Tag: Partnership

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia — Akademi GA, the exclusive partner of General Assembly (GA) in Malaysia (GA Malaysia), and MARQETR, an on-demand platform that links marketing experts to startups and small and medium enterprises (SMEs), have collaborated to equip Malaysian marketers with future ready digital skills and to empower them to work the way they want.

The partnership would be an avenue for both parties to achieve their goals; GA Malaysia can have placement referrals for marketing students or graduates for project opportunities on MARQETR. Meanwhile, MARQETR can refer new and existing marketers to upskill and reskill themselves at GA Malaysia, in order to maintain a high level of quality and performance in the marketing and digital discipline.

Upon analyzing and concluding that there is a demand for digitally skilled workers, MARQETR and GA Malaysia aim to close the digital skills gap among marketers in Malaysia and help with matching talents to on-demand work opportunities through this partnership.

Andrew Pereira, CEO of GA Malaysia, said, “GA Malaysia’s partnership with MARQETR will enable us to upskill and reskill even more marketers and provide another avenue for GA Malaysia graduates to access on-demand work opportunities with MARQETR. I look forward to seeing the impact of this partnership on the ultimate beneficiaries – marketing professionals and the organisations that benefit from their expertise.”

Meanwhile, Mawarni Adam, founder and CEO of MARQETR, shared, “Partnering with General Assembly Malaysia will not only boost the digital skillsets of the marketing talents on MARQETR but will also provide access for SMEs to hire the right marketers according to their business needs without the hassles of the traditional way of search and procurement.”

Adam adds, “Providing a supported and secure platform for marketers to offer their skills and services, and work the way they want is part of our mission too, and we are excited to be welcoming graduates from GA Malaysia and supporting them in their careers, as part of their on-demand marketing experts path on MARQETR.”

The partnership is already live and is available for SMEs to tap into GA Malaysia marketing talents via MARQETR, and for new signups and existing marketers on MARQETR to get access to GA Malaysia digital-driven marketing courses at exclusively-discounted rates to upskill themselves.

Vancouver, Canada – Global social media management platform Hootsuite has joined the content marketing speciality within TikTok’s Marketing Partner Program. As an official badged partner, Hootsuite has launched an integration that enables its customers to effectively manage, execute and optimise their TikTok content alongside their other platforms, from one integrated tool.

To empower businesses to explore the vast potential of this immersive platform and ease the transition for marketers looking to scale content creation, Hootsuite will be guiding its customers through this integration, one step at a time. Hootsuite will be helping its customers become creatively courageous on TikTok by launching a full suite of educational resources.

Maggie Lower, chief marketing officer at Hootsuite, said, “It’s safe to say that this partnership with TikTok has been much anticipated—as much for Hootsuite as for our customers. We’ve watched as video content has grown into a powerful tool that successful brands use to socialise with the world, and have identified the pain points our customers face in creating this type of content.I am beyond thrilled that Hootsuite can now play a more direct role in helping businesses become fearless on this unique, rapidly evolving digital platform.”

By way of the new integration capabilities, customers will now have the ability to elevate their content sharing experience on TikTok, and feel empowered to take the leap with Hootsuite as a trusted partner.

Meanwhile, Melissa Yang, head of ecosystem partnerships at TikTok, commented, “At TikTok, we are always looking for ways to make it easier for brands to develop great content that resonates with their communities. We are excited to welcome our new content marketing partners into the TikTok Marketing Partner Program, and to be collaborating with some of the most trusted partners in the industry.”

She added, “These partners will provide marketers with simple, effective tools to help them to regularly publish content, gain valuable performance insight, and meaningfully engage with their communities.”

Singapore – Global media platform Teads has announced a strategic partnership with the Singapore Media Exchange (SMX). Said deal gives Teads access to one of Singapore’s biggest media houses that comprises two of Singapore’s media giants- Mediacorp and Singapore Press Holdings.

As a part of this partnership, SMX brings leading news titles such as Channel News Asia and The Straits Times, as well luxury and lifestyle sites including Her World, ICON and HardwareZone catering to technology fans amongst their 25 sites for Teads to deliver ad formats in video and display inread, Teads flagship ad format, including ‘inRead Smart’ and ‘Smart6’ – a viewable video format for high engagement in brand safe, premium environments.

In addition, this strategic partnership will enable SMX to leverage Teads’ array of monetisation solutions across devices and formats, with a reach to digital consumers across Singapore with quality content and impactful ad solutions for greater audience engagement.

Julian Fernando, VP publisher solutions for Teads in APAC, said, “The advantage of Teads being a preferred partner with a powerhouse media company like SMX who represent leading brands like CNA, SPH, Business Times and premium SPH magazines is it gives us access to audience scale (reach) in brand safe environments. Team SMX are knowledgeable, collaborative and always eager to go beyond the brief, we are proud and excited to grow our partnership with them.”

Meanwhile, Michael Chng, general manager at SMX, commented, “Teads has been a partner of SMX since the very beginning when we started operations in 2018. Through various market challenges we’ve faced over the last 4 years, Teads has remained consistent in their commitment to our partnership. SMX is proud to have a steadfast partner in Teads, and I’m confident our collaboration will strengthen further in the years ahead.”

New York, USA — Yahoo and Hivestack, the independent programmatic digital out of home (DOOH) ad tech company, has announced a global strategic partnership to connect their industry-leading technologies, and enable premium, programmatic DOOH cross-channel media campaigns on a worldwide scale.

Via the partnership, Yahoo’s omnichannel demand side platform (DSP), will be integrated into the Hivestack supply side platform (SSP), which will allow Yahoo and its clients to access Hivestack’s premium global DOOH inventory through real-time bidding (RTB) transactions via open exchange and private marketplace (PMP) deals.

Bruno Guerrero, COO at Hivestack, said, “The evolving programmatic DOOH landscape has created numerous opportunities for brands, agencies and media owners to leverage the channel to drive meaningful and measurable connections with audiences across the globe.”

Guerrero adds, “We are thrilled to have the opportunity to integrate with the Yahoo DSP to facilitate seamless, efficient experiences for omnichannel marketers to transact across DOOH programmatically, providing access to premium global DOOH inventory and data.”

Interested advertisers and agencies can immediately access Hivestack’s global DOOH inventory through the Yahoo demand side platform.

Iván Markman, chief business officer at Yahoo, commented, “Early in the space, Yahoo has helped advertisers maximise DOOH screens throughout the consumer journey and foster meaningful and memorable connections. This partnership amplifies that ability and provides Yahoo DSP advertisers with the diverse, global and premium OOH inventory Hivestack affords.”

Meanwhile, Barry Frey, president and CEO of DPAA, shared that the out-of-home sector has seen a resurgence in the last year, fueled by innovative creative execution, digital facilitation and a return to ‘normal’. Frey says that they are thrilled to see major players and DPAA Board Members like Yahoo and Hivestack connect to facilitate these interactions between consumers and brands.

Sydney, Australia – Marketing communications agency Bastion Asia has announced a strategic partnership with Shanghai-based PR agency, Adventi, to drive greater digital and marketing innovation for Australian brands seeking to engage with Chinese audiences.

Adventi, a marketing and communications agency specialising in luxury brands, is known for bringing some of Europe’s biggest luxury brands to China, including Patek Philippe, Chanel and Gucci. From its Shanghai base, the Adventi team represents some of the biggest brands who are working to target Chinese consumers including Hermes, Chanel, Sephora, Porsche, Tag Heuer, among others.

Bastion Asia CEO Richard Chapman said the strategic alignment was designed to support the many Australian brands targeting Chinese customers, both locally and abroad.

“Adventi is at the cutting edge of marketing innovation in China and has forged a path into the country for some of the world’s biggest brands. We hope by working together we can help more Australian brands expand into China, while rolling out the latest thinking to our clients targeting Chinese customers based in Australia,” he said.

The Adventi partnership builds on Bastion Asia’s global network, which also includes long-held partnerships with local agencies in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, and The Philippines. Bastion also has operations in the US and New Zealand.

Meanwhile, Adventi Founder and Director Hong Zheng said: “China is an intimidating new market for many global brands, but our experience bringing many of Europe’s biggest luxury brands here demonstrates there is a path forward. We look forward to helping Australian brands speak to Chinese audiences and understand the value in a truly global approach to communications.”

With these partners Bastion Asia services a number of global clients across luxury brands, B2B and horticulture.

Chapman added, “We are on a path to be able to offer our clients an APAC wide and global approach to communications that cherry picks the best independent agencies in each market. This approach makes us nimble and competitive against larger global holding groups and has been well received by many clients.”

Hanoi, Vietnam – Vietnam’s telecommunications network operator, Viettel Telecom, has partnered with international insurtech, bolttech, to launch an insurance offering, which will be powered by bolttech’s insurance exchange platform, on its customer app MyViettel, with products including health, travel, and home, as well as car, and motorbike.

The partnership will see bolttech cooperating with Viettel and reputable insurers to create an insurance ecosystem that offers a range of product options to meet the different needs of Viettel’s customers. In a seamless experience within the MyViettel app, customers can now access the new insurance offering via the home page of the app and view options in a few clicks.

Chien Ta, bolttech Vietnam’s CEO, believes that their partnership with Viettel Telecom, a leading telecommunications provider in Vietnam, is an important milestone for bolttech. 

“By embedding an insurance platform into the Viettel customer experience, we can reach more customers in Vietnam with a choice of insurance to meet their needs and the convenience to access these products in a simple, easy way,” said Ta.

bolttech said that this partnership is another step in its partner-led expansion strategy for the market.

Singapore – Esker, the global cloud platform and AI-driven process automation solutions provider for finance and customer service functions, has partnered with HitPay, a full-stack payment provider offering a full range of payment methods that include credit cards, BNPL and local e-wallets in Asia.

With HitPay, Esker customers in Asia can now offer additional payment options to their customers, such as Paynow, Grabpay, and Alipay. HitPay’s payment solution is fully integrated with Esker’s Accounts Receivable solution, offering a wide range of options to get paid faster by providing additional payment methods that are available throughout Asia.

Aditya Haripurkar, HitPay’s co-founder and CEO, commented, “HitPay is dedicated to helping companies grow with scalable, easy-to-use payment solutions. We’re delighted to partner with Esker and drive the success of businesses around the globe.”

Meanwhile, Albert Leong, Esker Asia’s managing director, said, “We continue to make strategic partnerships for innovative local and global payment solutions to enrich the portfolio of Esker Pay. The partnership with HitPay will provide our customers with additional payment options such as Paynow, Grabpay, Alipay and more.”

Bangalore, India – HiveMinds Innovative Market Solutions, the full-service digital marketing and consultancy firm by Madison World, has recently bagged the digital marketing mandate of Rupeek, India’s asset-backed digital lending platform.

Rupeek aims to democratise access to hassle-free, doorstep credit for all markets and audiences. Currently, Rupeek also operates in the gold loan space. Its investors include Sequoia Capital, Accel Partners, Bertelsmann, and GGV Capital, as well as VEF, and Lightbox.

Rupeek’s spokesperson commented that as they continue to grow and unlock gold-backed credit for a billion Indians, digital marketing will play an important role in driving this momentum further via tech-led gold monetisation (GoMon) in over 120 cities across the country. 

“We are happy to partner with HiveMinds in this digital-led growth,” the spokesperson said. 

Meanwhile, Deepti Bhadauria, HiveMinds’ chief strategy officer, shared that gold asset loan is a $2 trillion opportunity in India, and there is a massive consumer segment looking for access to cheap capital and monetisation of gold assets that can be unlocked using digital marketing effectively. 

“I am happy that we will be partnering with Rupeek, in scaling and building India’s largest digital asset-backed fintech platform,” said Bhadauria.

In January 2022, HiveMinds has also bagged the digital mandate of insurance firm Max Life Insurance to manage its paid marketing portfolio. As part of the mandate, HiveMinds will be responsible for carrying out digital marketing activities across all publishers and platforms for Max Life Insurance including Google, Facebook, and Taboola, as well as Outbrain, amongst others. 

Singapore – Choco Up, a global technology and financial services platform offering revenue-based financing and growth solutions for digital merchants and startups, has announced its strategic partnership with Shoplazza, a global e-commerce Software as a Service (SaaS) platform. The collaboration will provide quick and accessible business growth funding for Shoplazza’s direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands, helping businesses to overcome financing challenges commonly encountered by e-commerce merchants.

The first-ever growth funding partner of Shoplazza, Choco Up’s embedded revenue-based financing solution with a proprietary AI-driven underwriting model will offer funding through the Shoplazza platform in just a few clicks. This will enable more than 360,000 merchants to grow in gross merchandise value (GMV) through inventory purchases, marketing expenditures, and new market expansions across the globe.

Shoplazza empowers merchants by providing all the tools they need to create their online store, freeing them from third-party marketplace platforms and allowing them to grow their DTC brands globally and independently. Its integrated platform helps businesses manage their online stores, including web infrastructure, product sourcing, enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer operations, etc. On top of software-as-a-service, Shoplazza also provides merchants branding, marketing, and other e-commerce-adjacent support.

Choco Up provides quick and easy growth funding to e-commerce merchants without requiring collateral, equity, or fixed terms. For Shoplazza’s DTC e-commerce merchants, there is no need to fill out lengthy applications or go through extensive credit checks to access growth capital. With its proprietary AI and machine learning technology, Choco Up can quickly and reliably conduct the risk assessment for merchants and is able to offer funding in as soon as 48 hours.

A significant pain point faced by many e-commerce merchants is their heavy reliance on third-party marketplaces such as Amazon and Lazada. These platforms pocket commission fees as high as 45% per transaction, putting pressure on sellers’ razor-thin margins. As a result, many e-commerce merchants have adopted the DTC business model, which offers higher margins, more flexibility and a greater Return-On-Investment (ROI). However, this also requires business owners to invest in their website and online store, which can incur substantial costs.

Brian Tsang, Choco Up’s co-founder and COO, said a synergistic convergence of two of Asia’s tech companies embedded financing product partnership between Choco Up and Shoplazza to revolutionize e-commerce funding at scale. Together, the two platforms will provide merchants access to quick and easy business funding to monetize growth opportunities in the dynamic e-commerce landscape and a comprehensive suite of digital-commerce-related support.”

Tsang added, “Teaming up with Shoplazza also enables us to help yet more local businesses expand beyond borders whilst furthering our mission to increase financial inclusion for companies of all sizes and types.”

As opposed to traditional financing methods, Choco Up’s revenue-sharing model – the first of its kind in Asia – allows merchants to easily get growth funding and repay flexibly by sharing a small proportion of their monthly revenue during repayment. Merchants no longer need to worry about overdue payments due to unstable cash flows and are provided with the flexibility and protection against business growth and expansion risks. By extending credit to e-commerce businesses and supporting merchants in their pursuit of global ambitions, Choco Up bridges the gap between e-commerce businesses and growth capital.

Meanwhile, Jesse Huang, the VP of Shoplazza, commented, “Through this strategic partnership, Shoplazza will be able to broaden its range of e-commerce-adjacent support for merchants currently using its software and services. In addition, the funding provided by Choco Up can help many DTC merchants realize their global growth potential.” 

Jakarta, Indonesia – As the digital era poses challenges to businesses which require them to get support from advanced technology to excel in the domestic and global competition, Indonesia’s conglomerate company Salim Group has established a joint venture with technology company WIR Group to develop a metaverse platform that will help them maintain their business leadership and competitiveness, and at the same time drive the development of the metaverse platform in Indonesia. 

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for this strategic partnership was signed by Michel Budi Wirjatmo, WIR Group’s president director, and Axton Salim, Salim Group’s executive director.

Commenting on the partnership, Salim said, “We see that our partnership with WIR Group will bring us great opportunities for the growth and development of our business in the future. Through the adoption of the metaverse platform, we can explore the potentials and business opportunities that are unimaginable before.”

Meanwhile, Wirjatmo thanked Salim Group for its trust to collaborate and establish a joint venture with WIR Group, and underlined WIR Group’s commitment to keeping the trust by presenting leading technology solutions based on the company’s expertise and experience in developing metaverse technologies that have been recognized in many countries.

“We have the capability to build and develop virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and artificial intelligence (AI) that will support Salim Group in entering the borderless digital era through the metaverse technology that we are developing,” said Wirjatmo.

He added, “With our expertise and experience in building and developing metaverse technology since 2009 to complete thousands of projects in the US, Germany, Spain, Nigeria, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Myanmar, WIR Group is confident in assisting the industry, including Salim Group, to enter and explore the metaverse world, to make innovations and breakthroughs, and to optimize every opportunity.”