Online marketplace app Smile Shop became the third supplier of fresh foods and other grocery products to people in restricted areas. POST STAFF
Homegrown Cambodian e-marketplace Smile Shop Co Ltd and venture capital Jin Sha Group have entered into a strategic partnership designed to expand the platform's capabilities, improve service offerings, shore up domestic businesses and bring local products to the global horizon.
The agreement was officially unveiled on August 20 and virtually signed on the same day by Smile Shop co-founder and CEO Jack Lee and Jin Sha Group chairman Liu Yang.
Lee said the added capital will fuel the company’s expansion into a "super e-commerce platform".
The company plans to invest more heavily in fintech, supply chain infrastructure, logistics and Cambodian products to market to an international audience, as well as improving customer service to turn Smile Shop into the most customer-centric platform, he added.
“We are delighted to bring on board Jin Sha Group, who believes in our vision and wants to be part of this journey.
“Smile Shop’s main focus is on Cambodia’s market. When people keep questioning 'Cambodia market’s size is not big', you can grow fatter instead of taller, so our vision is to be the number one super e-commerce” platform, Lee said.
Jin Sha Group's Liu noted that Smile Shop has been "performing impressively" at a larger scale during the Covid-19 pandemic, playing an "important role" in the e-commerce ecosystem.
“We are extremely excited to collaborate with Jack and his team in order to expand the company to grow to new heights, to reach greater milestones and to create a better life for Cambodians by integrating technology and internet.
“'Share the burdens with the country, fulfil people’s goals' is Jin Sha’s mission. Jin Sha Group would like to mainly invest in new infrastructure, vocational education, health care, new media, agricultural technology, et cetera,” he said.
The gross merchandise volume of e-commerce in Southeast Asia was expected to hit $62 billion last year, up 63.2 per cent from $38 billion in 2019, and could balloon to $172 billion in 2025, according to the annual e-Conomy SEA report by Google, Temasek and Bain & Company.
Revenue in the Cambodian e-commerce market is projected to reach $251 million in 2021 and expected to show a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.94 per cent from 2021-2025 to attain a market volume of $354 million in 2025.
The Smile Shop app was launched in October 2018 to great reception, and has become a prominent business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce platform leaving a remarkable imprint on the Cambodian retail and cross-border trading industries.
