Emerald Media leads $65 million Series B funding of Southeast Asian ecommerce companies
, ET Bureau|
Updated: Nov 20, 2017, 01.51 PM IST
MUMBAI: KKR-led Pan-Asian investment company Emerald Media has invested in Southeast Asian ecommerce enabler and e-distributor company aCommerce.
Emerald, which has a $300 million corpus from KKR to invest on fast-growing media, entertainment, consumer tech and B2B industries across Asia, is the lead investor in the $65 million Series B funding round of aCommerce.
Other participants to the round include existing backers Blue Sky, MDI Ventures and DKSH, with North Ridge Partners advising.
aCommerce has a strong presence in the four Southeast Asian markets that enables over 260 brand clients such as Samsung, Unilever, Nestlé, L’Oréal, Philips and Mars to sell to the world’s fastest growing consumer markets.
“In four short years, aCommerce has established itself as a leader in Southeast Asia working with the world’s top brands,” said Rajesh Kamat, MD & co-founder, Emerald Media. “We look forward to accelerating the expansion of the business as a key player in moving Southeast Asia’s retail ecosystem forward.”
The new funding will help aCommerce further augment its brand centric tech platform that allows clients to “plug in” and distribute through an integrated network of Business-to-Consumer and Business-to-Business channels, with real time data analytics. It will also allow scaling strategic partnerships within the retail ecosystem in current markets of Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines, and will enable client expansion into new markets like Malaysia and Vietnam.
“Our platform covers the entire customer journey online, from product sample distribution, collecting customer data to driving and attributing purchases across channels like the brand’s own webstore and the region’s top marketplaces,” added Paul Srivorakul, co-founder and Group CEO, aCommerce. “Having a strong partner like KKR and Emerald Media with their years of investment experience in the region will provide capital and critical connections in content and demand generation across Southeast Asia, which we see a great deal of convergence in. We can provide our clients an even better level of transparency and accountability hard to find elsewhere.”
Southeast Asia’s residents are moving to online shopping at an increasingly exponential pace, growing 32% year-on-year for the next 10 years according to research by Google and Temasek. The surge in online activities has caused giants such as JD.com, Amazon and Alibaba to expand their presence in Southeast Asia’s retail market.
In 2017 alone, brands such as Mars, Nestlé, and Unilever, have all established a stronger official ecommerce presence with aCommerce across the region in addition to selling through existing offline channels.
“What gives us confidence in aCommerce is the company’s highly brand centric technology platform that enables clients to simply plug in and use all operating systems, channel distribution methods and demand generation applications across the region,” said Paul Aiello, MD and co-founder of Emerald Media. “This provides new entrants a quick way to roll out multi-channel operations in these exciting markets without building large local operations.”
Emerald, which has a $300 million corpus from KKR to invest on fast-growing media, entertainment, consumer tech and B2B industries across Asia, is the lead investor in the $65 million Series B funding round of aCommerce.
Other participants to the round include existing backers Blue Sky, MDI Ventures and DKSH, with North Ridge Partners advising.
aCommerce has a strong presence in the four Southeast Asian markets that enables over 260 brand clients such as Samsung, Unilever, Nestlé, L’Oréal, Philips and Mars to sell to the world’s fastest growing consumer markets.
“In four short years, aCommerce has established itself as a leader in Southeast Asia working with the world’s top brands,” said Rajesh Kamat, MD & co-founder, Emerald Media. “We look forward to accelerating the expansion of the business as a key player in moving Southeast Asia’s retail ecosystem forward.”
The new funding will help aCommerce further augment its brand centric tech platform that allows clients to “plug in” and distribute through an integrated network of Business-to-Consumer and Business-to-Business channels, with real time data analytics. It will also allow scaling strategic partnerships within the retail ecosystem in current markets of Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines, and will enable client expansion into new markets like Malaysia and Vietnam.
“Our platform covers the entire customer journey online, from product sample distribution, collecting customer data to driving and attributing purchases across channels like the brand’s own webstore and the region’s top marketplaces,” added Paul Srivorakul, co-founder and Group CEO, aCommerce. “Having a strong partner like KKR and Emerald Media with their years of investment experience in the region will provide capital and critical connections in content and demand generation across Southeast Asia, which we see a great deal of convergence in. We can provide our clients an even better level of transparency and accountability hard to find elsewhere.”
Southeast Asia’s residents are moving to online shopping at an increasingly exponential pace, growing 32% year-on-year for the next 10 years according to research by Google and Temasek. The surge in online activities has caused giants such as JD.com, Amazon and Alibaba to expand their presence in Southeast Asia’s retail market.
In 2017 alone, brands such as Mars, Nestlé, and Unilever, have all established a stronger official ecommerce presence with aCommerce across the region in addition to selling through existing offline channels.
“What gives us confidence in aCommerce is the company’s highly brand centric technology platform that enables clients to simply plug in and use all operating systems, channel distribution methods and demand generation applications across the region,” said Paul Aiello, MD and co-founder of Emerald Media. “This provides new entrants a quick way to roll out multi-channel operations in these exciting markets without building large local operations.”
