December 19, 2025 • 13 mins
How will the $32 Billion AI Agent market change APAC Retail?
In this episode, Ngai Yuen Low (AEON360) and Ryf Quail (Comexposium) reveal why your product pages need to be "machine-readable" by 2028 and how TikTok Shop is evolving beyond fashion.
🔥 Topics & Timestamps:(00:41) The "Wrapped" Strategy: Creating shareable retail moments(03:30) AI Shopping Agents: The $32B forecast for APAC(08:15) TikTok Shop: Moving beyond beauty into serious commerce(11:17) Subscription Retail: Lessons from Coupang & L'Oreal
👤 Connect with the Guests:
Ngai Yuen Low: [Insert LinkedIn URL]
Ryf Quail: [Insert LinkedIn URL]
🔗 Mentioned in this episode:
AEON Group: [Link if you have one]
Comexposium: [Link if you have one]
🎙️ About The Retail Podcast:We help retailers and vendors cut through the noise to find what actually works. Hosted by industry veterans, we cover the real ROI of tech, from AI agents to the future of luxury.
👉 Subscribe for more APAC insights:https://retailnews.ai/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello, I'm Reef Quail, Managing Director of NRF AIPAC, and this
is Five things Friday AIPAC Edition.
Hello. Hello everyone.
(00:21):
Hello everyone. Lovely to see you all.
It's a special time of the year.We're just a week away from
Christmas and the New Year's, but we want to be respectful and
dive straight in. So you and why don't you kick us
off? OK.
And that depends on what pictureyou're going to pull out first,
and then I'm going to start my story that way.
(00:42):
I've got to start with this one.Yeah, just unbelievable.
Yes, as we wrap the years with all kinds of data and also all
kinds of insights, we have the infamous Shopify.
No, there's no shopping, right, This is.
Spotify. Qualified.
Oh my God, I'm like, so commerceSpotify rap, right?
(01:02):
Is this yours, Ewan? I know it's embarrassing.
Well, no, I'm proud of. No, no, I've had a whole new,
I've had a whole new insight on your character.
Please continue. So actually, I just wanted to
say that Spotify having launchedtheir rap every single year and
how it has actually created traction so much, I think
retailers should be smarter to use how Spotify rap is and how
(01:27):
collaborating with them can actually leverage conversations,
talk about from trend jacking totying in the different kind of
culture. So that conversation actually is
quite important and we're not hearing enough.
So this is really be a really good example and we can't, to be
honest, I can't stress on how more important shareability
(01:50):
really is. And this is me.
I'm 85 years old, as you can tell from my listening habits.
So we want is. That what you you had 85.
I know, but you know, I'm a really special person.
So there is this really interesting a company where they
talk about when you purchase something, we will actually wrap
(02:12):
your products, give it like thatgift wrapping with Spotify's,
your Spotify's, you know, inside.
And I think that's amazing. So you could print your own
Spotify raps like literal, like literal.
And then you could, you could share and give it away.
And it's not just online share now it's actually gone into
(02:33):
offline sharing. So I think this is certain ideas
that I, I really do think that retailers aren't aren't really
leveraging enough so that we have.
Oh no, I love it. I love it.
My, my, What's your listening adrieve?
19. I got 19, mine was 55 zero.
Alexis, there's 19. How is that possible?
(02:57):
Maybe he's listening to. Stuff like that.
That's because his his children have hijacked his Spotify and
he's lost. He's lost control.
Yeah, no. Yeah, OK.
That I can accept. OK.
All right. So moving on to you, Sir Reef.
Right. So this week I'm going to talk a
little bit about a couple of phenomena.
The first one I'm going to talk about is AI shopping agents in
(03:19):
Asia Pacific. So AI everyone's got, everyone's
sort of grappling with the content of our shopping agencies
and they're not that's, you know, they're not that foreign
to us. We're probably using them every
day. And in fact, it's estimated that
something like $32 billion worthof by 2028 will come via AI
agents shopping on behalf of consumers in APEC.
(03:40):
But in 2028, what we're seeing here is a situation where
there's lots of them. The use cases now, they seem
really simple and mundane, but we are actually using them every
day. So things like the use cases I
would identify things like personalised product discovery
and recommendations like I find sneak at under $120.00 that look
good with office casual wear or something like that, you know,
(04:01):
or, or things like conventional Q&A.
So you're actually making it conversational.
So I'm looking at this fishing rod and then say is it good to
fish in freshwater or saltwater?I don't know.
There you go, there's another one or autonomous.
So people are thinking about howautonomous agents are working in
their home. So you've run out of milk and
(04:21):
your fridge orders you the new milk.
So they're working on your, these agents are working when
you need replenishment of your food, for example, price
monitoring and deal optimization.
Good one is I'll buy that laptopif the price drops under when
you, when a deal pops up that laptop's under $900, just buy
it. So the agents are operating on
(04:42):
behalf of the consumer. And then there's complete end to
end, so full of Genting ecommerce where it's booking
travel, accommodation, add-ons in one flow.
Or it's, you know, you, you go, you give it a brief.
I'm gonna buy a gift for Alec. And he, he's this fella and
he's, these are his interests and the whole, the agent goes
out and buys the gifts and takesit to you.
And then you can say I don't like the gift and I'll manage
(05:02):
all the return and exchanges andall the refunds autonomously
without any human interview. So these things are real.
Now in the Asia Pacific region, these are classic use cases.
You know, the bigger, and I'll probably touch on the big agents
in the, and out in the region. We're seeing probably the the
major AI shopping agents assistants in the regions.
Obviously China, you can't start, you can't it stop starts
and stops with China. So Alibaba and Taibo the the the
(05:26):
generative AI shopping within Alibaba.
It's a Taibo e-commerce platformis is pretty amazing to discover
new products. Shopping is is basically
delivering their integrations with it gives you obviously
personalised suggestions and recommendations through the AI
tool through the agent Michelle in India, it's all chat and
voice AI agent so you can talk to it and actually start to
optimise your what you're looking for and then Visa that
(05:49):
as in the credit card is a really a launched intelligent
commerce extended extended to Asia Pacific.
So and so there are credit cardsso you're not seeing obviously
right across the region, but you're seeing it happen in
pockets where credit cards are used.
So there's some really good examples but where agent people
are using agents all the time and they're even building it.
I mean you can if you're if you're really dab hand at
(06:10):
ChatGPT or one of the other platforms, you can build your
own agent and do it from scratchyourself within the platform.
So you know by by 2020 eight $32billion you US in APAC region
fire agents, it's not insignificant talking about a
lot of agents that are operatingcompletely outside.
One of the things I would say too is it because the region is
very mobile LED you it starts and starts and Oval that.
(06:34):
So the natural, the natural use of agents through mobile digital
devices is accelerating really, really quickly and it probably
accelerates faster in mobile LEDmarkets than it does ingest DOT.
Market, OK, perfect. Thank you.
Ewan coming back to you. Yeah.
So having said that, I always wonder when it comes to agentic
commerce right now what Reef hasjust described very quickly, it
was just really talking about what it does on a personal level
(06:56):
for each of the customer. But the question needs to also
be, are retailers ready to also lead the space and also take
this conversation from their point of view and their and to
serve the customers? So yeah, I'm working on a really
special project and I can't waitto share that next year, but
that's coming soon. But right now, I also want to
(07:18):
add on to Reef's list. And this is about TikTok shop.
So I know, I think this whole year I have been on TikTok quite
a fabric, but really the real growth here is not in my
posting, but the real growth here is really about TikTok
shop. And it is now beyond beauty,
(07:39):
beyond fashion, beyond flash deals.
It is now moving into serious social commerce platform.
So I think a lot more brands being a lot more serious,
they're now using content like recipes, the integrated recipe,
the kind of, you know, value added content on TikTok to just
(07:59):
talk about products. So they're not just about price
anymore. So it's value now.
I think that narrative is actually quite good.
I think in the US, TikTok Shop is reported to have doubled in
sales this year compared to before.
And I think the biggest winner for me for TikTok Shop going so
well is the fact that the small and medium sellers are now
(08:21):
thriving. They have a place on, they have
a platform, they are able to expand their category debt
because of technology enabling. And it is evolution that I think
TikTok Shop is going through andthat I think it's worth keeping
our eyes on for the whole of next year.
Yeah, I think in the UK they were one of the biggest sources
(08:41):
of shopping, Black Friday, CyberMonday.
So they've done phenomenally well, going from strength to
strength and you only imagine itcontinuing as another channel
from a gentic perspective, from all the interviews that I've
done this year, it's interesting.
Some marketplaces aren't allowing Chachi PT to come in
scrape and purchase because theywant to keep their pricing
(09:03):
private. They don't want the agents.
And, and I found that that's an interesting decision that
retailers are going to have to make.
Do we allow marketplaces, do we allow the agent to come in and
leave or not? And then going back to your
point view and in terms of retailers being ready, it's
understanding that your product pages, your PDP's are now
(09:25):
serving machines and humans. And each shopping mission is
different in its in, you know, so for example, a Toot Me bag is
made out of whatever nylon, polyester, whatever the, the
materials are, but it's an F1 bag as well.
So how do you get your product pages to bring emotion into the
(09:48):
AI journey? And I think that's the probably
the biggest challenge for retailers on how they bring
these different elements to life.
Reef coming back to you for yourfinal one.
Right. So I'm going to talk a little
bit today about subscription retail.
We've said obviously North America has seen, you know, by
far the most mature market institution, probably led by
(10:10):
Amazon, you know, but and that that that Senate manifest in a
lot of terms of bundling. Obviously we all know Amazon
Prime, we can't get away from that, but you know, but bundling
of services. But then you've got food
delivery, we've got fashion, you've got so many different
beauty as well. So you're seeing that in all
fast facets. But when we come to Asia
Pacific, it's become really clear that this is a fast
(10:33):
growing area in our region. So growth rates of about 20% a
year for the for across the nextdecade and putting it clearly in
#2 so really fast growing hypertension growth.
So if you're a retailer agent Pacific and you aren't thinking
about subscription based retail in your category, I think you
need to think again, because this is where a bundle of growth
(10:56):
is happening right now. And we're we're seeing retailers
increasingly adopted to stabilise revenues and deepen
their engagement with their customers to have an ongoing
dialogue with them because there's a billing relationship.
You know, in the Asia Pacific region, we're seeing categories
such as beauty, fashion, food. And for example, in Japan, Japan
crate, it's candy, it's snacks, it's drinks or or Tokyo treat.
(11:19):
So lots of stuff happening in Japan.
In Australia, L'oreal's lunch orL'Oreal Australia beauty box.
So it's you subscribe to Q addedseasonal boxes of fragrances,
hair care, cosmetics, skin care.Now this is a brand that's sold
through supermarket and now it'sselling direct to consumer via
subscription based services. Obviously we're seeing food and
beverage, Australia's big and food and beverage.
But right across the region, we're seeing food and beverage.
(11:40):
And then we're seeing it at augmented in Asia through the
development of the growth of theSuper apps Grab, Gojek, you
know, and then also in, in, you know, Southeast Asia.
And then obviously up in China, you can't get away from the
Super app from WeChat and Alibaba.
But then the last 1 is really about the bundling.
And this is a real Western thing.
So you're seeing people delivering, you know, media
(12:01):
services with like Amazon Prime.But probably the most successful
in the region has been coupons membership programme Rail Rocket
Wow, which bundles fast free delivery with integrated
streaming content. So they're actually running a
hybrid subscription service which has subscription free
delivery. It has services such as retail,
(12:21):
but then obviously coupangs, because coupangs rapidly
expanding, it's allowing consumers to to engage in
categories like luxury retail, but through their subscription
platform. So I would say, you know, if
you're an APEC retailer and you're looking to find a new
place, looking to find a new growth era subscription
retailer, something to consider.OK, perfect.
Listen, I want to keep us underneath the 15 minute window
(12:43):
for LinkedIn. And so with that, I wish you
both a wonderful, wonderful holiday season, however you may
be celebrating it, and I look forward to speaking to you in
the new year. Like OK.
Alright, Merry Christmas.
Hello, I'm Reef Quail, Managing Director of NRF AIPAC, and this
is Five things Friday AIPAC Edition.
Hello. Hello everyone.
(00:21):
Hello everyone. Lovely to see you all.
It's a special time of the year.We're just a week away from
Christmas and the New Year's, but we want to be respectful and
dive straight in. So you and why don't you kick us
off? OK.
And that depends on what pictureyou're going to pull out first,
and then I'm going to start my story that way.
(00:42):
I've got to start with this one.Yeah, just unbelievable.
Yes, as we wrap the years with all kinds of data and also all
kinds of insights, we have the infamous Shopify.
No, there's no shopping, right, This is.
Spotify. Qualified.
Oh my God, I'm like, so commerceSpotify rap, right?
(01:02):
Is this yours, Ewan? I know it's embarrassing.
Well, no, I'm proud of. No, no, I've had a whole new,
I've had a whole new insight on your character.
Please continue. So actually, I just wanted to
say that Spotify having launchedtheir rap every single year and
how it has actually created traction so much, I think
retailers should be smarter to use how Spotify rap is and how
(01:27):
collaborating with them can actually leverage conversations,
talk about from trend jacking totying in the different kind of
culture. So that conversation actually is
quite important and we're not hearing enough.
So this is really be a really good example and we can't, to be
honest, I can't stress on how more important shareability
(01:50):
really is. And this is me.
I'm 85 years old, as you can tell from my listening habits.
So we want is. That what you you had 85.
I know, but you know, I'm a really special person.
So there is this really interesting a company where they
talk about when you purchase something, we will actually wrap
(02:12):
your products, give it like thatgift wrapping with Spotify's,
your Spotify's, you know, inside.
And I think that's amazing. So you could print your own
Spotify raps like literal, like literal.
And then you could, you could share and give it away.
And it's not just online share now it's actually gone into
(02:33):
offline sharing. So I think this is certain ideas
that I, I really do think that retailers aren't aren't really
leveraging enough so that we have.
Oh no, I love it. I love it.
My, my, What's your listening adrieve?
19. I got 19, mine was 55 zero.
Alexis, there's 19. How is that possible?
(02:57):
Maybe he's listening to. Stuff like that.
That's because his his children have hijacked his Spotify and
he's lost. He's lost control.
Yeah, no. Yeah, OK.
That I can accept. OK.
All right. So moving on to you, Sir Reef.
Right. So this week I'm going to talk a
little bit about a couple of phenomena.
The first one I'm going to talk about is AI shopping agents in
(03:19):
Asia Pacific. So AI everyone's got, everyone's
sort of grappling with the content of our shopping agencies
and they're not that's, you know, they're not that foreign
to us. We're probably using them every
day. And in fact, it's estimated that
something like $32 billion worthof by 2028 will come via AI
agents shopping on behalf of consumers in APEC.
(03:40):
But in 2028, what we're seeing here is a situation where
there's lots of them. The use cases now, they seem
really simple and mundane, but we are actually using them every
day. So things like the use cases I
would identify things like personalised product discovery
and recommendations like I find sneak at under $120.00 that look
good with office casual wear or something like that, you know,
(04:01):
or, or things like conventional Q&A.
So you're actually making it conversational.
So I'm looking at this fishing rod and then say is it good to
fish in freshwater or saltwater?I don't know.
There you go, there's another one or autonomous.
So people are thinking about howautonomous agents are working in
their home. So you've run out of milk and
(04:21):
your fridge orders you the new milk.
So they're working on your, these agents are working when
you need replenishment of your food, for example, price
monitoring and deal optimization.
Good one is I'll buy that laptopif the price drops under when
you, when a deal pops up that laptop's under $900, just buy
it. So the agents are operating on
(04:42):
behalf of the consumer. And then there's complete end to
end, so full of Genting ecommerce where it's booking
travel, accommodation, add-ons in one flow.
Or it's, you know, you, you go, you give it a brief.
I'm gonna buy a gift for Alec. And he, he's this fella and
he's, these are his interests and the whole, the agent goes
out and buys the gifts and takesit to you.
And then you can say I don't like the gift and I'll manage
(05:02):
all the return and exchanges andall the refunds autonomously
without any human interview. So these things are real.
Now in the Asia Pacific region, these are classic use cases.
You know, the bigger, and I'll probably touch on the big agents
in the, and out in the region. We're seeing probably the the
major AI shopping agents assistants in the regions.
Obviously China, you can't start, you can't it stop starts
and stops with China. So Alibaba and Taibo the the the
(05:26):
generative AI shopping within Alibaba.
It's a Taibo e-commerce platformis is pretty amazing to discover
new products. Shopping is is basically
delivering their integrations with it gives you obviously
personalised suggestions and recommendations through the AI
tool through the agent Michelle in India, it's all chat and
voice AI agent so you can talk to it and actually start to
optimise your what you're looking for and then Visa that
(05:49):
as in the credit card is a really a launched intelligent
commerce extended extended to Asia Pacific.
So and so there are credit cardsso you're not seeing obviously
right across the region, but you're seeing it happen in
pockets where credit cards are used.
So there's some really good examples but where agent people
are using agents all the time and they're even building it.
I mean you can if you're if you're really dab hand at
(06:10):
ChatGPT or one of the other platforms, you can build your
own agent and do it from scratchyourself within the platform.
So you know by by 2020 eight $32billion you US in APAC region
fire agents, it's not insignificant talking about a
lot of agents that are operatingcompletely outside.
One of the things I would say too is it because the region is
very mobile LED you it starts and starts and Oval that.
(06:34):
So the natural, the natural use of agents through mobile digital
devices is accelerating really, really quickly and it probably
accelerates faster in mobile LEDmarkets than it does ingest DOT.
Market, OK, perfect. Thank you.
Ewan coming back to you. Yeah.
So having said that, I always wonder when it comes to agentic
commerce right now what Reef hasjust described very quickly, it
was just really talking about what it does on a personal level
(06:56):
for each of the customer. But the question needs to also
be, are retailers ready to also lead the space and also take
this conversation from their point of view and their and to
serve the customers? So yeah, I'm working on a really
special project and I can't waitto share that next year, but
that's coming soon. But right now, I also want to
(07:18):
add on to Reef's list. And this is about TikTok shop.
So I know, I think this whole year I have been on TikTok quite
a fabric, but really the real growth here is not in my
posting, but the real growth here is really about TikTok
shop. And it is now beyond beauty,
(07:39):
beyond fashion, beyond flash deals.
It is now moving into serious social commerce platform.
So I think a lot more brands being a lot more serious,
they're now using content like recipes, the integrated recipe,
the kind of, you know, value added content on TikTok to just
(07:59):
talk about products. So they're not just about price
anymore. So it's value now.
I think that narrative is actually quite good.
I think in the US, TikTok Shop is reported to have doubled in
sales this year compared to before.
And I think the biggest winner for me for TikTok Shop going so
well is the fact that the small and medium sellers are now
(08:21):
thriving. They have a place on, they have
a platform, they are able to expand their category debt
because of technology enabling. And it is evolution that I think
TikTok Shop is going through andthat I think it's worth keeping
our eyes on for the whole of next year.
Yeah, I think in the UK they were one of the biggest sources
(08:41):
of shopping, Black Friday, CyberMonday.
So they've done phenomenally well, going from strength to
strength and you only imagine itcontinuing as another channel
from a gentic perspective, from all the interviews that I've
done this year, it's interesting.
Some marketplaces aren't allowing Chachi PT to come in
scrape and purchase because theywant to keep their pricing
(09:03):
private. They don't want the agents.
And, and I found that that's an interesting decision that
retailers are going to have to make.
Do we allow marketplaces, do we allow the agent to come in and
leave or not? And then going back to your
point view and in terms of retailers being ready, it's
understanding that your product pages, your PDP's are now
(09:25):
serving machines and humans. And each shopping mission is
different in its in, you know, so for example, a Toot Me bag is
made out of whatever nylon, polyester, whatever the, the
materials are, but it's an F1 bag as well.
So how do you get your product pages to bring emotion into the
(09:48):
AI journey? And I think that's the probably
the biggest challenge for retailers on how they bring
these different elements to life.
Reef coming back to you for yourfinal one.
Right. So I'm going to talk a little
bit today about subscription retail.
We've said obviously North America has seen, you know, by
far the most mature market institution, probably led by
(10:10):
Amazon, you know, but and that that that Senate manifest in a
lot of terms of bundling. Obviously we all know Amazon
Prime, we can't get away from that, but you know, but bundling
of services. But then you've got food
delivery, we've got fashion, you've got so many different
beauty as well. So you're seeing that in all
fast facets. But when we come to Asia
Pacific, it's become really clear that this is a fast
(10:33):
growing area in our region. So growth rates of about 20% a
year for the for across the nextdecade and putting it clearly in
#2 so really fast growing hypertension growth.
So if you're a retailer agent Pacific and you aren't thinking
about subscription based retail in your category, I think you
need to think again, because this is where a bundle of growth
(10:56):
is happening right now. And we're we're seeing retailers
increasingly adopted to stabilise revenues and deepen
their engagement with their customers to have an ongoing
dialogue with them because there's a billing relationship.
You know, in the Asia Pacific region, we're seeing categories
such as beauty, fashion, food. And for example, in Japan, Japan
crate, it's candy, it's snacks, it's drinks or or Tokyo treat.
(11:19):
So lots of stuff happening in Japan.
In Australia, L'oreal's lunch orL'Oreal Australia beauty box.
So it's you subscribe to Q addedseasonal boxes of fragrances,
hair care, cosmetics, skin care.Now this is a brand that's sold
through supermarket and now it'sselling direct to consumer via
subscription based services. Obviously we're seeing food and
beverage, Australia's big and food and beverage.
But right across the region, we're seeing food and beverage.
(11:40):
And then we're seeing it at augmented in Asia through the
development of the growth of theSuper apps Grab, Gojek, you
know, and then also in, in, you know, Southeast Asia.
And then obviously up in China, you can't get away from the
Super app from WeChat and Alibaba.
But then the last 1 is really about the bundling.
And this is a real Western thing.
So you're seeing people delivering, you know, media
(12:01):
services with like Amazon Prime.But probably the most successful
in the region has been coupons membership programme Rail Rocket
Wow, which bundles fast free delivery with integrated
streaming content. So they're actually running a
hybrid subscription service which has subscription free
delivery. It has services such as retail,
(12:21):
but then obviously coupangs, because coupangs rapidly
expanding, it's allowing consumers to to engage in
categories like luxury retail, but through their subscription
platform. So I would say, you know, if
you're an APEC retailer and you're looking to find a new
place, looking to find a new growth era subscription
retailer, something to consider.OK, perfect.
Listen, I want to keep us underneath the 15 minute window
(12:43):
for LinkedIn. And so with that, I wish you
both a wonderful, wonderful holiday season, however you may
be celebrating it, and I look forward to speaking to you in
the new year. Like OK.
Alright, Merry Christmas.
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