測高計增長

2023年1月19日

“由於在SPAC上市，Grab獲得了大量現金注入，”Momentum Works首席執行官李江幹在周二的在線新聞發布會上表示。“因此，與主要參與者相比，他們可能擁有最好的現金狀況。”李指的是這家新加坡獨角獸公司於2021年12月在美國首次公開募股，通過與特殊目的收購公司Altimeter Growth合並，使其在作為公開交易實體的第一天收盤時市值達到約346億美元。像Altimeter這樣的SPACs公司，也被稱為空白支票公司，首先通過IPO籌集資金，然後收購或合並現有業務，將其推向公開市場，而無需經曆傳統的、通常耗時的上市過程。通過SPAC的路線，Grab得以籌集大量資金，通過其超級應用程序擴大業務。該應用程序在東南亞的一個移動互聯網平台上提供廣泛的數字服務——從叫車到金融，再到送餐。但Momentum Works的報告顯示，這種擴張可能正在達到一個轉折點。COVID-19大流行帶來了一波外賣業務的增長，因為被封鎖的消費者轉向數字服務來滿足他們的需求。從2019年到2020年，東盟主要市場的外賣行業總市值飆升了183%，一年後又增長了30%。去年從155億美元增長到163億美元，僅增長了5%。報告稱，印尼、泰國和新加坡的數據均有所下降。 Momentum Works noted that for the first time in three years, growth was driven primarily by the region’s smallest food delivery markets including the Philippines, Malaysia and Vietnam, as Southeast Asia gradually opened up from COVID restrictions. Under pressure to carve out a path to profitability, existing and new food delivery players have continued to cut back on subsidies and compete based on service quality, the report highlighted. It reflected the loss-making positions of startups like Grab, which have gone on massive fundraising stints to fuel growth and acquire customers in a bid for market dominance, but have not demonstrated an ability to deliver consistent profits. The report noted that Shopee, a unit of Singapore technology giant Sea, has scaled back its ShopeeFood thrust to focus on making its core e-commerce business profitable after a surge in investment in food in 2021. Like Grab, Sea has been posting losses in the hundreds of millions of dollars. While cutting subsidies and incentives in the food delivery space is an obvious action for platforms to improve margins, Momentum Works’ noted that in a competitive environment, this might be hard to achieve as such moves could yield market share to still-spending competitors. Traditionally, food delivery platforms generate revenue via commissions from merchants and delivery fees. The report highlighted that in recent years, players are exploring non-commission revenue, through subscription packages and advertising for instance, to produce income as rivals continue to compete for market share. “At the end of the day there will be one or two large platforms which can cover the whole sector,” Momentum Works’ Li said on Tuesday. “A smaller player will be kept alive by the other parts of the ecosystem—nobody wants to see one player dominant.” This article first appeared on Nikkei Asia . It has been republished here as part of 36Kr’s ongoing partnership with Nikkei . Share