Ecommerce is booming across Asia. Although companies like Amazon have yet to change day to day lives of those in the region, homegrown companies like Lazada, Tokopedia and Blinda are beginning to change the shopping behaviors in Asia. In the last couple of years we’ve seen a significant rise in online shopping as local companies developed infrastructure across SE Asia in places, such as Indonesia, that present significant logistical challenges.
Among those impacting the rapid rise of ecommerce is the company aCommerce. aCommerce is a one of the most important leaders in e-commerce solutions for retailers, brands, manufacturer, and all companies in Southeast Asia. Based in Thailand, their mission is to grow their clients’ business by keenly focusing on all the issues and connections between the brand and its customers. aCommerce provides “a one stop shop for e-retail services including, Channel management, cross-border management, marketing, tech development, fulfillment centers, etc… And, as the company likes to point out, they will help companies like Amazon make expansion into Asia possible. aCommerce essentially focuses on the logistics and management of ecommerce and traditional retail.
After noticing major challenges in ecommerce across the Asian region, Paul Srivorakul founded aCommerce in late 2012 and managed to gather nearly 20 million USD to in investments to date. Srivorakul’s mission was to become the primary force in enabling the retail and ecommerce business to do business in ASia.
aCommerce team:
| Name | Designation | A Short “About” |
| Paul Srivorakul | Group CEO (Chief Executive Officer) |
Graduating from the University of California, Paul started his career in sales at Ask Jeeves Inc. in the United States. This Thai-American entrepreneur successfully took a hike in three companies in Southeast Asia. He is the Co-Founder and Group CEO at aCommerce. |
| Piers Bennett | Group CFO (Chief Financial Officer) |
Piers has almost 20 years of management, finance and sales experience in IT industries in Asia, the UK and the USA. He is the former CFO of DMS Group and Ensogo companies. |
| Peter Kopitz | Group COO | Peter was the Managing Director and Co-Founder of Rocket International Thailand, the largest growing e-commerce endeavor in Asia related to fashion. He is the group COO at aCommerce. |
| Graeme Oldham | Group CPO | Dr. Graeme Oldham brought 15 years of experience from Thomson Reuters in engineering systems and finance systems. He is the group CPO at aCommerce. |
| Sheji Ho | Group CMO | Sheji has worked in four markets like New York, Singapore, Shanghai and Beijing, and at present he is working in Bangkok – the Group CMO at aCommerce. |
| Mitch Bittermann | Group CLO (Chief Logistics Officer) |
Mitch leads and builds aCommerce cross-border initiatives in order to fulfill the increasing demand of smooth transactions in Southeast Asia. He is serving as the Group CLO at aCommerce. |
| Tom Srivorakul | CEO Thailand | The vast experience of Tom helps aCommerce to get the consultation to many top-notch companies. He was the Managing Director and Co-Founder of LivingSocial/Ensogo companies, and the CEO at aCommerce, Thailand at present. |
| Snorre Larstad | CEO Indonesia | After serving as an interim Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at Jennifer Convertibles Inc., Snorre joined aCommerce from Morris Group. At present, he is the CEO at aCommerce, Indonesia. |
| Ray Alimurung | CEO Philippines | Ray worked with industry giants like Rocket Internet’s Lazada and Amazon as well as the former COO of Netopia for 6 years before joining in aCommerce. He is the present Chief Executive Officer at aCommerce, Philippines. |
| Hadi Kuncoro | COO Indonesia | Hadi revolutionized e-commerce by introducing the Cash-on-Delivery (in short, COD) on a national level. He is the successful Founder of Rocket Internet’s Zalora and the Co-Founder of a Muslim fashion e-commerce company. At present, he is the COO at aCommerce, Indonesia. |
| Phensiri Sathianvongnusar | Regional Operations Director | Phensiri worked as a Vice President of Zalora, Thailand, which is a part of one of the world’s leading cyberspace incubators before joining aCommerce. She is the Regional Operations Director at aCommerce. |
| Felicia Moursalien | Regional Head of Communications | Felicia’s works has led to cover the leading business medias like Forbes, Tech Crunch, The Economist, etc. She is specialized in growing startups into global trademark through B2B Marketing, PR, and digital marketing. She is the Regional Head of Communications at aCommerce at present. |
(aCommerce, 2015)
aCommerce was officially born in May 2013 with the mission of providing a solution to what Ardent Capital saw as the major challenges to the rise of e commerce across Asia. With issues like logistics in developing economies and a dearth of fulfillment centers and services, and everything in between, Ardent Capital had growing concerns and sought to solve these issues through aCommerce. Ardent Group brought their comprehensive backgrounds in technology, finance, marketing, and operations to support the business model. An absolute unified Warehouse Management System (WMS) and Order Management System (OMS) was finally developed after working for months on it with aCommerce developing their very own delivery and warehouse systems. In additional to logistics like last mile delivery services-which other companies offer, aCommerce stands out in their end-to-end solution such as cross-border services, along with customer service, along with fulfillment centers.
Matt Walters, The Principal at Ardent Capital, told to TECHINASIA that:
“Going after e-commerce infrastructure isn’t easy, but that’s precisely what makes it so attractive. You have to do the hard things to create value, things that potential competitors can’t easily replicate. When we spoke with a number of e-commerce companies in the region, one of the recurring problems raised was that there isn’t adequate e-commerce infrastructure, from shipping to on-demand call centers, to support the growth of e-commerce. We saw the problem and wanted to change it.” (Sakawee, 2013)
Investors and Financials:
In 2013, investors like Ardent Capital, Sinar Mas, Asia Pacific Capital, etc. raised a capital worth 18 million USD when the company was about to be founded. (The Sea Startups 100, 2015)
Paul Srivorakul, the Co-Founder and Group CEO of aCommerce say:
“To transform e-commerce in Southeast Asia, you need to have both an aggressive growth strategy and a long term vision. We are privileged to have investors who support us in both,”
At present, the company has 8 Investors, here they are in short:
| Name of Investor(s) | Location | A Short Details |
| Ardent Capital | Thailand | Ardent Capital is a private investor that guides the entrepreneurs with great business ideas and high potential. aCommerce is receiving intensive expert guidance and investment from this investor from the very early stage of their foundation. |
| Inspire Ventures | Thailand | aCommerce and Inspire Ventures have been building the business together to solve the actual problems faced by the Southeast Asian consumers and businesses. |
| NTT Docomo Ventures | Japan | It is NTT Docomo Venture’s first investment to invest in a Southeast Asian e-commerce company – aCommerce. |
| Sumitomo Corporation | Japan | Sumitomo Corporation is one of the biggest multinational syndicates in Japan with over 65,000 employees all over the world and more than 800 subsidiaries. |
| Sinar Mas Indonesia | Indonesia | Sinar Mas Group is one of the largest multinational companies in Indonesia, formed in 1962. This group is one of the most notable investors of aCommerce. |
| Asia Pacific Digital | Australia | 300 professionals of Asia Pacific Digital support the company with technology, skills, and strategy as well as financial assistance to increase the profit and sales. |
| CyberAgent Ventures | Japan | CyberAgent is a notable investor of aCommerce’s entire bridge funding. |
| JL Capital | Singapore | JL Capital PTE Ltd., founded by James Loh in 2013 to conduct Fund Management. |
(aCommerce, 2015)
Top Competitors:
Many companies are providing cross-border management, last-mile delivery channel supervision, fulfillment, and warehousing services. As a result, an open competition erupted amongst the companies. The following table lists the top 10 such Competitors of aCommerce:
| RANK | COMPANY | CEO (Chief Executive Officer) |
| 1 | Anchanto Pte Ltd. | Vaibhav Dabhade |
| 2 | Links Warehousing & Fulfillment | Jonathan Krost |
| 3 | eShopWorld | Eamon Keating |
| 4 | PayWhere Pte Ltd. | Dickson Gregory |
| 5 | Borderfree, Inc. | Unknown |
| 6 | PFSweb Inc. | Mike Willoughby |
| 7 | Westset Distribution, Inc. | Guy Dominguez |
| 8 | International Checkout | Unknown |
| 9 | Intershop Communications AG | Jochen Wiechen |
| 10 | ME-Retail Solutions Pte Ltd. | Unknown |
(Owler, 2016)
Partners of aCommerce:
| Name of the Partners of aCommerce: | ||
| Bluecore | ||
| Criteo | LEFTRONIC | |
| SKYBOSS | Mixpanel | |
| optimizely | ||
| Campaign Monitor | Mouseflow | |
| Amazon Web Services | Hootsuite | |
| Python | Google Analytics | |
| Amazon RedShift | Shopsmart.xyz | |
| Rabbit MQ | DHL | |
| NETSUITE | TNT | |
| Pentaho | CJ GLS | |
| DKSH | Magneto | |
Revenues:
Back in 2013, when aCommerce was started, it raised a capital of $1 Million from Ardent Capital and about $3.1 million in the second round of capital funding from CyberAgent Ventures and NTT DOCOMO Ventures.
2015 has been a compelling year for aCommerce Indonesia. Within one year of their establishment, the company successfully hit a milestone of their biggest driver of revenue. In that single year, their revenue multiplied by seven times and their growth exceeded 30%.
Mitch Bittermann, Group CLO at aCommerce, says:
“The opportunity for international brands in Southeast Asia is huge, with China outbound cross-border volume rapidly increasing as well as the upcoming ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) integration, the region will be a launchpad for new innovative distribution solutions,”
(aCommerce, 2015)
Customer Service:
It is their number one priority to keep their customers happy. Their customer care services include Social Media Management (SMM), email communication management, live chat, and personalized call centers. Their experienced agents use enterprise and modern technologies to provide a scalable and efficient solution to serve their customers.
Country aCommerce Operates:
aCommerce is now operating in six Southeast Asian countries. Although the company started working in the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, and Singapore before 2014, they extended their service in Malaysia and Vietnam after they reached their $100 million revenue.
Here are the list of the countries it operates:
- Indonesia
- Malaysia
- Philippines
- Thailand
- Vietnam
- Singapore