Indonesians love brands. This ecommmerce newcomer has them all.

VP Sharma, CEO of the Map Group, at Map Emall’s launch event.

Mitra Adiperkasa, the Indonesian retail giant known as Map, is finally taking its business online. It announced ecommerce plans mid-2015, but it took another half year for the site to launch.

Since yesterday, customers can shop on Map Emall. The site offers fashion, travel accessories, and some home furnishing items – no electronics.

Map Emall’s edge over other ecommerce players in Indonesia is its vast range of international brands. It is, for example, the local franchise holder for Zara, TopShop, DKNY, Barbie, Adidas, and many more.

International labels are available on other online stores, but Indonesia has a history of dealing with counterfeit goods, so buying them online from a third party seller poses a risk.

Access to the genuine article is Map Emall’s trump card.

“With the launch of Map Emall, our customers in Indonesia can shop a wide variety of fashionable products and brands from the whole world, without having to worry about their authenticity,” VP Sharma, CEO of the Map Group, said at the launch event.

How does it compare to competitors?

Map Emall could become a serious challenger to major ecommerce sites like Lazada Indonesia and MatahariMall. Map has high brand recognition in Indonesia’s major cities through its many high-end department stores like Sogo, Seibu, and Debenhams. When Map spoke with Tech in Asia last year about its ecommerce plans, it said it had close to 1,800 retail outlets in more than 60 cities across the archipelago.

What’s more, Map is also the franchise holder of ubiquitous food and beverage chains like Burger King and Starbucks. That could prove a tremendous opportunity for cross-promotions and online-to-offline services.

Its vast brick-and-mortar network makes Map Emall similar to MatahariMall, the ecommerce venture started by Indonesia’s Lippo Group. MatahariMall said it saw its strength in possible tie-ups with the Matahari department store chain, which is also part of the Lippo conglomerate.

So Map Emall and MatahariMall have some things in common, but there are also significant differences, especially in operations.

When MatahariMall launched in 2015, it made a point of assembling a team of experienced ecommerce professionals. It hired Hadi Wenas as CEO, who came to MatahariMall via Zalora and logistics provider aCommerce. Komang Arthayasa became CTO – he was previously technical lead at TokoBagus (later acquired by OLX). MatahariMall made sure the world knew its ecommerce endeavor would be well funded.

In contrast, we don’t know much about the team behind Map Emall and its experience. Map Group CEO VP Sharma also didn’t reveal the amount of funds the company intended to put into developing the platform in the coming years.

What we do know from an earlier conversation with Map Emall is that it works with aCommerce as its logistics partner. MatahariMall partners with the same firm. As a so-called ecommerce enabler, aCommerce offers services like warehousing, logistics, and even marketing and PR. Map Emall could compensate for its relative inexperience by outsourcing these tasks to an experienced partner. This would give it a chance at playing catch up with MatahariMall.