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In focus
- Melissa Goh on why being hyperlocal is an advantage
- Ninja Van’s 2025 in numbers
- Shopee’s upswing, as shown in charts
Hello reader,
Amazon’s 2019 rollout of local services in Singapore was a big deal.
Just two years before that, in 2017, I remember covering the launch of Prime Now from inside the company’s massive warehouse and being excited about the possibilities of same-day deliveries that Amazon Prime could offer (still a novelty at the time).
Image credit: Ulla
The tech giant saw limited uptake in the city-state, though. While I know of people who regularly order from Amazon Fresh, over the years, I can count on two hands the number of times I’ve bought items from the platform. Even beyond Singapore’s shores, Amazon never made a push into Southeast Asia.
In the meantime, platforms like Shopee and Lazada grew exponentially as they gamified their marketplaces, expanded their product selection, ramped up partnerships with brand-name retailers, experimented with livestreaming, added groceries to the mix, and so on.
So it felt serendipitous that, while catching up with a good friend who was visiting from the US over the weekend, I heard her delight in discovering the magic that is Shopee – its sheer variety and the availability of cheap Chinese goods on the platform. Apparently, she’s already spent a few hundred dollars on Shopee purchases for her toddlers in just two weeks.
It was also timely that this week, parent company Sea Group reported that Shopee recorded a new high in gross merchandise value and a revenue growth of 45% in its first quarter.
Amazon isn’t the first case of a large global firm that has had to retreat from the region after failing to make a dent in the market, and it isn’t going to be the last. But in Southeast Asia, we’ve seen time and again that being hyperlocal wins.
Melissa Goh, senior editor
Editor’s picks
1️⃣ Ninja Van’s revenue shrinks, losses narrow 31% in FY2025
Short cuts
One data story you shouldn’t miss
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