Multiply closes on May 6, ceases all business operations by May 31

Online marketplace Multiply.com will close its services and shut down operations by May 31, 2013.

Multiply.com, an online marketplace has just announced that they will be closing their site this May 6 and ceasing all business operations by May 31. Using the rest of the month of May to handle all accounts, merchants will also receive full payment for all transactions completed on the platform.

Multiply has also said that by closing earlier, it will “also provide [their] merchants with time to find and migrate to alternative ecommerce platforms, settle all payments on items bought and delivered, and to minimize disruption to their businesses.”

While Multiply closed its social networking site last August to focus on its e-commerce platform, now it is shutting down. Why? There has been no formal explanation yet, but Multiply has been mentioned as the top three e-commerce sites in Indonesia. And the scene seems to be doing even better in Asia now than ever. Zalora has recently launched its iPhone app and e-commerce has been said to “show no signs of slowing down”.

So, Multiply divides. Who’s next?

Here is the full announcement from Multiply:

We regret to announce that Multiply will be closing on May 6, 2013 and ceasing all business operations by May 31, 2013.

Multiply will maintain normal site operations through May 6. We will use the rest of May to make sure the all accounts are settled and that merchants receive full payment for all the transactions they completed on our platform. This will also provide our merchants with time to find and migrate to alternative ecommerce platforms, settle all payments on items bought and delivered, and to minimize disruption to their businesses.

Multiply will ensure that you receive all funds you earned on the platform no later than May 31, 2013. We will close the actual marketplace sooner, on May 6, 2013, to ensure that all orders have sufficient time to complete and be delivered to your customers before the end of the month.

Merchants who have premium subscriptions should contact our customer support and we will ensure that they receive a full refund for the un-used time on your subscription.

Image Credit: White Keyboard with Trolley / Shutterstock

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ZALORA iPhone app launched, offers 20% discount across the board

Fashion e-commerce site ZALORA has launched its iPhone application, and offers 20 percent discount across the board as part of its launch promo.

Fashion startups are on the rise in the Asia Pacific, evident with the likes of ZALORA, TheHallyu, BerryBenka, LUXA, and Lovvd, among others. Apart from web applications, mobile seems to be the next frontier for fashion startups. ZALORA, for one, has launched its dedicated iPhone application, and along with this is a program that offers big discounts across the board.

ZALORA’s iPhone application is out, and is compatible with the iPhone 3GS onward running iOS 5 and up. The app lets users browse and buy fashion items, as well as get alerts for any new items and deals.

• Get push notifications on new arrivals and flash sales
• Browse for a quick overview of product information, images, ratings and reviews
• Add items to cart and infinitely save them for later
• Pick from multiple payment methods: Credit Card, PayPal, Cash-On-Delivery

Given that ZALORA’s e-commerce offering caters to localized versions for different countries in the region, the iPhone app will also route shoppers to their respective localized catalogs.

As part of this mobile application launch, Zalora is offering a 20 percent discount across the board for all its products bought from the app. This discount is given through an in-app only voucher code. Given that ZALORA usually has a ceiling of 15 percent for discounts, this is a good opportunity for shoppers who want to try out the app and get a good discount for their purchases.

ZALORA gives a 30-day return policy for items, and delivers free to certain markets. The fashion startup owned by Rocket Internet has a presence in Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Taiwan. ZALORA has also recently launched a loyalty program and same-day delivery for its users in Indonesia.

The ZALORA iPhone app is a free download from the iTunes App Store.

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Southeast Asia’s big media emerges from slumber, finds digital media revolution at its doorstep

While traditional media in the United States have been reeling from the digital media revolution, registering millions in losses, shutdowns, and layoffs, their counterparts in Southeast Asia have been insulated from its devastating effects.

But maybe not for long.

Well aware that the window to adapt is fast closing, the region’s big media are finally getting more serious about investing in technology. Take this recent piece of news as an example: Scoop, a popular digital newsstand in Indonesia, has raised SGD 3M (USD 2.4M) in Series B funding from Kompas Gramedia, the country’s largest media conglomerate.

It’s certainly a good result for Scoop, which previously raised SGD 1M in Series A funding, hinting at a substantial increase in valuation for the company. The service currently has 210k monthly active users, with 90 percent coming from Indonesia.

Willson Cuaca, CEO of Apps Foundry, the company behind Scoop, says that this is the first non-controlling minority stake the media giant has taken in a foreign entity (App Foundry is based in Singapore). Prior to this, Kompas has either been developing its own products or acquiring other companies.

This significant development is no isolated incident.

Singapore Press Holdings (SPH), MediaCorp, and The Star Media Group — dominant in Malaysia and Singapore — have all increased their activities in the digital media space, venturing even beyond internet display advertising, which can hardly replace traditional ad revenues due to the ever-expanding amount of online inventory that’s available.

These three companies also face a more compressed timeline compared to Gramedia: Singapore and Malaysia are somewhat ahead of Indonesia when it comes to tech adoption. Combined with a smaller market in terms of population size, the pressure on them to change is also inevitably much higher.

Besides developing its own online products, SPH has been rapidly diversifying in the past year, investing in restaurant reservation site Chope and acquiring vehicle classifieds site sgCarMart for USD 48M, considered by many to be a fair valuation, and possibly even overpriced.

The company has been facing a slow but steady decline (see graphic below) in newspaper readership, and is counting on its events and property arms to boost its bottom line.

Source: SPH Annual Report 2012

More recently, The Star Media Group, a media conglomerate in Malaysia, has gone a step further — it launched a RM 20M (USD 6M) startup accelerator that focuses on digital media startups. The move has garnered cautious praise from the country’s tech startup players, although some noted that the company might be better off partnering with an existing accelerator instead.

And then there’s MediaCorp, Singapore’s largest terrestrial broadcaster, which firmly believes it can innovate on its own. But its in-house attempts at daily deals and an e-bookstore have been disastrous — both shut down quietly after failing to attract much traction.

It recently started a couple of new ventures. The first is stylexstyle, a hybrid of an online magazine, a Birchbox clone, and an e-commerce store, and while it may yet succeed, MediaCorp’s traditional thinking and top-down management may prove to be its undoing.

The second is Toggle, an on-demand, multi-platform content delivery service that finds itself competing with the likes of mioTV, StarHub, iTunes, and not to mention the wide variety of free content (read: YouTube) that’s already available on the Internet, both legal and pirated.

We may soon see the broadcaster follow the route of its rivals — acquire digital natives with fresh perspectives, seed startups that exhibit great potential, and give in-house innovators more autonomy to made decisions.

It’s an inevitable path for long-standing giants hoping to survive large-scale disruption that is undercutting existing businesses.

But what’s bad news for the media giants is good news for the region’s tech startups. Digital newsstand apps like Scoop and Ookbee are great examples: Both have managed to secure publishing deals with big media who will experiment with anything just to stay relevant.

While the region’s innovators have traditionally suffered from the lack of exit options, we may start to see more traditional media companies act as the ecosystem’s white knights.

The question is whether startups will find themselves running willfully into their arms, or get dragged along kicking and screaming.

At the end of the day, a huge cultural gulf exists between traditional companies and startups: command-and-control versus soft authority, suits versus t-shirts, speed versus caution.

This is precisely why certain startups, even dying ones, have rejected acquisition offers from the big boys: They fear working under neanderthals with fossilized habits and mindsets — the very sort of attitudes they despise.

So, for both parties to profit from a disruptive environment, they’ll need to find a way to compromise.

But I wonder if the local organizations can muster up the will to adapt before its too late.

We’re already starting to see foreign MNCs make a play for regional startups, and my sense is that the most promising entrepreneurs, with their global ambitions and international connections, would rather work with a Japanese company like Rakuten or a global security firm like Gemalto — instead of languishing with dominant, single-market players with nothing much to show on the global stage.

This leaves local players in an unenviable position of fighting over second-tier startups.

Inevitably, geographical barriers-to-entry will give way to globalization’s rising influence. Not even the strongest fortresses can withstand a tsunami when it hits.

Photo: Julian Povey

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XL Axiata introduces seamless payment options for Facebook credits

Facebook users can now pay with prepaid credits when purchasing Facebook credits through XL Axiata.

Back in March, we saw XL Axiata Tbk launch the myXL app that integrates Facebook login and management. Just this week, the Indonesia-based mobile telecommunications services operator that offers data communication, broadband internet and mobile communications, has announced that its digital service department will allow a new payment alternative for Facebook social game players to purchase Facebook credits to acquire in game items.

This service works by giving the option for XL Axiata’s consumers to convert their prepaid credits into Facebook Credits that can be used in-game to purchase items in trending games like the all popular FarmVille and Petville.

A step by step instruction on helping customers convert their credit is listed below.

1. Login into Facebook.
2. Start any game application of your choice (e.g., Farmville)
3. Click on options to add in game credits (they may be listed as crowns, coins and etc depending on the game of your choosing).
4. Select “Mobile Payment” to confirm the amount of credits you wish to purchase.
5. Select “nationality” and proceed to fill in your contact number then choose your mobile operator as XL.
6. Proceed and follow the instructions to confirm your payment which will be sent to your phone.
7. You have successfully purchased your in game credits with your telco credits.

Other than using phone credits, customers may also have the option to use gift vouchers to purchase their in-game currency.

A survey conducted by XL within their customer base has found that out of their 30 million data subscribers, nearly over half of their users — 16 million — are Facebook users within the age of 15-30 years, which is the target age group for the online gaming industry. This finding has sparked XL’s digital service to tap into the gaming industry and is expected to grow 30 to 40 percent within this year.

Source: Daily Social

Image credit: Sneijers

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Apps Foundry lands US$2.42M series B funding

Apps Foundry, a mobile application developer in Singapore and Indonesia, has just announced its S$3 million series B funding.

Apps Foundry, which is best known for its SCOOP smartphone and tablet eReader application, has just raised a S$3 million (US$2.42 million) series B funding. The new funding round is invested by Indonesia’s largest media group Kompas Gramedia, through its Digital Group’s subsidiary, PT Gramedia Digital. Kompas Gramedia runs Indonesian news website Kompas.com as well as Kompas Daily, one of the country’s largest-circulation newspapers.

“This strategic investment will strengthen our already leading position in Indonesia e-publishing industry. The money will be used to extend our presence regionally, develop new products and improve our services to current users. We have a rapid expansion plan in Asia – and our immediate target will be to strengthen our presence in ASEAN countries.” – Willson Cuaca, CEO of Apps Foundry

Read also: Thai e-publishing platform Ookbee inks partnership with Indonesian SCOOP

The investment by Kompas Gramedia is also strategically motivated. Through the investment, magazine publishers and daily newspapers that have a partnership with Kompas daily will join Apps Foundry’s SCOOP e-publishing platform. This means that over 10,000 e-book titles from 7 Gramedia Book Publishers can now be downloaded through SCOOP. Founded in 2010, Apps Foundry now has a team of 30 people in Singapore and Indonesia. Its flagship product, SCOOP, currently supports over 20,000 editions of magazines, books and newspapers in print replica form. SCOOP currently delivers over 1.8 million e-publications annually worldwide. The SCOOP newsstand application has been downloaded to over 650,000 devices such as mobile phones and tablets, with 210,000 monthly active users.

Prior to its series B investment, Apps Foundry has also managed to raise funding from Gobi Partners and Mitsui Global Investments (MGI).

Late last year, we have also seen SCOOP partnering with Thailand e-publishing platform Ookbee. The partnership between Ookbee and SCOOP was announced shortly after their funding announcement of US$2 million at a US$8 million valuation.

Read also: Thailand ebook store Ookbee raises US$2M at US$8M valuation

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Mobile loyalty app Squiryl closes shop, more than 50K users affected

Squiryl has announced its closure, after finding the mobile loyalty platform unsustainable.

One of the verticals we have kept a keen lookout for is the loyalty space. In Singapore, we have seen the rise of loyalty app players such as Perx, and in Indonesia, there are Squiryl and its latest player Pouch. In Malaysia, there is ChopChop and ChopInk.

The loyalty industry has boomed, and we have seen these players trying to capture the market share around the region. However, we have just found out that Squiryl, one of our Echelon 2012 Startup Marketplace alumni, has announced the closure of their service. Here’s the message from its CEO Mulyadi Syariffudin:

Hi Everyone,

It is with the deepest regret that we hereby announce the decision to cease all operations for the Squiryl platform.

The idea for Squiryl first came about in May of 2011. At that time, my Co-Founder Alan Lee and myself were able to raise some funds internally from some friends and families. After 7 months of developments, the first beta for Squiryl was launched in January 2012, and the official platform was launched two months later in March.

During this time, we were fortunate enough to be selected to take part in Demo Asia 2012, Startup Asia, and was also one of the 50 startups selected for the Startup Marketplace at Echelon 2012. By July 2012, we successfully rolled out our POS (Point of Sale) module and was able to work with multi chain brands like Sakae Sushi and Cafe Cartel.

While we were able to grow our user base to more than 50,000 by Dec 2012, one thing became very clear: 1. This is not the model that we wanted to achieve, and more importantly, 2. We could not sustain the model that Squiryl is turning into.

From day one, our vision was for Squiryl to be a self serve model where any merchants that see the benefits of a mobile loyalty platform could just go online, set up their own account, and start using the platform to serve their users. However, as we started rolling out the platform, it became apparent that this will never be the case. What initially was to be a scalable model with little or no sales people involved, became a resource intensive operations involving full time sales and support staff. And that was just the problems on the brand acquisition side. There are then other issues like user acquisitions, infrastructure readiness, etc. All these became more obvious as we started to roll out in Indonesia.

So with this, it has come to the inevitable conclusion that faced with the current situations, Squiryl will not be able to continue to function and serve both merchants and users in a manner we deem proper and professional. As such, I personally feel that the best option is to cease all our operations.

We will officially stop all operations on 15th April 2013. And Squiryl users can redeem any outstanding token before 31st May 2013. Please feel free to email me directly, and I will try to reply as many as possible.

Kind Regards,

Mulyadi Syariffudin
CEO, Squiryl

Read also: Indonesia’s mobile loyalty space heats up with latest entry Pouch

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South Korea’s TheHallyu to ride the Indonesian e-commerce wave

The Korean wave is getting bigger as a new e-commerce service TheHallyu enters the Indonesian fashion e-commerce space.

The so-called Korean wave is now getting into the Indonesian e-commerce space. This time, Kim Min-soo, founder of South Korean daily deals site Ticket Monster (which was acquired by LivingSocial in 2011) is launching a new venture. Dubbed TheHallyu, the new startup is done as a joint venture between local digital strategic intelligence company Inlite Indonesia and South Korea’s Coolink, Ltd. “Hallyu” refers to the “Korean wave,” or the rising popularity of Korean culture and entertainment in media outside the country.

The fashion e-tailer brings its home-grown products — such as Envylook, Shinn and Style Line — to Indonesia, which is its third foray outside of South Korea, after Japan and France.

As of writing, TheHallyu accepts PayPal, bank transfer and credit cards as payment methods, while other modes are on the way, such as Mandiri Clickpay. TheHallyu has also partnered with courier services with proven track records, such as Express Mail Service, DHL and UPS. As such, whatever needs to be delivered gets delivered.

Prior to the decision to tap the Indonesia market, Inlite — led by CEO Citra Yuliasari — conducted a market survey, in which the company saw a huge potential in the Indonesia market for e-commerce.

TheHallyu Indonesia Landing Page

Kim believes that online shopping will be increasing by 45 percent in the next five years, with an average expenditure of IDR 500,000 (US$51.50) per transaction. That makes sense and explains why the products they offer ranging from the price of IDR 250,000 (US$26) to IDR1 million (US$105). Today, free shipping is available for a limited time for purchases with minimum of US$150.

“Based on the research results, the Korean wave in Indonesia is larger than neighbor countries, not only from the scope of entertainment such as music and drama, but also fashion and lifestyle,” Citra said in a statement.

Citra, who was formerly chief sales officer for DealGoing, highlighted that upon launching both companies will have customer satisfaction, payment system and delivery system development as their main priorities.

Besides focusing on the B2C market, the e-seller also plays in B2B. It’s actually the more important aspect of the business, which is their “revenue backbone.” By targeting a certain amount in minimum purchases, the wholesaler and resellers are entitled to a certain percentage of discounts.

In addition to these two programs, they also offer affiliate partnerships to reward publishers and partners for each visitor or customer brought in by outside marketing efforts.

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Movie junkie? Movreak app might just be your thing

Movie app Movreak provides movie information for Indonesian moviegoers.

Some of us might have the sudden urge to hit the cinemas but are often left wondering what movies are actually worth watching. Well, there is an app here to solve your pain. Movreak, created by an Indonesian-based company Dycode, was an award winner for Best Mobile Application on iOS during the Sparx Up Award in 2010.

This app allows users to check the latest movies in Indonesia cinemas, view screening times, view current screened movies, cinemas nearby around users as well as read the ratings and recommendations of movies by other users virtually. Unlike some apps that only allow you to view movie listings by a specific cinema, Movreak screams versatility as it allows you to view movie lists from various cinemas.

Users are greeted with four main menus such as “Now Playing” that provides information about current movies played in the cinemas, “Theater” that provides information on all registered cinemas, “User Reviews” which basically speaks for itself by providing movie reviews by fellow Movreak users and finally, “Profile” that gives users a choice to register in Movreak and further gain full access to other Movreak features.

This app proves useful for everyone especially families whose parents may want to view the suitability and genre of a movie before hauling their underage children to the cinemas. Instead of googling for movie reviews and information which could probably take up more time, Movreak provides complete movie information such as duration of movie, actors, genres, IMDB level, language, scriptwriter, reviews from other users, the availability of the movie and many others. For those who are very much engaged in social media usage, this app also allows users to share the movie info with friends via Twitter, email and SMS.

Movreak is a great and convenient app for movie goers in Indonesia but personally it would be better if it includes the pricing for movies because different cinemas provide different pricing. Nonetheless, this free app is available for download from Windows Phone Store, iOS, BlackBerry, Android and Symbian.

Source: TeknoJournal

Image Credit : Dycode

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Zalora Indonesia introduces express delivery and loyalty program

Fashion e-retailer Zalora Indonesia has launched two new programs starting this month: express delivery and the Zalora Rewards loyalty program.

Zalora Indonesia is launching an express delivery and loyalty program this month, which they believe will sustain their user base, get more fashionistas onboard, and keep providing their consumers with the best fashion forward experience as a one-stop destination for fashion and footwear. These are branded as Zalora Delivery Express or “ZDEX” in short, and Zalora Rewards.

Zalora Delivery Express

ZDEX is basically same-day delivery for Zalora Indonesia users. The new service is valid for orders placed from the Central Business District (CBD) in the Greater Jakarta area and other cities across Indonesia. Other terms and conditions are as follows: products should have special stamps, orders should be placed before 12 noon Jakarta time from Monday to Friday, and cash-on-delivery (COD) as payment method. So far, COD has been implemented by the online fashion store in a total of 57 cities and districts.

For orders booked by customers outside the CBD, Zalora Indonesia promises to ship these in one business day at the most, while for non-Jakarta purchases, the item will be handed over to the delivery partner one business day at the latest, too. The express delivery complements their existing services: free shipping and a seven-day return policy.

This new program applies to Zalora Indonesia’s 30,000 fashion items from 600 brands.

Zalora Rewards

Meanwhile, Zalora Rewards is a loyalty program in which customers are allowed to redeem points they have collected from shopping online with special offers, free shopping vouchers, free gift wrapping, priority services, and two coming-soon features: access to Zalora Shopping Club and Personal Shopper.

Like any other loyalty program, the points are redeemable when these hit a certain threshold, and will be valid within 12 months.

Every customer is entitled to attain basic membership. The more they shop, the more points the customers will get, and the higher membership level they will attain – Silver, Gold, and Platinum.

Zalora Indonesia operates under the legal name of PT. Fashion Eservices Indonesia. On their first anniversary last February, they have managed to get traction from 150,000 visitors with 1,000 to 1,500 daily orders.

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Ade Parulian is Affle’s Ripple new director of sales

Affle Group appoints Ade Parulian as Ripple’s director of sales.

Affle Group recently appointed Parulian Lummy Sitorus (or fondly known as Ade) as the director of sales for its “Ripple” rich media and video ad network business in Indonesia.

Ade, an Indonesian native and having worked in the industry for sixteen years, holds an in-depth understanding of the diverse local market. His wide experiences come from working in various leading digital and traditional media companies before joining Affle Group.

He also held senior positions at Admax Network, Multiply Indonesia, Sun Televisi Network and MTV. Prior to his current appointment, Ade was country lead and sales director at Komli Media Indonesia. At Ripple, Ade’s core responsibilities will include building strategic partnerships to help grow the business and lead advertising sales and business operations in Indonesia.

According to Co-founder and MD of Ripple, Anuj Kumar said that Ade brings a wealth of knowledge and in-depth market experience to the Ripple team in Indonesia. Indonesia has always been one of the most important business markets in South East Asia and building it as a regional operations hub is expected to drive much greater growth for the business. Ade Parulian said that he is very happy and excited to be part of the Affle family and to be given the opportunity to contribute positively towards the growth of the company.

Since its launch, Ripple has grown massively in Asia by delivering over 12 billion monthly ad requests and establishing partnerships with publishers and advertisers in the region. Affle Group  is a Singapore headquartered ‘Smart Media’ company that has expertise in all key areas of the digital media eco-system. The announcement came about as part of Affle Group’s plan to merge Ripple’s regional business operations and build Indonesia as the hub for further South East Asia business expansion. Ripple is Affle’s rich media and video advertising network delivering integrated advertising solutions across all smart screens.

Image Credit : HR Dave

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