E-commerce sovereignty picks up with Pantip Mall

Platform eyes site’s large user base

- SUCHIT LEESA-NGUANSUK

The founders and supporters of Pantip Mall unveil details about the platform.

Thailand has begun to explore the concept of local e-commerce sovereignty with the debut of Pantip Mall e-marketplace, as regulators and local e-commerce veterans share growing concerns over the dominance of foreign platforms.

Pantip Mall is slated to launch a beta test in April and May before a grand opening in June.

The mall dubs itself a “local alternative choice” for merchants and consumers, seeking to leverage the huge volume of visitors to the online community website Pantip.com.

The mall debuts as the Trade Competition Commission of Thailand (TCCT) passed new e-commerce guidelines to govern multi-sided digital platforms, which is awaiting publication in the Royal Gazette.

The new rules are meant to increase scrutiny of the platforms and market competition.

“We foresee a structural challenge in Thailand's e-commerce sector, which is dominated by foreign platforms and the increasing burden of various service fees,’ Niwat Chatawittayakul, chief executive of Digithun Worldwide Co, told the Bangkok Post.

Digithun is the technology partner of Pantip Mall and developer of enterprise e-commerce solution ShopSCAPE.

The Pantip website has a massive user base with 2.2 million daily active users and more than 43 million forum threads.