From payments to omnichannel operations, these startups are helping emerging-economy merchants become tech-enabled and take advantage of online shopping.
The race to secure new shoppers is on — and emerging markets might be the ticket.
While economic growth in advanced markets like the US and France is set to see a notable slowdown in 2023, per the IMF, the picture is more positive in emerging markets like China and many countries in Africa.
However, brands and retailers have found it challenging to grow in these geographies at times. While some locations boast alluring market sizes — for instance, in India, retail spending is reportedly set to hit $1.4T by 2026 — the vast majority of retail in these countries takes place in informal, or traditional, channels.
In these small stores, merchants track metrics like inventory and sales in relatively low-tech ways, such as in notebooks, making it cumbersome to gain insight into sales performance or shopper behavior. Additionally, few of these stores sell online.
But digital penetration in these markets is growing, fueling growth in e-commerce and tech-enabled shopping. For example, e-commerce sales in India are set to increase by more than 40% and hit nearly $150B by 2025, according to Insider Intelligence.
Major retailers like Walmart are investing heavily in these markets. Manufacturers including Unilever, Anheuser-Busch InBev, and Coca-Cola have also set up their own digital marketplaces to make it easier for small retailers in these countries to buy the brands’ products for their stores.
Meanwhile, local companies in these countries are playing a central role in solving these tech challenges. They are digitizing store operations as well as making it faster and easier for merchants to sell online and ship their products.
Using CB Insights data, we identified 82 companies in emerging markets that are deploying tech to make traditionally fragmented and informal processes more efficient and trackable — helping retailers and manufacturers sell more.
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