Buyandship

Buyandship (Buy&Ship) is a business-to-consumer cross-border e-commerce platform that combines overseas parcel forwarding/consolidation with proxy purchasing, allowing consumers to buy from foreign online retailers and have goods shipped to their home market. Users obtain overseas warehouse addresses, declare incoming shipments, and merge multiple parcels from different countries into a single consolidated forwarding order that is dispatched within one to two working days; charges are based on actual weight, with the Taiwan site stating no hidden fees and duty-inclusive forwarding for packages under NT$30,000. The proxy-buying service covers sites in Japan, Korea, the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada, including marketplaces such as Rakuten, Mercari, GRL and ZOZO, and is offered without a service fee at the company's stated exchange rate. A third mode lets members buy overseas products directly in local currency through group-buy offers.

The company describes itself as vertically integrated purchasing and consolidation infrastructure, operating a fulfilment network spanning 10 purchasing markets (Japan, United States, Korea, United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Canada, Australia, Hong Kong, plus a consolidation hub) and 12 delivery markets (Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Macau, Japan, India, the UAE, Vietnam, the United Kingdom and Australia). Its stated roadmap adds an AI shopping agent to the existing consolidation and proxy-buying services, built on the physical fulfilment network, AI and robotics deployed in each purchasing market, and models trained on a decade of proprietary transaction data used to score and verify reliable sellers. Consumer-facing mobile apps for iOS and Android let members track orders and forwarding shipments.

At the time of its 2024 Series B first closing, the company said it operated 11 overseas warehouses across 11 countries and regions, and had developed a Robotic Process Automation-based automated shopping assistant to increase order-processing capacity, alongside an AI recommendation system for its Buyaholic social commerce platform.

Business model

B2C platform monetising cross-border shopping: consumers pay weight-based consolidated shipping fees for parcels forwarded from overseas warehouses, while proxy purchasing is offered without a separate service fee at a stated exchange rate; the company also runs member group-buy offers and a rewards/points and referral programme, and lists business development and brand partnership channels for merchants.

Traction

Company-reported figures include more than 2 million consumers, 47,000+ partner merchants, over 4 million annual shipments, approximately US$700m in estimated annual gross transaction value and 37% revenue CAGR. The Taiwan site reports over 1.8 million registered members and more than 12 million cumulative items handled, and states that overseas-exclusive products account for 50% of volume and savings of up to 90%. Press coverage of the 2024 Series B first closing cited 1.72 million registered users and $383m in gross merchandise value processed in the prior fiscal year.

Latest developments

In 2024 the company announced a first closing of $10m in its Series B round led by Cool Japan Fund, a public-private fund backed by the Japanese government, earmarked for operations automation, AI and machine learning R&D, and Southeast Asia expansion; it also referenced funding from the HKSTP Elite Program. In June 2024 an additional $6m was reported for the Series B. The company lists an AI shopping agent as an upcoming service alongside its live consolidation and proxy-buying products.