide on a secure service rather than an unreliable one because the consumer will feel reassured that they will be receiving what they are asking for in a safe, secure, and reliable manner. The higher the digital trust of a company, the more users or customers it will have.

According to Jeffrey Ritter from TechTarget, “it is used by both digital service companies and their consumers. Consumers are more likely to use a company that is trustworthy than one that is unreliable. Companies aim to gain digital trust from consumers and use this goal to digitally transform themselves and create greater confidence in security, safety, privacy, and reliability among consumers.”

A recent study by independent identity provider Okta showed that when it comes to building a brand’s digital trust, consumers care most about a company’s service reliability, strong security, quick response times, and good data handling practices.

The Okta study also found that Asian consumers are most likely to lose trust in brands that intentionally misuse or sell personal data, followed by brands that fall prey to a data breach. 

Multiple protective policies are the way to go

As businesses, governments, and other entities become increasingly connected through the internet, so too have cyber and privacy risks increased — mainly due to the value behind the entities holding top-tier data such as health information. 

As most organizations are digitalized in some way, their success will also take into account their cybersecurity and data protection profiles. As such, companies cannot afford to overlook their cyberprotection, as well as data protection policies. 

Consumers are increasingly looking for ways to ensure they are using the most reliable services, forcing organizations around the world to re-evaluate and transform the way they run their operations to provide greater security and reliability. 

While it’s fine and often necessary to collect data for business purposes, companies can do better by approaching data collection and retention methods through an ethics and data privacy-first framework to ensure that trust exists between staff, customers, and partners.

Singapore’s SGTech’s Digital Trust Committee aims to drive ground-up initiatives for digital trust, including establishing internationally recognized standards and practices and creating products and services built on digital trust.

They will also work closely with groups such as SGTech’s Data Protection Committee and stakeholders such as Singapore’s Personal Data Protection Commission to raise awareness of its importance. 

The post Here’s why SGTech set up a digital trust committee appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

The platform aims to empower users with technology advancements, setting up landlords, operators, occupants, and system integrators with a one-stop proptech solution for smart space needs in the construction and real estate industries, through its proprietary Shop, Plug, and Play approach, and is currently available to the Singaporean and Malaysian markets.

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“We’ve seen an upward trend in recent years, with the increase in more clients needing smart, integrated solutions and we saw a massive gap in the industry for a B2B marketplace and a trusted intermediary. Therefore, we set out on a journey to help fill this gap,” said SpaceWorx chief executive officer Lakshita Wijerathne.

This approach to proptech enables businesses with a platform that has an ecosystem of modular building blocks to craft their own integrated digital solutions, with pre-integrated products, pre-configured automation, and expert service providers making up those building blocks.

An open proptech ecosystem

Spaceworx’s open ecosystem concept also allows users or businesses to list their products on the marketplace, as long as it is interoperable, via its unique integration platform called Lucy, something that is rarely available in the industry.

Headquartered in Singapore, Spaceworx is led by a team with over 20 years of experience in delivering smart city, building, and workplace solutions across the world. The company is the result of a partnership between Eutech Cybernetic and DP Architects in 2019 to deliver a pilot implementation of Spaceworx.io for CapitaLand Limited, under a grant award from the Infocomm Media Development Authority’s (IMDA) Call for Innovative Solutions (CFIS) with CapitaLand and government agency JTC Corporation.

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In the platform’s pre-launch phase, Spaceworx had onboarded over 70 product principals, over 400 products, and over 100 automation onto the marketplace, while making several partner introductions such as Waste Hero, MapsPeople, Microengine, and Visioglobe to the building– and city-level customers.

“We are standing at the crossroads of the future of real estate, where digital twins can enable physical and digital experiences of buildings to merge. The ease by which digital twins can be created with Spaceworx.io will unlock latent human resources within the built-environment industry and accelerate its digitalization,” said DP Architects Chief Executive Officer Seah Chee Huang.

Moving forward, Spaceworx plans to expand beyond technology to onboard non-tech products and essential services, such as insurance, security, utilities, electricals, and furniture.

Importance of sustainability

While sustainability and green buildings have been enduring trends in the real estate space for the past few decades, it is no longer a niche as more and more consumers demand and expect it from most aspects of their lives, according to Nathan Miller, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Rentec Direct.

This is backed by Nielsen’s 2018 strategy guide, “Sustainable Shoppers Buy The Change They Wish To See In The World”, which states that 73% of global consumers say they are willing to change their consumption habits to reduce their environmental impact.

Business owners should take heed that sustainable real estate development not only brings environmental benefits, it brings along financial and social benefits as well, where green buildings not only cost less but have a very good return on investment as the value of the property increases with sustainable construction.

The use of sustainable materials also improves health, minimizes waste, and leads to better use of resources, according to Majesty Gayle, Senior Fund Manager at Evo Opportunity Fund.

These point towards the importance of incorporating sustainable processes and materials into real estate developments and construction projects, if only to remain current with consumer needs, with platforms like Spaceworx offering easy access to smart solutions for buildings, homes, and workspaces.

The post Spaceworx launches Singapore’s first proptech marketplace appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

Malaysian SMEs in retail and F&B that are still considering digitalizing their operations can now better understand and learn more through digital guidebooks. 

Launched by the Malaysia Digital Economy Malaysia (MDEC), the SME Digital Guidebook and Quick Guide for the Food & Beverages (F&B) and retail industry are part of MDEC’s 100 Go Digital initiative.

A quick how-to for Malaysian SMEs

These resources aim to help SMEs in the retail and F&B sector to reassess their digital opportunities and readiness via a step-by-step guide on how to enhance their current digital capabilities and begin their digital transformation journey.

“Digital technologies are massively transforming every sector. While this poses a tremendous number of challenges for SMEs, particularly traditional businesses, it also creates a wave of new opportunities.

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“Malaysia may have scored high on digital readiness rankings, but digital adoption by SMEs and traditional businesses are often hindered by – among others – lack of awareness, readiness, know-how, and appreciation of the benefits of digitalization; as well as the oft-misperceived high cost of implementing new technologies”, shared MDEC CEO Surina Shukri, in a statement last week.

At the time of writing, Shukri, who has led MDEC since 2019, will leave the organization by 31 August 2021.

In Malaysia, an overwhelming 98.5% of the 920,624 business establishments in Malaysia are small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Despite being the backbone of the country’s business environment, digital adoption among SMEs lags behind that of larger enterprises, according to the World Bank Malaysia. 

Surina Shukri, CEO of MDEC (IMG/MDEC)

According to MDEC, these essential guidebooks are structured, with an easy-to-follow method. This will enable and empower businesses with the necessary skills and knowledge, ensuring resiliency and agility, especially during a time where a pandemic is raging.

The SME Digital Guidebooks serve as the first point of reference for SMEs interested to embark on digital adoption. It also lists down the latest trends that will impact SMEs, talk about the importance of digitalization, and also direct SMEs to available initiatives within Malaysia that they could leverage on.

Guides come in two forms

Currently, the SME Digital Guidebooks are focused on the retail and F&B industry and comes in two reference guides for each sector. 

The SME Digital Quick Guide is an easy-to-read document for quick reference, providing a high-level view for businesses.

The SME Digital Guidebook, on the other hand, is a full document that will take a more structured approach in mapping digital needs, technologies, business goals, and best practices to guide SMEs in elevating their digital capabilities. The Guidebook was co-developed with International Data Corporation (IDC), which provided analysis of the market and technology insights.

“Being a ‘digital first’ entity is no longer a choice but has risen to be a focal point for many SMEs to operate in current market conditions, and to thrive beyond 2021. The pandemic has permanently changed the manner consumers and businesses operate – and the profound impact of this change has resonated across all sectors of the economy; with retail and F&B segments being severely disrupted. 

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“To accelerate in a Digital Economy, it is crucial for SMEs to leverage upon available platforms and to transition its traditional base to one that is digitally-led”, said Sudev Bangah, Managing Director, IDC ASEAN.

The SME Digital Guidebook was launched during the Malaysia Tech Month 2021 (MTM’21), a virtual and month-long curation of digital and technology events geared not only towards showcasing Malaysia as a hub of digital investments but to also enlighten businesses with topics, solutions, and tools that can aid them in their digital transformation.

The SME Digital Guidebook and Quick Guide can be accessed and downloaded at https://mdec.my/100-godigital

The post MDEC launches digitalization guidebooks for Malaysian SMEs appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

In a release shared last week, the company claimed that MissFresh can accurately predict and capture consumer’s demands in China’s first and second-tier cities.

MissFresh does this through working with Tencent Smart Retail to provide their customers a comprehensive SaaS and AI-based technology platform via its Retail Cloud initiative. This enables capabilities such as omnichannel marketing, private domain traffic operation, merchandising and last-mile delivery, and more. 

The company has over six years of innovation in the modernization of the neighborhood retail market, which comprises fresh groceries and fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) among others. 

MissFresh provides traditional retailers, especially small and medium-sized supermarkets, with digital services in order for them to more easily bring fresh groceries and FMCG to customers. 

The company’s Retail Cloud platform, which comprises a suite of proprietary SaaS tools, enables these neighborhood retailers to achieve sustainable growth with efficient, optimized digital operations. 

China’s neighborhood retail market reached US$1.86 trillion (RMB11.9 trillion) in 2020, with supermarkets as the largest sales channel.

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MissFresh is modernizing what has otherwise been a highly fragmented business landscape of more than 143,000 supermarkets with limited digitalization and low operating efficiency. 

The neighborhood retail cloud market for supermarkets has huge growth potential, according to iResearch, which projects it will grow from US$29.5 billion (RMB190.7 billion) in 2020 to US$292.8 billion (RMB1,893.2 billion) in 2025 in terms of the gross merchandise value (GMV) at a compound annual growth (CAGR) rate of 58.3%.  

Recognizing the core technology capabilities and growth potential of MissFresh, Tencent has been supporting the expansion of the company in different ways. Tencent Smart Retail first formed a strategic partnership with MissFresh in June 2019. 

Now, both parties are deepening their cooperation in the B2B space. Tencent is a strong player in China’s industrial Internet sector, with a broad user base and advanced technological capabilities, while Tencent Smart Retail offers B2B assistance in improving customer engagement through digital services.  

Through persistent investment in technology, MissFresh has improved its Retail AI network (RAIN) – a trinity of “Smart Marketing”, “Smart Logistics”, and “Smart Supply Chain”. RAIN offers MissFresh retail partners, such as small and medium-sized supermarkets, assistance by automatically making decisions in smart merchandising, offering smart marketing based on consumer behavior and big data analytics, and enabling smart store operation to provide intelligent recommendations on product variety, store layouts, and inventory tracking to improve the accuracy of service recommendations.

These services in turn allow small and medium-sized supermarkets to overcome many barriers of entry in the online retail market, expanding their proportion of online business and growing their customer base and gross margins. Such gains will be felt across China’s entire neighborhood retail industry.  

“Working hand in glove with Tencent Smart Retail has been integral to MissFresh’s advancement of its Retail Cloud services, enabling us to continuously be able to offer the latest and most optimized merchant tools to supercharge individual retailers’ online business growth,” said Zheng Xu, MissFresh’s Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer. 

The post China’s MissFresh to bring smart retail to SME grocers with Tencent appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

Decades back, countries in the European Union (EU) collaborated on facilitating cross-border economic activity with free trade agreements. However, the Asia Pacific region (APAC) had been a little on the laggardly side when it comes to improving its processes, laws, regulations, tariffs, and access to financing, especially in relation to global value chains.

Countries in APAC, especially Asia, have primarily focused on improving trade within its sub-regional perimeters, such as within Southeast Asia, or Greater Asia. This can be largely attributed to the proximity of these countries with each other, and the similarity of cultures driving demand for variations of goods similar to theirs.

Although improvements in cross-border trade have dramatically improved over the past decade, the Covid-19 pandemic has been rather disruptive to this industry due to border closures and movement restrictions that interrupted domestic and external supply chains.

Despite escalating trade tensions over the past half-decade between China and the US, or political disputes between China and Japan, the region at large has so far been successful at growing and reducing poverty. 

This can be largely attributed to nations sticking by their strategies to boost regional and international trade, such as by keeping trade lines open and free. Access to precious resources such as the exchange of capital, talent, and knowledge on a regional and international scale translated into improvement of their own workforces and eventually, domestic economies.

Asia, which heavily depends on international trade, shows great promise for a post-pandemic recovery — surpassing others even. Admittedly, whilst trade was impacted negatively by the pandemic, heavy damage was largely averted through several approaches. 

Strong and proactive domestic, bilateral and multilateral cooperation; prudent fiscal regulations and access to financing, and the rapid pace of technological adoption helped businesses streamline operations, generate more economic activity, and ensure business continuity. 

Tech Wire Asia sought some insights on the impact of digitalization on cross-border trade during the pandemic in Asia in an exclusive interview with Derick Teo, Director, Enterprise Go-Digital Solutions, BIPO. 

Digital connectivity key to resilience

According to Teo, digital connectivity has been key to helping businesses navigate this disruption. As a result, we see a shift towards a greater reliance on the digital economy, underscoring a need for governments to enable digital trade and accessibility in order to accelerate economic growth and speed up recovery. 

Some of the major digitalization efforts that Teo has noticed include how key players have harnessed more robust technology to ensure greater compliance in the end-to-end process, which is needed to instill trust through transparency for all parties. An example is how businesses leveraged digital trade financing platforms such as RYTE, whereas another is by using blockchain tech in the supply chain.

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Additionally, the automation of operational services such as salary disbursements or the use of electronic signature tools such as DocuSign for employment contract approvals have allowed businesses to remain strategic rather than being burdened with arduous, time-consuming tasks.

“It would be a myopic view if we consider digitalization as a tool to merely tide us through the pandemic. In fact, the impact will outlast the pandemic as cross-border trade will evolve to integrate a hybrid system of the cloud and face-to-face physical interaction once borders reopen. 

“Moreover, businesses will increasingly begin to adopt digital trade as a go-to practice and this will expedite cross-border trades at a quicker pace, leading to the rise of multi-cloud business environments.”, he added.

Government policies in cross-border trade

Teo mused that governments that prioritize digitalization are miles ahead when it comes to building resilience and innovation capabilities. With the right technological infrastructures in place, business efficiency and productivity will increase, which improves cost-effectiveness for companies. 

“Digitalization helps to transform the customer journey, provide more data-based insights, and unlocks greater cross-functional collaboration.”, he shared.

According to Teo, digitalization within a cross-border trade scenario allows for:

• The automation of processes from onboarding to offboarding
• Easier HR processes, including management of remote employees and even predicting attrition rate through technology such as machine learning
• The conversion of HR functions from being operation-heavy to strategy-first

He is of the belief that digitalization efforts by Asian players will create an enormous ripple effect on the economy as a whole. The more countries embark on enhancing their digitalization efforts, the more this feeds into the strength and robustness of regional and global economies. 

Teo, however, cautioned that “there needs to be a cautious balance of scale between countries so that all players can thrive in the trade environment. As such, digitalization is key in enabling greater collaboration and diversification of SEA’s trade economy”.

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On the topic of ‘future proofing’ the cross-border trade industry, Teo expects to see more businesses expanding regionally at a reduced cost without setting up physical offices. 

Teo opines that cross-border trade facilitation ought to be seamless, compliant, and trusted, and delivered through digital integration of tools. Also, trade should constantly evolve and look to other competitive industries such as e-commerce to innovate and keep abreast of the changing consumer behavior and demand.

“We have seen a great improvement since the height of the pandemic last year. In fact, last year we observed that many businesses were looking to expand their footprint across Asia without looking to set up a physical office in the country. 

“Such regional growth plans are indicative of a positive recovery rate. While we are still in the midst of the pandemic, it’s great to see that leaders are finding ways to expand cross-border movements, even as travel restrictions persist”, he added.

The post How digitalization averted cross-border trade disaster in Asia appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

The tax on imported services will be introduced with effect from Jan 1, 2020, and will apply to imported business-to-business services such as marketing, accounting, and management services, as well as business-to-consumer such as video streaming, and online subscription fees.

This will make Singapore the first country in Southeast Asia to introduce a tax on the digital economy, following jurisdictions such as Australia, the European Union, Japan, and Korea.

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According to Koh Soo How, Asia-Pacific Indirect Tax Leader, PwC Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia are also considering implementing such a tax.

The new tax move is to ensure that the country’s tax system remains “fair and resilient” in today’s digital economy, says Singapore’s Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat.

“Today, services such as consultancy and marketing purchased from overseas suppliers are not subject to GST. Local consumers also do not pay GST when they download apps and music from overseas,” the minister said.

“This change will ensure that imported and local services are accorded the same treatment.”

The surging growth of the e-commerce market no doubt plays a factor in the tax. Singapore’s e-commerce market is expected to hit over SG$7 billion (US$ 5.28 billion) by 2025, with 55 percent of the market consisting of cross-border transactions.

“The proposed e-commerce tax allows Singapore to broaden the scope of GST and provide a new and sustainable revenue pipeline for the government,” noted PwC’s Koh.

Businesses selling imported services to consumers in Singapore will be required to register with the taxman and collect GST on behalf of the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore.

However, this will apply only to overseas vendors with an annual global turnover exceeding SG$1 million (US$0.76 million), and with sales of digital services to consumers in Singapore surpassing SG$100,000 (US$75,5400). The latter requirement ” minimizes the compliance burden on overseas vendors which do not make significant sales to Singapore consumers”, the Finance Ministry said.

“Introducing GST on imported services will ensure that, irrespective of whether the service consumed in Singapore is bought from suppliers here or from suppliers abroad, the same GST treatment will apply,” the ministry said.

Seems it’s only a matter of time before consumers are hit with the tax while shopping for online goods overseas. Source: Shutterstock

Otherwise known as the “Netflix” tax, global entertainment companies are sure to get caught up in Singapore’s new tax implementation. Netflix, which raked in US$3.3 billion in revenue in the last three months of 2017 alone, has not yet revealed numbers on subscriber base in Singapore. It is uncertain as to whether other global firms such as Uber could potentially fall into the category.

The new tax will not affect the online sale of goods, the Finance Ministry announced Monday.

It seems that it is only a matter of time before consumers are hit with the tax while shopping for online goods overseas. There are reportedly international on-going discussions regarding how the tax could potentially be applied to imported goods purchased online, such as clothes and books.

Australia is set to be the first in the world to tax low-value imported goods this year.

The post Singapore to tax digital services from 2020 appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.

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The increasing digitalization is also significantly affecting the way we shop. Once a thing of science fiction, we can now order items to our door on the same day of purchase with just a click of a button. And who needs a human to deliver the package when drones now have the ability carry it right to your door?

The introduction of AR and VR mean customers can partake in a whole new shopping experience; whether it is virtually applying make-up, watching your desired outfit being modeled by a fashion model on a catwalk, or test-driving the latest car through virtual picturesque landscapes.

The increasingly digital world is also disrupting the real estate business, slowly eroding the human factor which was once a crucial aspect to all stages of the house-hunting process, from search through to purchase.

Search and discovery phase

In regards to the search and discovery phase of house-hunting, the requirement for human touch is almost negligible. Prospective home buyers can search for properties using various property portals, at any time, anywhere, from a laptop or mobile app.

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According to Calum Melhuish, associate director at UK-based company Hollis Morgan, the Internet is a crucial part of the business.

“Internet advertising probably accounts for around 65 percent of enquires we receive on each property,” he said. “It has made it so much easier for people to view property details – especially for clients looking to relocate from abroad.”

With more and more buyers using the Internet to search for new homes, businesses must adapt their strategies accordingly in order to keep up with competitors.

Olivia Anstee, a UK-based estate agent, told Tech Wire Asia: “With all businesses, there is a huge importance to keep up with modern technology and other competitors. We find that the majority of our clients tend to search on Internet-based portals when hunting for a property.

“Properties are becoming more accessible from the comfort and convenience of your own home, especially if you’re searching for something which is out of your local area.  Internet portals have become extremely advanced, providing huge amounts of access from site to site, creating a domino effect and enabling clients to research more than one aspect to their search criteria when purchasing a property.”

Virtual Reality

Though more commonly associated with the gaming world, virtual reality (VR) is becoming more and more popular within the real estate industry.

House-hunters are able to take virtual tours of houses, in the comfort of their own homes, providing solutions to common industry issues such as inconveniences in timing and location for buyer, seller and realtor alike.

VR has emerged as a powerful tool in the selling of real estate. Source: Shutterstock.com

Panoleh is a Singaporean startup which aims to make the home-showing process a simple and seamless procedure for its clients through VR technology. Users are able to build virtual tours using the platform, which allows buyers to enter a simulated 3D environment where they can get a real feel for the property they are viewing.

“This is the future of technology and soon buyers will be able to look at properties in Singapore while they’re sitting at dinner in China,” said Panoleh CEO Jackson Chong.

Augmented Reality

As well as VR, in recent years there has been an increase in augmented reality apps within the real estate industry. Last year, furniture giant Ikea released The Ikea Place App, which allows users to bring its catalogue to life by using AR to see how a piece of furniture will look in their house.

Want to see if your sofa will look good in a house you’re viewing? Simply open the app, point your camera at the floor and watch it appear to scale.

Comparison phase

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House-hunters are also able to use different platforms  to compare properties, based on parameters such as price, size, accessibility and location. Though these platforms facilitate in helping the customer make a decision, it cannot be said that the magic of human involvement is completely void in this stage.

“With online platforms, it’s quite hard to get a sense of reality on an area; even with things like area reviews, it’s never the same. Most agents live in the area they work in, so the knowledge is far higher than what online can give,” says Luca Giambrone, a UK-based estate agent.

Furthermore, many buyers rely heavily on the opinions of their social circle when deciding on a property. Online forums and review sites also still play a major role in the decision process for many.

The last mile

The last stages of the house-buying process involve finalizing the property and making the purchase. These stages are when human interaction is crucial, where the prospective home buyer must shift from the digital world to interaction with a real estate consultant.

Though buyers can go straight to the developer/seller and “cut out the middle man”, this is arguably risky business due to personal bias. A professional consultant can give a much more reasonable opinion to the buyer.

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Director of the real estate agency LiFE residential, Jon Werth, believes that digitalization is a key factor in the industry, especially in enhancing communication.

“The digitalization of property search is really a fundamental necessity when linked with AI or Chatbot technology, for example the way the new startup Blyng is aiming to help us communicate out of hours via Facebook and when extra busy periods hit us unexpectedly,” he told Tech Wire Asia.

“The benefit of this addition should be to enhance the customer journey by adding subtle touch points to the enquiry which enable a warmer communication from the negotiators.”

The final stage of closing the transaction is a stage which remains heavily dependent on human interaction. With a multitude of paperwork to complete and registrar appointments, the reliance on digital alone will not be of value.

Is the future of real estate purely digital?

Considering the emotional journey of purchasing a property, the wired veins and metal heart of the digital world simply will not cut it.

“Although agencies are in need of keeping up with the demand of technology, there is still a requirement for high levels of customer service offered to create a professional level of sales progression. A personal approach and knowledge of the local area are something a computer cannot offer,” says Anstee.

“I believe the demand will continue to grow with the thirst of youth needing instant access via mobile devices. But I strongly feel that this will need to be backed up by a happy and helpful estate agent.”

While digitalization highly enhances the experience of house buyers in terms of ease and convenience, human interaction still remains a very ‘real’ need in the real estate industry.

“People still value customer service and experienced agents, otherwise there would be no shop-front agents around… everyone would be buying and selling through online agents who charge roughly one fifth of what a high street agent charges,” said Melhuish.

The post Is digitalization driving out the human touch in real estate? appeared first on Tech Wire Asia.