Ecommerce sales in five of the largest markets in the Asia-Pacific region will soon surpass all e-retail sales in North America and Europe combined, Forrester Research Inc. has predicted.
Taken together, online retail sales in the five markets — Australia, China, Japan, South Korea and India — are growing rapidly, from $398 billion in 2013 to $858 billion in 2018, a compound annual growth rate of 16.61%, Forrester projects in the report, entitled “Asia Pacific Online Retail Forecast, 2013 to 2018,” by analyst Zia Daniell Wigder.
Forrester predicts e-retail sales in these five Asia-Pacific markets will reach $768 billion in 2017, nearly 17% more than the $658 billion Forrester predicts in 2017 for the U.S., Canada and Western Europe combined. (Forrester has not yet issued 2018 e-commerce projections for the U.S. and Europe.)
The report states that Australian online retail sales will grow 10% per year from $23 billion in 2013 to $38 billion in 2018. Australians buy a lot from foreign online retailers, encouraged both by a relatively small number of domestic players and the fact that the first A$1,000 in purchases made from a foreign retailer enter the country duty-free. Purchases made under this exemption, the government reports, totaled $6.23 billion in 2011-12. More global brands are entering the online space in Australia, taking advantage of the relatively minor localization required for brands that operate in the United States or United Kingdom.
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Tags: Asia-Pacific, Australia, business, online, report
