Southeast Asia’s e-commerce gold rush draws Chinese giants from Alibaba to ByteDance

The Southeast Asian e-commerce market is expected to more than double in the next six years to reach US$370 billion by 2030, according to a report from US technology giant Google, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek Holdings, and consultancy Bain & Co.

The booming sector has attracted a slew of Chinese players – including Alibaba Group Holding’s Lazada, PDD Holdings’ Temu and ByteDance’s TikTok Shop, as well as regional giant Shopee from Singaporean conglomerate Sea – all vying for Southeast Asia’s 612 million consumers. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.

The study, published on Tuesday, covers the digital economies of six major Southeast Asian nations: Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Together, their gross merchandise value (GMV) is set to rise 15 per cent this year to reach US$263 billion, while revenues are expected to expand 14 per cent to US$89 billion.

The rapid adoption of live-streaming e-commerce, pioneered and made popular by TikTok’s Chinese sibling Douyin, has helped recharge growth in the region’s online shopping business. The sales method, which lets consumers buy products marketed during live streams, now accounts for around 20 per cent of the sector’s GMV, up from less than 5 per cent two years ago, the report showed.

The office of Alibaba-owned Lazada in Bangkok, Thailand. Photo: Xinhua

TikTok Shop, which nearly quadrupled its annual GMV to US$16.3 billion last year, is currently the second-largest e-commerce platform in Southeast Asia, according to a separate report by Singapore-based consultancy Momentum Works. Bargain-shopping platforms Shein and Temu are also expanding their footprints.

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