Industronics Bhd is tapping on the US$17 billion pre-owned luxury watch market through Ecgo International Ltd, its wholly-owned subsidiary in Hong Kong.
This follows the launch of Industronics’ luxury watch e-commerce platform, watch-exchanges.com.
Executive director Datuk Chu Boon Tiong said based on data and overall market performance, the pre-owned luxury watch market showed promising growth prospects.
“We are excited to capitalize on the growing trend with the launch of WatchExchange and aim to pave the way for a streamlined trading platform that will not only revolutionise the transactions of pre-owned luxury watches but drive further growth in this industry,” he said in a statement today.
WatchExchange aims to be the first luxury watch e-commerce platform that issues authenticity certificates for pre-owned luxury watches in Malaysia and Asia Pacific.
Some of the leading brands profiled are Audemars Piguet, Hublot, Patek Philippe, Tag Heuer, IWC, Omega, Jaeger LeCoultre, Panerai, Rolex and Breitling.
Chu said pricing and demand for pre-owned luxury watches had been so strong over the last few years that even high-end watch brands were moving into the pre-owned market themselves.
“However, the biggest challenge for the pre-owned luxury watch market lies in authenticating the watches.
“Our role here is to ensure that the shoppers can safely purchase luxury watches on WatchExchange without having to worry about the security and authenticity of the pre-owned luxury watches,” he said.
Industronics, with its team of professional and experienced watch appraisers, said it wanted to create a professional, safe trading environment that would elevate customers’ experience of purchasing pre-owned luxury watches to a new level.
The company will set up offices in China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, the United States, Canada and Europe, where sellers worldwide could visit for physical appraisals of their watch collections.
The success of WatchExchange will depend on excellence in several key areas namely stability, sustainability, search engine optimization (SEO) and new media marketing.
This will also require extensive funding to carry out both online advertising and offline promotional activities.
Chu believes the competitive advantage for WatchExchange lies in the company’s ability to build a “unicorn” ecosystem around the region.
“We do not think that the strength of the platform lies solely in the certification and authentication guarantees.
“We intend to replicate the business models globally via partnerships with a locally listed company in the respective countries.
“Among the markets that we are looking into are Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong, China and several emerging markets in Europe. Once our ecosystem matures, we will have so much more to offer to our customers, in terms of the variety of brands, models, and other services,” Chu said.
According to a management consultancy firm Bain & Company, the global pre-owned luxury watch market was valued at US$17 billion in 2018.
However, less than 20 per cent of that market is in the Asia Pacific region, while only 25 per cent of the total pre-owned luxury watch sales were online transactions.
Euromonitor International, an independent strategic market research provider, estimates the value of retail sales of timepieces in Malaysia to grow by five per cent per annum between 2019 and 2022, to reach up to RM2.5 billion.
Industronic is looking to set up a fund in Hong Kong to raise RM250 million from potential investors.
Proceeds raised will be utilised to purchase different brands of luxury watches for resale on the company’s platform.
Industronics aims to invest around RM25 million or 10 per cent of the total funding required, together with the Hong Kong Cyberport Fund, which will invest an equivalent amount or at a 1:1 ratio.