Tag: Headquarters

Singapore – Recommerce company Carousell has announced the launch of its new regional headquarters called ‘Carousell Campus’, which is dedicated to advance recommerce capabilities as part of its goal to make buying and selling secondhand items more trusted and convenient.

Carousell Campus also houses the Group’s first ‘Capabilities Centre’, which brings the group’s brands and subsidiaries into one single location to streamline operations, integrate capabilities for authentication and inspection, as well as allow for more efficient collaboration.

To make peer-to-peer marketplace transactions even safer, the group has also rolled out enhancements to the secure on-platform payment features in its Singapore and Vietnam marketplaces, with plans to continue in more markets starting with Malaysia by end of September.

To increase convenience for everyday Singaporeans selling items they have decluttered, Carousell Singapore will be the first C2C marketplace in Singapore to offer a paperless D2D shipping option to casual sellers. By the end of September, users will only need to write down their tracking number on the parcel, have access to competitive paperless D2D shipping rates, and also skip the hassle of printing out the shipping label for the courier. 

Quek Siu Rui, group CEO and co-founder at Carousell Group, said, “This space marks a coming-of-age for Carousell as a Group. Recommerce means bringing the best things that we know and like from e-commerce and availing it for secondhand products. We have been building up our recommerce business in recent years, and have grown to be the leading recommerce Group in Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan, with tens of millions of monthly active users and 80 million new listings annually.”

He added, “As we take the lead in advocating for recommerce and a circular economy in the region and beyond, we believe in contributing back to the local startup community and cementing Singapore as the region’s prominent startup hub.”

Rui also noted, “Centralising our Singapore-based entities at Carousell Campus has allowed us to strengthen our operations excellence. Our strategic focus on key growth product categories has streamlined our efforts to offer more compelling user value propositions and facilitate more collaboration opportunities to innovate on ways to increase circular economy adoption. This has allowed us to roll out a variety of recommerce programmes and features across multiple platforms and markets this year, providing an e-commerce-like experience. We will continue to invest in growth and technology across our platforms to make buying and selling secondhand items as trusted and convenient as buying brand new items.”

Singapore – Baozun Inc., an e-commerce service partner that helps brands execute their e-commerce strategies in China, has announced its new regional headquarters in Singapore, as it seeks to drive e-commerce innovation and bring a competitive advantage to brands in SEA.

Following its expansion into Hong Kong and Taiwan in 2013, Baozun identified Singapore and Malaysia as key markets in SEA to expand its footprint. The company is also in the midst of setting up its Philippines office and plans to expand to Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand by the end of 2023. 

Moreover, the company plans to continue nurturing a robust team of local experts with first-hand e-commerce experience to support business expansion and growth in the region.

“With 15 years of experience in the most advanced e-commerce market, we’re confident that Baozun Asia’s advanced technologies and infrastructure will give brands in the region a competitive advantage. Having said that, we’re acutely aware that SEA is a highly diverse region, so we look forward to prioritising a localised approach and creating custom solutions that help brands grow sustainably through a long-term relationship,” said Thomas Yeoh, board member of Baozun Asia. 

Baozun said that the demand for strong e-commerce technological capabilities and infrastructure is only increasing, and its entry into the region means that brands will have access to custom end-to-end omnichannel services, tailored to the fast-changing needs of brands in SEA. This encompasses the entire e-commerce value chain covering IT solutions, store operations, digital marketing, customer services, and warehousing and logistics.

Manila, Philippines – To celebrate COMCO Southeast Asia‘s sixth anniversary, the integrated communications agency based in the Philippines has unveiled its new global headquarters in Makati, the business capital of the Philippines, as part of its expansion. 

The new headquarters will house COMCO Mundo League of Enterprises’ current and upcoming ventures – COMCO SEA, COMCO Middle East & Africa (MEA), Camp COMCO Alumni Society, and Citizen COMCO Advocacy Program, as well as SEA Wave Pop Culture Studio, and Taro Digital AOX.

Each area is inspired by different pop culture references rooted in COMCO’s love for movies, series, music, books, and all the emerging platforms out there. The COMCO SEA workstation is called the ‘Millennium Falcon’, while the executive office is dubbed the ‘Cerebro’. 

Meanwhile, the rest of the areas are ‘Rivendel’ for the Corporate Services Unit, ‘Black Castle’ for the Digital and Multimedia Arts Unit, ‘Watch Tower Hall’ for the conference room, ‘Bifrost Bridge’ for the reception, and ‘Room of Requirements’ for the stock room, as well as ‘Wooley Hall’ for the lounge area. 

Following its launch during COMCO SEA’s Blazing Sapphire anniversary event last year, COMCO Middle East and Africa is now in full blast servicing various brands in the market. In its first year, COMCO MEA has already worked with notable brands in the Middle East such as Buono Buono, Nolte, Open Thrill, Paus, and POPC Live!, as well as Red Shrimp, and TruCARE, amongst many others.

Moreover, COMCO MEA, together with COMCO SEA, also recently conducted property roadshows for Philippine property firm RLC Residences in Dubai and Abu Dhabi as amongst the group’s first of many synergy initiatives.

COMCO SEA also continued to strengthen its client portfolio for its sixth year, winning major accounts in recent inter-agency pitches for premiere brands/organisations such as MR. DIY, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), and Lenovo, as well as Skechers, and Lalamove, amongst others.

Singapore – To drive inclusive growth in SEA, superapp Grab has announced the official opening of its new headquarters in Singapore. The newly-launched headquarters comes with the superapp’s new initiative called ‘GrabMerchant Centre’, which aims to help small businesses grow online.

The new headquarters in Singapore spans nine floors and more than 42,000 sqm, bringing about 3,000 Grabbers and an R&D Centre under one roof. Apart from the first GrabMerchant Centre, it will also be home to the digibank team. This new headquarters is one of two headquarters Grab has in the region. The dual headquarter is based in Jakarta, Indonesia, and serves as Grab’s regional innovation hub for small businesses.

Meanwhile, the ‘GrabMerchant Centre’ seeks to provide 1-on-1 business consultation services for Grab’s SME merchant-partners. It is a one-stop hub dedicated to helping small businesses optimise their online presence, maximise GrabFood, GrabMart, GrabFin, and GrabAds services for their businesses, and learn to use digital tools to grow.

Anthony Tan, Grab’s group CEO and co-founder, shared that as they celebrate Grab’s 10th anniversary this year, they hope that their announcements will help small businesses and their future workforce upskill and maximise their opportunities, even in this challenging macro environment. 

“Providing access to digital tools can be a powerful way to ensure all Southeast Asians can equally participate in – and benefit from – the rising digital economy, the same way 10 years ago when our driver-partners learned how to use their smartphones to earn incomes,” said Tan.

Aside from the new headquarters and the new SME initiative, Grab has also committed an annual US$1m from the GrabForGood Fund towards the ‘GrabScholar’ programme, which will provide university scholarships and educational bursaries across all countries Grab operates in SEA.

‘GrabScholar’ programme plans to award over 2,000 scholarships and bursaries annually. It will cover tuition and study-related expenses for underprivileged children to attend primary, secondary, or vocational schools, as well as universities. Internship opportunities will also be offered to tertiary students to develop their professional aptitude and prepare them for full-time roles when they graduate. It was launched in Indonesia last July in partnership with Yayasan Benih Baik Indonesia. This is in addition to existing scholarship and bursary initiatives that are offered to the children of Grab’s driver-, delivery- and merchant-partners in Singapore and Thailand.

Singapore – To celebrate foodpanda’s 10 years of operations in Asia, the q-commerce platform has launched its new regional headquarters in Singapore. This new headquarters houses 1,200 employees from its regional and local operational teams, plus the company’s global tech hub.

foodpanda said that Singapore has always been a base and test market for innovation and new product development. Amongst the features beta-launched in Singapore were foodpanda’s cloud store network pandamart and on-demand retail marketplace foodpanda shops – leading Asia’s push into q-commerce, as early as 2019. Singapore was also the first market to roll out proof-of-concept drone deliveries in partnership with ST Engineering, as well as foodpanda’s Logistics-as-a-Service feature, pandago in 2020, offering express doorstep deliveries to customers.

Moreover, the platform has launched its ‘PowerUp! Tech Academy’, which aims to enable the next decade of growth, building up a strong tech core. Unlike a localised R&D facility, the foodpanda PowerUp! Tech Academy will use Delivery Hero’s global knowledge base in Singapore to power the tech and innovation ecosystem. It comprises programmes and partnerships to grow the local tech talent pool, upskill riders, and help merchants digitalise.

foodpanda, together with its parent company Delivery Hero’s Delivery Hero Ventures, has also invested more than SG$120m in Singapore-based regional tech start-ups including Toku, Flash Coffee, and Omnistream.

Jakob Angele, CEO of foodpanda, said that Singapore has proven to be a dynamic hub for foodpanda’s operations in the region, and they expect to see more innovations to be launched from Singapore into the regional markets.

“Initiatives like our foodpanda PowerUp! Tech Academy is essential to our long-term plans, as we nurture more of Asia’s tech talent, build the ecosystem and grow Asia’s digital economy,” added Angele.

Singapore – Global hotel franchising company Wyndham Hotels & Resorts has announced the launch of its Asia-Pacific headquarters in the city-state of Singapore, specifically in CapitaString.

The new headquarters embodies the theme of sustainability, which is woven into every aspect of the new office. In line with the global Wyndham Green commitment, the design incorporates eco-certified and energy-efficient materials throughout.

Carl Wee, vice president for technical services for Asia-Pacific at Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, said, “We are delighted and excited to reveal our new regional headquarters here in Singapore. Progress and innovation always start with the sharing of ideas, and this new space will help to usher in a new era of collaboration and interaction.”

He added, “By blurring the boundaries between the corporate and social worlds, we hope to stimulate creativity, encourage teamwork and unlock the full potential of our team members to drive our entire business forward.”

Following the launch of its new Singapore headquarters, Wyndham is positioned to accelerate its expansion strategy in 2022 and beyond, building on its leading position in the Asia Pacific with over 1,600 hotels in 20 markets and territories.