Indonesia’s largest passenger transport, payments and services company, Go-Jek, plans to expand its presence in additional markets in Southeast Asia within the near future, in accordance with its CEO.
After officially launching services in Vietnam earlier this week, Go-Jek is expanding its operations in Thailand with a localized brand called “GET!”.
Go-jek can be working with regulators in Singapore and the Philippines, Andre Soelistyo told CNBC on Friday.
“Thailand is coming soon… the team is already working on launching the product,” he said, adding that for Singapore and the Philippines, “we are still working on it with local regulators, local teams to make sure that all the requirements are properly checked before we go ahead to expand.”
In early May, Go-Jek announced it could invest roughly $500 million to expand into 4 markets over the subsequent few months. The company said it would offer “technological support and expertise” to local founding teams, who would then work to achieve traction in each of those countries.
The mobile app that launched in Vietnam is known as Go-Viet and is now available in the most important cities of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. Using this app, users can book two-wheel rides and use courier services. The company said it plans to introduce four-wheeler transportation, food delivery and digital payment services on the app in the longer term.
Soelistyo said the choice to launch in Vietnam first was for several reasons, including its cultural similarity to Indonesia and its high social media penetration rate.
“Motorcycle penetration is very high, and this is crucial for our platform,” he said. “We saw a lot of excitement from the local team and local partners, and they really wanted to step it up. We ended up starting with Vietnam.”
According to Soelistyo, Go-Jek’s ultimate goal is to consolidate transactions on its app by constructing recent technologies inside it that may perform various functions comparable to making payments, purchasing goods and services online, and ordering food.
Earlier reports from Singapore suggested that Go-Jek was in talks with the country’s largest taxi operator, ComfortDelGro, to ascertain a partnership before the corporate entered the market. Soelistyo declined to comment on this report and as a substitute said Go-Jek at all times takes a “very partnership” approach.
Go-Jek’s expansion in Southeast Asia has the potential to fill the void left by Uber. Earlier this 12 months, the US technology company sold its regional operations to local competitor Grab.
The two Southeast Asian firms already compete in Indonesia and can now do the identical in Vietnam.
Both firms have significant backers: Grab counts SoftBank, China’s Didi Chuxing, Toyota, global asset management firm OppenheimerFunds and China’s Ping An Capital amongst its investors. Go-Jek, which reportedly raised about $1.5 billion in February, is backed by Google, Singapore’s Temasek Holdings and tech giant Tencent.
Source: CNBC | Gooruf.com
