Lazada, an e-commerce startup owned by Alibaba, sees ‘unprecedented demand’ for online grocery in Singapore amid the coronavirus outbreak

With continued spread of deadly coronovirus all around the globe, many people are now avoiding public places to avoid being infected with the virus. This is a good news for e-commerce and online delivery companies. Today, RedMart, a grocery arm of e-commerce startup Lazada, said it sees “unprecedented demand” in Singapore after a brief period of panic-buying amid the coronavirus outbreak, according to a report from CNBC, citing an email from CEO of Lazada Singapore, James Chang.

There have been a total of 96 confirmed cases of infection in Singapore since noon on Feb. 27, and 66 of them have been discharged. RedMart, Alibaba-owned e-commerce firm Lazada’s grocery arm, said it is “currently seeing unprecedented demand” in the city-state. Shoppers “have been buying 4 to 10 times more food staples, 3.5 to 5 times more paper products, and 2 to 6 times more personal care and household cleaning supplies,” James Chang said.

Founded in 2012, Lazada is the number one online shopping and selling destination in Southeast Asia – present in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Lazada helps more than 100,000 local and international sellers as well as 2,500 brands serve the 560 million consumers in the region through its marketplace platform, supported by a wide range of tailored marketing, data, and service solutions. Lazada offers an excellent customer experience through a wide network of logistics partners and its own first- and last-mile

Lazada, which is now owned by Alibaba, acquired RedMart in 2016 for $35 million, well below the $55 million venture funding that had gone into the company.

Chang said that RedMart’s orders jumped when Singapore raised its disease response level to orange on Feb. 7, following a rise in locally transmitted cases. Orders on the online supermarket exceeded the company’s weekly average by 300% as people rushed to buy in bulk, he said.