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Snacks company Mondelez Philippines has welcomed a new marketing head to support its purpose to empower people to snack right. Toby Gatchalian joins the company, which makes beloved snack products Eden Cheese, Cheez Whiz, Tang, Oreo, Toblerone, Cadbury and Tiger .  

In his new role, Gatchalian will lead a team of more than 15 individuals across all the company’s product categories: biscuits, chocolate, gum, candy, powdered beverages and cheese. The Philippines is one of parent company Mondelēz International’s biggest business in Southeast Asia and is a major growth driver for the business unit. He will report to Southeast Asia senior director for marketing, Nikhil Rao.

Gatchalian comes with 21 years of marketing and sales background in FMCG and banking. He has also taken a turn as an entrepreneur to run his own wellness products business. A graduate of the Ateneo de Manila University, Gatchalian has vast experience working in different countries, having held roles in Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, and the USA.  His leadership promises to strengthen its brands and corporate marketing excellence. 

Globe is set to unpack new offerings to strengthen its leadership in the mobile sector and regain business momentum despite mobility restrictions, as it continues to gear up for increased competition. The company is determined to reinvent its products and services while embarking on a sustained network upgrade and expansion.

As the industry pioneer and leader in 5G technology in the Philippines, Globe has recently launched its 5G roaming services in 16 countries across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Currently in partnership with 17 international telecommunications companies, Globe is set to continue its goal to own the widest 5G coverage worldwide with more upcoming launches in Europe and North America. The 5G roaming service is available to Filipinos traveling internationally, as well as subscribers of select foreign telcos visiting the Philippines.

In a virtual interview with Media Partners Asia Executive Director Vivek Couto during the recent APOS media conference, Globe President and CEO Ernest L. Cu said the telco would roll out new offers for its over 80 million subscribers to address changing consumer behaviors that arose from the pandemic.

“Globe is stepping up its efforts so you will start to see more aggressive offers that will give the people basically more value for their money,” Cu said.

Another first of its kind in the market, the new GPlan with GCash offers maximum flexibility for customers by giving them GCash which they can spend for anything they want and need -- whether it’s gadgets, content subscriptions, shopping vouchers, or even home appliances like robot vacuums. Mobile and life essentials are combined in any GPlan type. Aside from generous data allocations, customers receive unlimited all-net calls & texts, free GoWiFi when in transit, unlimited teleconsultation via KonsultaMD & 3 months insurance coverage via GInsure from Singlife with plan offers like GPlan with Device, GPlan Sim-only, and GPlan with GCash.

London-based Fitch Ratings, meanwhile, said the entry of DITO Telecommunity would further intensify competition in the local landscape. Cu noted, however, that the third player has not yet made a dent on the country’s telco industry.

“Certainly at this point, we don't see that (effect) yet given the very wide disparity in coverage between them (DITO) and the two incumbents,” said Cu. DITO only runs on 4G and 5G networks that cater mostly to data services and not voice calls and SMS.

Globe is further pushing its network rollout which includes site upgrades to 4G/LTE, 5G mobile expansion, and rollout of more Fiber-to-the-Home capabilities. The telco continues to deploy its mobile and broadband services regardless of community quarantine status to address the demand for connectivity which is vital especially during these times of crisis.

Globe At Home has been upgrading its subscribers to higher technology for better connectivity experience. Its latest fiber plan called UNLI FIBER UP provides customers with fast and reliable internet for the whole family’s needs, plus health essential and entertainment freebies. Apart from 3 months' worth of FREE GInsure medical coverage for COVID 19 and dengue of up to Php 140,500, Globe At Home customers may also get 3 months access to 24/7 online and hotline doctor consultation through KonsultaMD as well as 3 months entertainment access to streaming services like Viu Premium, HBO Go, and Amazon Prime Video.

The company has earmarked an unprecedented P70 billion capital expenditure program this year as it aims to deliver first-world internet connectivity for the Filipinos. The budget will be used to build and upgrade more sites and install 1 million fiber-to-the-home lines.

In March of last year when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the country, it instantaneously put a halt to live events, brand launches, and other on-ground activities and mass gatherings.

It was the global event industry’s biggest and totally unexpected challenge , and the Philippines was no different. Many businesses related to events had no choice but to pivot, shift, and find a solution, to survive.

Not all faced a blank wall, though. Some decided to innovate and face the challenge head on.

While others shifted to Zoom webinars and Facebook live streams, Sharon Yu Ong, co-founder and CEO of Waveplay Interactive, Inc., opted for something different.

Although there were available virtual event platforms abroad, their clients were not satisfied with “templated” solutions. Brands and organizers didn’t  want their virtual events to end up looking similar to others. They aspired for their virtual events to closely mimic or replicate the “look and feel” of their on-ground events, from the activities, and experience, to the actual event environment. And this can’t be achieved through cookie cutter solutions.

“Over the past 10 years, Waveplay has been tailoring innovations to create one-of-a-kind experiences for on-ground events, and we were determined to do the same even for virtual events.” Yu Ong says,  as she  brings their interactive experience expertise to the new normal of events by introducing Webplay, the Philippines’ first fully customizable virtual / hybrid events platform, in May 2020. Webplay gives brands and agencies the power to create events with a wide range of interactive features and fun elements not found in other platforms.

“Webplay also allows for tailored immersive environments and journeys, so no two virtual event venues are the same. And, it works from high-end laptops to basic smartphones, even with regular internet connection,” Yu Ong says.

With uniqueness as their battlecry, Yu Ong shares that in a span of 8 months since Webplay’s launch, they were able to successfully produce over 60 unique virtual venues, powered over 300 event days, accommodated more than 700,000 attendees, and created more than 250 custom side activities.

The baptism of fire, so to speak

During the lockdown’s early stages, agencies and brands wanted to stand out with something new and not done before, making them open to suggestions. Yu Ong says, “We shared Webplay to select clients and they liked what they heard—a fully customizable, interactive, Instagrammable, gamified, immersive platform that runs well even on a data plan, is gadget-neutral, and can launch your very own venue in a few weeks. It sounded too good to be true.”

However, Yu Ong believes they couldn’t have captured clients’ attention that easily. They had to share a link to a fully functional virtual event microsite with all their promised features and let them experience it on their own—unguided. To their amazement, clients liked what they saw and booked Webplay for their major events.

With a number of successful case studies shortly after Webplay’s launch, other brands came in. New clients likewise signed up based on their experience as actual attendees of virtual event spaces that Waveplay produced.

Challenges came to the fore

Yu Ong knows that going from “live” to “virtual” events has its share of challenges.

When it comes to virtual or hybrid events, downtimes, no matter how short, can cause “palpitations,” as Yu Ong succinctly describes it, to any organizer. This is where having expert back-end and cloud engineers are crucial to ensure that the infrastructure is excellently stable, she explained.

Waveplay’s on-ground team wasn’t exempted from the virtual transformation, too. They were upskilled to become eagle-eyed testers, live help desk representatives, and livestream troubleshooters. “We also created multiple permutations of the virtual event realm to ensure that everything is cascaded well across different gadgets and browsers; all things considered, clients’ short lead times never changed.”

During their first presentation of Webplay, Yu Ong did not anticipate booking 2,500 attendees  for a virtual venue project that is 12 days away. It took a while for them  to receive the final artwork and directions.

Then came another “good problem” when they were awarded another project with different features, but happening just 10 days after the first one. Waveplay worked on both projects in parallel. “We understood that our agency partners were doing this for the first time as well, so we did a lot of handholding from brainstorming, database and materials checking, to operations on the live day.”

Both events turned out successful, the brands received rave reviews, “and we continue to work with them on their lineup of events this year.”

Raising the game

With the first events going smoothly, Yu Ong looked at how they can raise their level of expertise even further to impress more clients and for better efficiency of their production processes. Soon, they could brew up to six ultra-custom venues simultaneously.  She says, “We are still in the pursuit of improvement and innovation via new interactive features with the aim to continue surprising our partners and event attendees.”

Most of their events are usually for FMCG brands, telecommunications companies, medical, and non-government organizations. “We have been able to successfully replicate various types of events from product launches, expos, selling events, medical conferences, tech conventions, student caravans, and activations. We have done seasonal events as well.”

Post-Covid events industry

Yu Ong expects that once it’s completely safe to go out, live events will come back as fast as they were halted. However, she also points out that the advent of virtual platforms has opened the eyes of clients to the potential of scaling events exponentially. It enables access from anywhere in the world, increases attendee capacity, extends availability of the event on demand for those who missed the live dates, and provides comprehensive data of guest activities. The next frontier event agencies will look at is how to go hybrid, so guests can choose to attend from the comforts of their couch or inside the physical venue.

With physical gatherings imminent, Waveplay is already working on new on-ground interactive ideas, including contactless options. Considering the ongoing pandemic, they have been tapped to do mall activations and smaller corporate events centered on touchless interactions.

Yu Ong says, “Our drive for continuous innovation has allowed us to continue providing clients limitless possibilities in the events and activations landscape. And it will only get better.”

Livestream shopping has slowly gained momentum in the local market pre-pandemic, but the COVID lockdowns have further propelled its growth.

Livestreaming e-commerce, or popularly known as "Livestream shopping," is promoting and selling goods through influencer streams on their social media channels, most often housed on online shopping marketplaces. Industry experts dubbed it as Home Shopping 2.0, with more charismatic, trendy hosts moderating an entire program that is part infomercial and part variety show.

Livestream shopping is an innovative way for brands to gain awareness and move excess inventory. It also enables small local businesses from online sellers to independent farmers reach customers, which is very important in light of the COVID lockdown restrictions.

One of the first local companies that jumped into this trend in 2019 is Shoppertainment Live Inc., a tech-enabled livestream shopping network for e-commerce and social media that helps brands generate real results on real time. It acts like a virtual shopping network where customers can shop and be entertained at the same time

According to Hiyasmin Neri-Soyao, CEO of Shoppertainment Live, "Shoppertainment comes from two words— shopping and Entertainment."

Their team creates entertaining live shopping streams for brands that will help people to shop smart, so they just add-to-cart. They deliver the whole marketing experience from awareness, engagement, to sales for every livestream session bringing their influensales™ mindset. They described Influensales™ as all about having an influencer's ability to engage, inform and entertain, while having the salesman mindset to sell products and understand every product's unique features and benefits.

Soyao, a former O Shopping host and TV actress, explained that Shoppertainment Live creates a Homeshopping 2.0 experience for brands and their consumers. "It's essentially a "broadcast network hat works with companies and brands to sell their products through livestreams," she explained.

Building a makeshift studio in her partner's chat support office, Shoppertainment Live started by doing livestreams on Lazada, signing-up brands who were willing to try out the relatively new e-commerce tool. It didn't take long before they perfected the concept, and they started attracting more clients.

By 2020, the company put up its own livestream studios and started hiring more people. "We knew we were doing something right when we were reaching an average of 20 streams per month and had to grow the team from six employees to 30 immediately. We also increased our studio capacity to meet the demands. We started with an average of one to two campaigns per month and increased to 200 percent by the end of 2020," she claimed.

Hiring the right talent was also key strategy for the company. Seasoned professional from the broadcast industry, Lawrence Lee, who has over 15 years’ experience in TV, currently leads the production team and brought in the foundational practices of broadcasting. Paired up with people from the events industry who know the intricacies of a live event with similarities with a Livestream, Thei Vitug from Viva events joined in to lead the accounts team. Asked why they joined the company, both saw this as an opportunity to establish a new innovative industry.

Research and development lead JB Operario said that the industry is always evolving: “I might know so much about livestreaming at this point but I will never know enough. Every day is a new opportunity to learn something new in order to improve our already competitive services.”

Shoppertainment Live has done over 1,000 live streams since its inception and has worked with more than 70 local and multinational brands. The company has also worked with some of the country's top celebrities and influencers and has been part of award-winning e-commerce and marketing campaigns for multinational brands in more than a year in the business. Soyao told, "The need for live streams during the quarantine increased, and we knew that we were already equipped with the right production skills needed by the brands who were pivoting to digital."

Livestream shopping is proven to be a pandemic-proof response for heavily affected industries like below-the-line advertising and activations sectors.

"BTL and activations-reliant consumer brands didn't know how to pivot their marketing game when lockdown and social distancing took place. We empowered these brands and companies to shift from their traditional "promodizing" method (usually done inside malls) to doing it via live streaming," Soyao pointed out.

Shoppertainment Live sees this as an ongoing trend, even if things get back to normal. “They say it takes 30 days to make a habit, it’s been over a year, live streaming is already part of our commercial lifestyle. The pandemic has indeed accelerated the livestream consumption behavior and accelerated the growth of our industry. Currently, we are expanding capacity, studio space and workforce. Our mission is to challenge ourselves even more and hit our target of doing 9,000 livestream sessions in 2021,” she added.

Online sales for FMCG did not stem from increased spending by existing online buyers but from the rising numbers of households buying online and from increased frequency in buying and spend. According to NielsenIQ, a global measurement company, this signals the end of the beginning of e-commerce in Asia.

NielsenIQ, warns retailers that as e-commerce transitions to the next phase, there are five challenges that retailers need to face:  greater fragmentation in retail, redefining of the role of physical stores, divergent realities, increased fight for consumer attention, and the race to last-mile fulfillment.

“We have entered the end of the beginning of e-commerce in Asia and those who rest now will sleep through the most formative time of growth for e-commerce,” states Vaughan Ryan, Nielsen IQ’s consumer intelligence managing director in Asia.

“The technological advancements and creativity of the last decade have made the retail world more advanced—leading to an environment where trust is solidified, where it is more than logistics but more about pushing the envelope on personalized discovery and curation, where there is exploration of new categories, and seamless omnichannel integration.”

While e-commerce has been viewed to transform retail, Covid-19 accelerated its trajectory to its readiness to transition to the next phase.

The growth in the Philippines is the most dramatic due to stricter movement controls in 2020, recording +325% increase in households shopping online. NielsenIQ further notes that 67% of consumers who have purchased online plan to continue to buy online even after quarantine restrictions are removed.

“This signals a more permanent transition towards a brick-and-click shopping behavior where both formats influence the final purchase decision,” say Pauline Jill Uy-Yu, NielsenIQ’s consumer intelligence head in the Philippines. “As consumer  habits continue  to  evolve, it's important for retailers to track performance versus competition or risk becoming obsolete to the omni-shopper."  

Integrated PR solutions agency Ripple8 recently announced the promotion of Michelle “Mich” Ople to managing partner.

Joining Ripple8 nearly four years ago as Media Relations and Activations Director and concurrently serving as such, Ople is a familiar name in the quad media of TV, radio, print, and online.

Her many years as a journalist proved instrumental in continuing to build relationships with Ripple8’s media partners and clients at a time of shelved campaigns and curtailed budgets since the pandemic started in 2020.

Ople also plays an important role in Ripple8’s Crisis Management team where she helps assess and manage issues with immediate, data-based recommendations and media intelligence.

More recently, Ople helped expand Ripple8’s media coverage to the international community for the Department of Tourism (DOT), helping build strategies to keep the country’s tourism sector relevant to targeted emerging markets. This, despite the current lull in leisure travel, is made possible through strategic relationship-building initiatives, and innovative visits using virtual technology and other efforts.

“Mich has been an integral part of Ripple8’s strategic growth and continued success by fortifying our relationships with media to the extent that what we have with them are no longer transactional, but rather personal – almost familial – relations. And this benefits not just us, but our clients,” said Ripple8 head and managing director Bobby Vito. “This promotion is merely a formality. In the years that I’ve worked with her, she has acted as a partner long before she received the title.”

The public relations arm of DDB Group Philippines, Ripple8 is one of the most sought-after PR firms in the country, with a clientele that includes energy and water utilities, telecom, QSRs, consumer staples, beverages, mass transportation, airlines, healthcare, banking and finance, resorts and hotels, government agencies, and even the globally famed Miss Universe Organization.

As Cebu’s domestic economy prepares for gradual reopening, mobility and on-demand delivery services will continue to play their roles in driving economic activities across various industries and supply chains. Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corporation, the Philippines’ longest-running energy company, and Grab Philippines, Southeast Asia’s leading super-app, have come together to provide support to Grab’s driver- and delivery-partners who play a key role in supporting Cebu’s longer-term socio-economic recovery through safe and reliable mobility and delivery services.

Pilipinas Shell and Grab Philippines will collaborate on a range of initiatives benefiting thousands of Grab driver- and delivery-partners in Cebu, helping them save up on their daily expenses and maximize their earnings on the Grab platform.

● Through this partnership, Grab driver- and delivery-partners in Cebu will be able to enjoy exclusive fuel discounts at Shell stations, and avail budget-friendly rice meals in Shell Select Stores as low as PHP 30.00.

● Grab delivery-partners will no longer need to queue behind other cars and vehicles, as Shell has also dedicated special biker lanes to ensure that their vehicles are well-conditioned to continuously serve the consumers and support merchant-partners in Cebu.

● To support their medical consultation and insurance needs, select Grab driver- and delivery-partners - who have maintained a monthly average re-fuel of 200 Liters and 50 Liters, respectively, for at least six months, can also qualify for insurance and telemedicine services via the Shell Go+ Pro Loyalty Program.

● Lastly, Grab driver- and delivery-partners in Cebu may also apply for Shell-subsidized scholarships for their children - easing their worries on tuition fees and allowing them to make the most from their earnings on the Grab platform.

By providing meaningful support to Grab’s driver- and delivery-partners in Cebu, Pilipinas Shell and Grab Philippines aim to encourage and motivate driver- and delivery-partners to be on the road and help local businesses continuously serve their consumers - opening up revenue streams for these enterprises that are just getting back on their feet.

“We welcome this opportunity to partner with Grab Philippines to help restore mobility and reinvigorate the economy of Cebu,” said Randy Del Valle, Pilipinas Shell’s Vice President for Retail and General Manager for Mobility. “We recognize the important part that their Grab driver and delivery-partners play in restarting businesses and bringing essential goods and services to the public in a safe and reliable manner. Pilipinas Shell is committed to this partnership which will help mobilize this city’s progress and economic recovery for years to come.”

“We are committed to supporting the needs of our driver- and delivery-partner communities in Cebu as they play an essential role in helping local businesses better reach and serve their consumers, and providing safe transport services to many Cebuanos who need to be in their workplaces to perform essential economic activities. By working together with Pilipinas Shell on a range of meaningful initiatives, we are able to continue helping our driver- and delivery-partners with their everyday needs, and we hope that they will continue to be on the road to serve the needs of our countrymen in Cebu, and contribute to the city’s broader socio-economic recovery,” said Grab Philippines Country Head Grace Vera Cruz.

The pandemic has resulted in new consumer behaviors emerging in the Philippines, where more Filipinos are starting to go on digital commerce platforms and make cashless payments.  According to Visa’s latest Consumer Payment Attitudes study, 52% of Filipinos shopped online through apps and websites for the first time during the pandemic and 43% of them made their first online purchase using social media channels.

Online shopping activity has also increased in the past one year based on the research findings. Close to nine in 10 Filipinos have increased their online shopping activities on websites or apps, whilst seven in 10 are shopping more on social media channels. More than half of the consumers are also more inclined to shop from large online marketplaces (53%) and home-based businesses (61%). These new shopping preferences might turn into habits that last beyond the pandemic.   

The study also showed a large user base who started ordering home delivery, likely due to lockdowns or movement restriction order in the country during the pandemic. More than nine in 10 Filipinos used home delivery in the Philippines and 67 per cent of them increased their use of home delivery services.

“The pandemic has transformed the way Filipinos shop and pay. Based on the latest highlights from our annual Visa Consumer Payment Attitudes study, we see the adoption of new consumer behaviors, including more Filipinos using digital commerce platforms and helping to accelerate the usage of digital payments in the country. Based on Visa’s data, we see double-digit growth for eCommerce transactions for purchases on marketplaces and digital goods. In addition, one in four active Visa cardholders made their first eCommerce purchase during first half of last year. Categories that they made their initial purchases include food and groceries, bill payments, and pharmaceutical products,” said Dan Wolbert, Visa country manager for the Philippines and Guam.

Pre-pandemic, more than seven out of 10 payments were made using cash compared to current usage of five out of 10. This trend of consumers carrying less cash is similar in other Southeast Asia countries. Filipinos cited using more contactless payments (73%), perceiving cash as unsafe because of the potential spread of infection (54%) and more places adopting digital payments (50%) as the top reasons for carrying less cash. In addition, Filipinos see bill payments (81%), grocery shopping (71%), and overseas travel (68%) as the top categories where they would likely go completely cashless in the future.

The study also showed that contactless payments had a 66% increase in usage amongst current users due to the pandemic. In addition, 88%  of Filipinos who had not used contactless payments stated interest in using this payment method in the future. Top benefits perceived by Filipinos for usage of contactless cards include not having to carry cash with them (88%), feeling safe from infection (75%), and being an innovative payment method (68%).  

“Based on Visa’s data, contactless transactions have been increasing steadily month-on-month in the Philippines since August last year.  We believe that contactless payments will continue to grow as Filipinos appreciate the benefits of contactless payments, including perceiving this payment method to be more hygienic due to the absence of physical interaction at point-of-sale. Even though we’ve made progress in digital payments adoption, there remain huge opportunities for us to encourage more Filipinos to embrace digital payments as we look to expand digital payments acceptance across the country,” added Wolbert.

In the hope that the pandemic will soon be under control, consumers see travel as the top category that they most look forward to spending on when borders reopen. The study showed that 30% of Filipinos look forward to domestic travel and 22%   would like to spend on international travel post COVID19.

Served Manila was tapped to help mount “Fiesta Filipinas: An Online Celebration of Philippine Festivals” launched last December 2020 by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) in cooperation with the Department of Tourism (DoT) and National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA).

Aiming to introduce and showcase Philippine festivals, culture, and traditions to a global audience, this six-part online event series simulates the experience of a Filipino festival through the combination of live performances, pre-recorded videos, and interactive workshops.

“We’re hoping to bring the experience of Philippine fiestas closer to people’s hearts by making them feel the fiestas,” DFA Executive Director Marie Yvette Banzon-Abalos emphasized.

Fiesta Filipinas is completed with a customized fiesta kit for each festival which includes Filipino delicacies, culture representation, and activities, carefully curated by Served Manila, a local pioneer in experiential online events.

The Halal-certified delicacies featured in the kits come from SMEs and local brands like Malagos Chocolates, Bong Bong’s Delicacies, Cebu Best Dried Mangoes, Gourmet Farms Coffee, Oh So Healthy Snacks and Orich International Malunggay Juices.

“We are excited to bring our exploration kits to people around the world, and showcase the best of Philippine culture, traditions, and even food! It warms our hearts to see foreign nationals smile and hear them say that they are excited to see the Philippines in the future,” says Served Manila chief explorer, Alan Fontanilla.

These kits are delivered to 94 foreign service posts across the world—an immersive invite for foreign tourists to visit the country when conditions are more favorable.

“There’s the taste, the aroma. There’s the sensation of doing things. And everything actually equates to, “Go to the Philippines if you want more,” DoT Undersecretary Roberto Alabado III expressed when asked about the program’s impact on tourism.

Fiesta Filipinas has created a community of foreign nationals and Filipinos overseas looking forward in experiencing the actual festival themselves.

“This is the first time that I have an online celebration like this which is really a great experience for me,” Jennie, a virtual bisita who attended the Sinulog, Ati-atihan, and Dinayang event from Vietnam said.

Another bisita noted that the experience was “absolutely amazing”. “I felt like I was there but I have never been there before,” said Dionte from New Zealand when she attended the Panagbenga virtual fiesta.

Currently gearing for the other fiestas scheduled, the DFA, together with its partner agencies and with the help of Served Manila and its video production and streaming partner Sinematika, Fiesta Filipinas continues to evolve the activities to bring the full Filipino fiesta experience around the world.

The global pandemic has significantly changed the way retailers promote and sell their products. With more Filipinos using digital platforms and transitioning to cashless transactions, businesses need to quickly adapt in order to gain and maintain customer loyalty.

As the Philippine government recognizes the increasing importance of eCommerce in the country, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) recently updated its eCommerce roadmap and highlighted speed, security, and infrastructure as the three main pillars to drive industry development, long-term employment, and inclusive growth. The updated DTI eCcommerce roadmap features the key timelines in 2021 that will contribute to the growth that the industry is currently experiencing, and mentions major players in the Philippine eCommerce architecture. It also outlines the integral role that online platforms like Shopee, the leading eCommerce platform in Southeast Asia and Taiwan, and Shopee’s mobile wallet, ShopeePay, play in encouraging Filipinos to slowly embrace digital transactions.

Martin Yu, Director at Shopee Philippines, said, “Shopee continues to evolve and grow as a company not only for our consumers but also for our business partners, such as brands and MSMEs. They are integral to our business and we will continue to support them through various initiatives, partnerships, and in-app innovations. As eCommerce continues to grow at an unprecedented pace, we want to equip our partners with the right tools to serve Filipinos with ease.”

Shopee’s goals and initiatives to support brands and micro, small-and-medium enterprises (MSMEs) on their digital journey are in line with DTI’s eCommerce roadmap strategies. This formula is something Shopee can readily provide to brands and MSMEs, to help them succeed in the digital space. Shopee makes it simpler and easier for brands and MSMEs to adjust to the new DTI eCommerce roadmap with its current ecosystem. With its marketing and logistics tools, mobile features for both sellers and consumers, and digitalization efforts, Shopee gives all its users a smooth online shopping and selling experience.

Shopee also continues to form partnerships with other organizations to offer initiatives to encourage brands and MSMEs to go digital. These include the recent TatakPinoy Virtual Trade Fair, seller masterclasses that offer training to allow MSMEs to on-board easily on the platform, and the launch of new in-app features within Shopee Live, such as co-streaming. All these opportunities are created to help brands and MSMEs broaden their market audience, and embrace digitalization as a whole.

Yu adds, “Shopee is encouraged to see DTI moving swiftly to set the direction of growth for the industry, this helps to ensure that everyone stands to benefit from eCommerce in the long run. As a leading player in the industry, we'll do our part to support DTI's efforts and support businesses.”