Signs David Jones, JB-Hi Fi, and Forever New
Riskified, a fraud management platform enabling frictionless eCommerce, has today announced it has expanded its presence in the APAC region with the opening of its new office in Melbourne, Australia. The Israeli-founded company has identified Australia as a key growth market, citing the acceleration of eCommerce in the region as a direct result of the pandemic.
It will double down on its local expansion strategy by assisting online retailers to eliminate fraud and enable safe eCommerce for Australia’s largest online retailers, without creating friction at checkout – one of the leading reasons consumers abandon cart – recouping millions in lost revenue for companies selling online.
Six of Australia’s top 20 retailers are already using Riskified’s solutions to create trusted relationships with their consumers. These include JB Hi-Fi and David Jones as well as Forever New and The Card Network.
Riskified Country Manager for Australia, Nathan Joel, said the COVID-19 induced surge in online shopping created fulfillment and fraud challenges for Australian retailers, with legacy anti-fraud systems unable to keep up:
“eCommerce growth comes with an increase in fraud, which is not usually managed efficiently with the current tools available to merchants. Due to legacy fraud tools, payment failures, and high-friction verification methods, eCommerce merchants lose billions to false declines, chargebacks, and cart abandonment. Given our ongoing work with leading global online players we know we can change that,” he said.
“In this age of hyper-fast digital transformation, Australian eCommerce merchants are uniquely positioned to experience exponential growth – if they are willing to innovate and use the latest machine learning solutions. Research shows more Aussies shopped online in 2020 than ever before, with 1.36 million people making their first online purchase. But we also know this cohort is extremely sensitive to checkout friction.
“Riskified has created a solution to maximise revenue while also managing fraud, and without compromising the customer shopping experience, which is key to conversion, and it’s why Australia’s largest online retailers choose us to build trust with their customers,” he said.
In 2020, around four in five Australian households (almost nine million) shopped online at some point during the year, bolstering online spending by 57 percent to a staggering $50.46 billion.
An Australian Payments Network report found in that same period, card fraud in Australia rose by 0.6 percent to $467.6 million, with card fraud alone costing merchants 58.3 cents per $1,000.
Riskified believes it can curb these figures by replacing legacy fraud tools. For one Australian retailer, Riskified delivered a 6% uplift on their online approval rate, enabling more customers to complete checkout, generating extra revenue for the retailer.
In the last six months, Riskified detected multiple groups of fraudsters targeting Australian eCommerce retailers. These fraudsters attempted to use stolen credit cards to make online purchases from retailers, and then sell the stolen products on third-party websites such as eBay.
In addition to saving retailers millions in lost revenues, detection of the fraudulent transactions also helped them protect their customers and their own brand reputation.
The establishment of Riskified into Melbourne was made possible with support from Invest Victoria, the Victorian Government’s investment attraction agency, which fosters long-term prosperity by enabling business opportunities and providing facilitation support.
Minister for Economic Development Tim Pallas said, “Riskified’s decision to establish its base in Melbourne shows strong confidence in our industry, workforce and culture of innovation.
“It reinforces the Victorian Government’s commitment to support a safe e-commerce ecosystem for both merchants and consumers.”
As part of Riskified’s commitment to the Australian market, the company has established its HQ on Exhibition St in Melbourne, joining businesses taking advantage of cost-effective leases in a bid to bring Melbourne’s struggling CBD back to life as the city nears the end of lockdown. Riskified has appointed three executives and plans on adding more team members before the end of the year.
This team is supported around the clock by a range of technical and product teams in Tel Aviv; London; Shanghai and New York. The Melbourne office will service the ANZ markets and provide support to APAC.
