TikTok buys Tokopedia

 

Chinese video-sharing platform TikTok has expanded its e-Commerce reach: the social media giant has purchased a controlling stake in Indonesian online marketplace Tokopedia. The merger was first announced at the end of 2023 and finalized in the first months of 2024.

 

Read all about TikTok’s e-Commerce ventures here!

 

TikTok paid around 781 million euros to purchase 75.1% of Tokopedia. The rest of the company remains in the hands of Indonesian technology firm GoTo, the country’s “largest digital ecosystem” that provides transport, e-Commerce, fulfillment, logistics, financial, as well as food and grocery-delivery services to both businesses and consumers.

 

As GoTo’s CEO, Patrick Walujo, remarked, “We are creating an Indonesian e-commerce champion, combining Tokopedia’s strong local presence with TikTok’s mass market reach and technological prowess.”

 

 

What changes for Tokopedia

Thanks to the merger, TikTok Shop could resume its operations in Indonesia after it was shut down due to a law that forbids online shopping on social media platforms. However, customers looking for TikTok Shop may be disappointed: the venture continues to use the well-known Tokopedia name, even after it receives a cash injection of approximately 1.4 billion euros.

 

Learn more about TikTok Shop here

 

When visiting Tokopedia’s website, we didn’t notice any significant changes indicating the merger. From a consumer’s point of view, the marketplace seems to operate just like it did before.

 

 

Screenshot of tokopedia.com’s homepage

 

 

Learn all about Tokopedia and other noteworthy marketplaces in Asia!

 

However, when landing on the sign-up page for sellers, the differences were more than obvious.

 

 

Screenshot of https://seller-id.tokopedia.com/account/register

 

 

The top left corner features both TikTok Shop and Tokopedia’s brand names, while the main text invites sellers to grow their business with “TikTok x Tokopedia”, which makes the connection between the e-Commerce actors clear.

 

Scrolling down the page, prospective sellers get a taste of what services they can expect from the newly united platforms. These include live-streaming, short videos, product showcases, and more.

 

 

Screenshot of the Commerce Solutions section of https://seller-id.tokopedia.com/account/register

 

 

Further down, the page offers guidance on the sign-up process, including a list of all the documents prospective sellers need to join the marketplace.

 

 

What’s in it for TikTok and Tokopedia

Both entities had ample motivation for the merger.

 

Tokopedia is the second-largest e-Commerce platform in Indonesia behind Shopee. Analysts praise the marketplace for its exceptional logistics coverage, delivering to 93% of the country, often even on the same day as the order was placed.

 

Discover Indonesia’s emerging e-Commerce industry!

 

With 57.3 million monthly users and an estimated annual revenue of $1.8 billion, Tokopedia has been an important player in Indonesian e-Commerce even before the merger with TikTok Shop. Now, however, the platform can focus on further developing its offering and strengthening its position in its domestic market.

 

According to GoTo CEO Patrick Walujo, “we will optimize our capital usage in line with a newly developed capital allocation plan, which may include a share buyback initiative, subject to regulatory and shareholder approval.”

 

Moreover, the newly merged TikTok and Tokopedia have already forged a partnership with the leading Indonesian university, UGM, to establish a digital talent development centre complete with internship and employee exchange programes.

 

 

Related topics

Introduction to e-Commerce in Indonesia

 

What is Tokopedia

 

Is Xiaohongshu the new TikTok?

 

 

As for TikTok, being able to reenter Indonesian e-Commerce is a clear win. The market is currently valued at $90.35 billion, with forecasts predicting a growth to $185.71 billion by 2030 - no wonder TikTok Shop wanted to find a way to come back after shopping on social media platforms was banned in 2023.

 

Ever since the video-sharing platform launched its social commerce endeavor by partnering with Shopify in 2021, TikTok has aimed to follow the path of sister company Douyin and grow its share in social shopping.

 

Learn more about TikTok and Douyin’s ventures in e-Commerce!

 

TikTok Shop has an annual GMV of $33.2 billion, with beauty and personal care products taking the lead as the most popular product category. Currently, TikTok is the third most popular social commerce platform in the world behind Facebook and Instagram, with 13% of shoppers choosing it. (For reference, Facebook stands at 24% and Instagram at 20%, while WhatsApp comes in fourth with 8% and YouTube fifth with 7%.)

 

A reentry into the lucrative Indonesian e-Commerce market gives TikTok Shop a great chance at growth. With 125 million TikTok users in the country, 6 million of whom used to sell on TikTok Shop before the ban, the platform already has a great base. Add Tokopedia’s 117.3 million monthly visitors to that equation (although there’s surely an overlap between the two groups of people), and it’s clear that the venture is off to a promising start.

  

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+++ Update Summer 2025 +++

 

Newspapers report that a year after the merger, Tokopedia sellers still find it hard to adjust to the change of ownership. Many of them are unwilling or unable to create videos and livestreams to attract customers - a feat that’s vital for TikTok but may seem foreign to classic marketplace sellers. Others claim that integrating their Tokopedia dashboard into TikTok resulted in higher fees, less control over shipping, and an overall decrease in visitor numbers. Analysts believe that TikTok has not invested enough into Tokopedia, and hasn’t tried to adjust its culture to local expectations. This has resulted so far in declining sales numbers and sellers flocking to different platforms, like Shopee and Toco.

 

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Obviously, as online brand protection experts, our main question at this point is what the merger means for the protection of intellectual property rights.

 

 

Online brand protection on TikTok Shop x Tokopedia

When it comes to counterfeiting and the fight against IP infringements, Tokopedia is no stranger to us at globaleyez, as the marketplace was repeatedly featured in earlier editions of the USTR’s (United States Trade Representative) Review of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting.

 

However, this year’s edition doesn’t mention Tokopedia as a notorious marketplace. This is no doubt due to the effort of the platform to combat IP infringements - an effort that includes a strong cooperation with globaleyez.

 

Our marketplace monitoring service is designed to detect IP-infringing product listings on Tokopedia and over 150 other marketplaces worldwide. With keyword-based searches, our software tool traxster quickly gives us a collection of listings containing words that imply an association with your brand. Powerful filters discard those that are indeed associated with you, leaving us with dubious listings that infringe on your IP rights.

 

Our social media monitoring service does the same on social media platforms, detecting infringing product listings, ads, posts, and other types of content that may hurt your brand’s IP rights. Since fraudsters often use stolen or copied images to draw in customers, a round of image monitoring could also be necessary to pick up stragglers and establish connections between seemingly independent cases of infringement.

 

Once all infringing content has been rounded up, we can enforce your rights. We’ll reach out to the hosts (social media platforms, marketplaces, domain registries and registrars, etc) and demand the removal of all infringing content from the internet.

 

 

Conclusion

The merger of Tokopedia and TikTok Shop may shake up the landscape of Indonesian e-Commerce. Whether your brand sees it as a chance is up to you.

 

However, don’t let fraudsters see it as a chance to infringe on your IP rights: contact us and let’s devise an effective, tailor-made online brand protection strategy together.