Lazada, together with brands such as HP Inc and BMW, launched Southeast Asia’s first e-commerce anti-counterfeiting consortium.
The consortium, which is named the Southeast Asia eCommerce Anti-Counterfeiting Working Group (SeCA Working Group), will be based in Singapore.
The consortium was launched in tandem with IP Week @ SG, organised by the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS).
In its composite declaration, the consortium has committed to collaborating with its stakeholders to “address rapidly evolving issues” of counterfeit trade in online retail. The consortium has also pledged to support both its participating platforms and brand owners in their intellectual property rights (IPR) and consumer protection efforts in the e-commerce environment.
According to Lazada, the idea for such a consortium was first proposed in 2021, during the Covid-19 pandemic. The e-commerce platform also observed that the pandemic had accelerated the need for collaboration and coordination on online IPR protection issues between IPR owners and e-commerce platforms, which eventually led to a proposal to facilitate open and constructive dialogue and information exchange between IPR owners and e-commerce platforms.
At its launch event, the SeCA Working Group also unveiled plans to provide an online directory. The directory will house the respective intellectual property rights protection policies, programs, tools and resources offered by Lazada to support IPR owners in their efforts to manage and deter IPR-infringing activities on the participating platforms.
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It will also serve as an accessible repository to educate the public on IPR protection matters online.
“At Lazada, we are committed to maintaining high standards of IPR protection on our platform so as to foster a trusted and safe e-commerce environment,” says Alan Chan, chief risk officer of Lazada Group. “We are proud to be a founding participant of the SeCA Working Group, and look forward to playing an active role in driving progress as well as development in IPR protection standards and industry-wide awareness. Together, we can build a sustainable and fair eCommerce ecosystem for all participants across Southeast Asia.”
“As e-commerce continues to be a key growth driver of the digital economy, businesses will need to pay more attention to IPR protection and counterfeit trade issues,” says Cyril Chua, founder and managing partner of Robinson LLC, who coordinated the efforts. “We hope that this directory will lay a strong foundation for the future development of consensus on industry best practices and adoption of voluntary standards in the area of IPR protection across the e-commerce industry.”
