A conference discussing coaliation in HCM City.

Launched by Yeah1, a digital media- and media technology-focused company, MEGA1 is a sale revenue performance platform which seeks to stimulate consumption and help many brands sustain revenues through media commercial solutions including how to sell and save marketing costs.

It connects brands with consumers, takes advertisement campaigns to customers, organizes contests and other promotions for the brands, enabling them to optimise advertising costs while customers stand to win prizes in the contests offered on the app.

It has tied up with some major names like Viettel, Vinaphone, Lotte, BIDV, Prudential, Be, and Samsung Pay.

Recently it collaborated with Tan Hiep Phat Group to offer customers prizes worth VND69 billion (US$2.9 million) and with Dai Viet Group for prizes of VND38 billion ($1.6 million).

MEGA1’s success underlines the fact that Vietnamese companies are embracing coalitions to overcome the challenges posed by the pandemic.

In MEGA1’s case, the coalition involves brands, media and tech companies who are exploiting each other’s strengths such as customer data, market and technological capacity.

Such coalitions have become imperative also because of the trend of digitising. Though not a new story and has been discussed for years, the pandemic outbreak has made digitising an urgent requirement since social distancing is changing customers’ habits and more and more are switching to online services.

E-commerce company Shopee said: “The retail landscape in Viet Nam has been transformed by increased social distancing efforts as the community combats the spread of Covid-19. As a result, brands and sellers are venturing online in search of growth, while consumers turn to e-commerce to meet their shopping needs. On average, people are spending 25 per cent more time on Shopee every week.”

Nguyen Anh Nhuong Tong, chairman of Yeah1 said, “More people are buying online and this is both an opportunity and a challenge for traditional companies.

“In order to bring products to customers, these companies have to transformed or co-operate with companies that are strong in technology to create a new eco-system.”

Ly Truong Chien, chairman of TriTri Group, said that companies in Viet Nam are making efforts to overcome the pandemic-induced difficulties with many of them restructuring.

For instance, a fashion company has started to make face masks while other companies have switched from a business-to-business to a business-to-customer model, he said.

“Using the internet and apps enables companies to optimise their business during the COVID-19 pandemic. But most of the Vietnamese companies are micro, small and medium-sized enterprises and so their ability to set up their own platform is limited.

“Spreading one’s resources too thin will not be effective, and so an eco-system is required so that companies can support each other and develop together.”

Globally, such coalition models are being created in many countries.

In Japan, for instance, Tpoint, which has 68 million members, connects 900,000 stores and created revenues of over $63 billion a year.

In Viet Nam the economy has taken a hit from the pandemic with over 34,900 companies suspending operations in the first quarter, 12,200 closing down and 4,100 going bankrupt. — VNS