At a glance
Trends driving growth
“On the opportunity side, the digital economy was 55 per cent and rising consumer demand was 54 per cent in terms of respondents who thought that was an opportunity.”
“The third-ranked growth driver was supply-chain diversification at 38 per cent.”
“I was a little surprised to see artificial intelligence in fourth place at only 26 per cent.
Maybe that is a little bit to do with businesses and their perceptions not yet catching up with the hype of artificial intelligence.”
“Another one that was surprising was we had a very low response for ESG and sustainability at around 18 per cent.
[Businesses are] indicating that they don’t see that as a big driver of opportunity in Asia in 2025.”
Biggest challenges
“50 per cent of respondents indicated that geopolitical risks would be the top challenge in 2025. For anyone who’s been following the news over the last few months or year, nothing greatly surprising there.”
“The next one after geopolitical risks, at 49 per cent, is competition from local and international businesses. I think this is one that probably doesn’t get a lot of attention in the media and in commentary, but is certainly something that I hear time and again from businesses as they are looking to compete and grow in Asia.
It is an intensely competitive space. Business innovation and speed-to-market is really fast and businesses need to be quite agile to compete.”
Managing regulatory risk
“Market intelligence is absolutely vital. Much market intelligence you can gather from doing research or having someone do research on your behalf.
But in some of these markets, there are limits to how much you can find out that way, and you need to be on the ground in the market and go out and engage people to understand the complexities.
Because sometimes the way a regulation is written isn’t the way it works in practice.”
“If you have a good local partner, then they can really help you understand the nuances around regulation and how to navigate it.
The last thing I’d say is the Australian government, and the state governments as well, can often help businesses understand regulations and the complexities there.”
