Builk.com to become B2B e-commerce channel for construction industry

The collaboration shows how a Thai start-up can grow and co-exist with large corporates, said Builk Asia principal and evangelist Patai Padungtin.
He said builk.com was working this year to transform itself into a marketplace for the construction industry by 2017. The company aims to increase its revenue by five times from Bt25 million last year to more than Bt100 million in 2016, around 95 per cent of the revenue from Thailand.
Currently, Builk Asia has a business presence in five countries in Southeast Asia, namely Thailand, Indonesia, Myanmar, Laos and Malaysia.
Builk Asia yesterday officially kicked off its e-commerce business via builk.com. Builk.com is to play a key role as an e-commerce business for its strategic partner, Millcon Steel, which invested 40 per cent in Longkong Studio. Longing Studio has a 90-per-cent stake in Builk Asia, the operator of builk.com, with the remaining 10 per cent held by private investors.
Pawoot Pongvitayapanu is the lead private investor in Builk Asia. Millcon Steel’s resources and Pawoot’s expertise are expected ensure that builk.com achieves its goal of being the largest B2B e-commerce channel for the Thai construction industry.
“We have all the key elements for e-commerce including traffic, products, logistics, and payment [systems]. Builk.com has big data of construction businesses and it has business partners who supply construction materials, while Millcon Steel, apart from offering construction materials, can fulfil logistics [needs] and KBank provides an e-payment platform,” Patai said.
He added that this year, Builk Asia would clone the business model of builk.com in Thailand to deploy in Indonesia. 
Currently at builk.com, there are more than 50,000 stock-keeping units from several suppliers such as Millcon Steel, Siam Cement Group, Diamond Building Products. It has around 15,000 members, consisting of 10,000 contractors and 5,000 construction-material shops.
Builk.com was founded in 2010 as a provider of software as a service for the construction industry. It has been building a database of its members. Its revenue comes from advertising.
Builk.com has been continually transforming itself from relying on advertising to big data, and now is ready to ride the e-commerce opportunity, becoming a marketplace in the next step.
“Builk.com trialled the e-commerce business model for a year [in 2015] with Millcon Steel and other business partners,” Patai said. “We found that builk.com can be more than a software service provider. We can be the platform to help businesses in the whole value chain in the construction industry reduce costs while increasing efficiency.
“We know the exact requirements of construction firms and we know suppliers. We are turn ourselves into a platform to match demand with supply and make it easier for them to do their routine work without any extra cost with our e-commerce business.”
Patai wants to showcase builk.com as an example of how a Thai start-up can grow together with a large corporate, without launching an initial public offering or being acquired.