Retail Media Is Becoming the Next Battleground for Asia’s FMCG Industry

As retailers across Asia turn consumer data, digital storefronts and physical stores into advertising inventory, FMCG brands are gaining a more direct route to consumers. But the region’s fragmented retail landscape could make scaling retail media more difficult than it appears.

Retail media is moving from an emerging advertising format into a significant part of the global media economy. Dentsu expects retail media spending to grow 12.3% globally in 2026, making it one of the fastest-growing areas of digital advertising. Its APAC outlook is particularly notable: retail media in the region is expected to grow at about 10% annually through 2031, driven by major commerce platforms across China, India and Southeast Asia.

For FMCG companies, the attraction is straightforward. Retailers sit close to the point of purchase and increasingly possess first-party data showing what consumers search for, compare, add to carts and ultimately buy. Advertising can therefore move closer to the transaction, potentially giving brands a clearer connection between media exposure and commercial outcomes.

But Asia’s retail media opportunity is not simply a story of more advertising inventory. It is also a story about who controls consumer data, how that data can be used, and whether fragmented retail ecosystems can provide brands with scalable and comparable measurement.

Traditional digital advertising can identify audiences and measure clicks, views or conversions. Retail media adds another layer: the retailer can potentially connect advertising activity with actual shopping behavior. That is particularly valuable for FMCG brands, where consumers purchase frequently across supermarkets, convenience stores, marketplaces and grocery applications. Retailers can use their own digital properties, including websites and apps, to place sponsored products and display advertisements. Increasingly, those networks are expanding beyond retailer-owned environments into off-site advertising, video and physical stores.

The shift is changing the economics of retail as well. Retailers can monetize assets that were previously treated primarily as distribution infrastructure, while brands gain access to audiences closer to a purchase decision. McKinsey has described this as the evolution from retail media networks toward broader commerce media networks, where shopper and transaction data can be used across a wider set of media channels. Its 2025 research found that 55% of surveyed advertisers planned to increase commerce media spending over the following year.

South Korea offers an early view of the opportunity

South Korea is an important market to watch because digital commerce is already deeply embedded in everyday consumer behavior. McKinsey estimated that online channels represented 41% of total Korean retail sales when it examined the market in 2023, creating favorable conditions for retailer-owned media networks. At the time, it estimated South Korea’s retail media market at about $2 billion and argued that the market could expand substantially as retailers developed their data and advertising capabilities.

More recent estimates suggest the market is continuing to expand. Grand View Research estimates South Korea’s retail media networks market generated $416.4 million in 2025 and could reach approximately $1.08 billion by 2033, representing a projected 12.5% CAGR from 2026 to 2033. The broader significance is not simply the size of Korea’s market. It is the combination of mobile-first shopping, fast delivery, reviews, price comparison and loyalty ecosystems that has made digital consumer journeys unusually mature.

Youngmi Lee, Managing Director for South Korea, highlighted this connection while conversing with AsiaTechDaily.

“The areas in South Korea that may offer useful implications for the broader APAC region include online grocery shopping experiences, retail media, and data-driven consumer segmentation. Korean consumers are highly accustomed to fast delivery, mobile-first shopping, price comparison, membership benefits, and review-based purchasing. These consumer expectations may become increasingly important in other Asian markets as well. However, successful models in Korea cannot necessarily be applied directly across the entire APAC region. Each market has different retail structures, logistics infrastructure, platform competition, and levels of consumer trust. Therefore, Korea should be seen less as a model to be copied directly and more as a reference point for how digital FMCG consumption may evolve.”

That distinction is important. Korea demonstrates what retail media can look like when commerce and digital consumer behavior are highly integrated, but it does not provide a universal template for Asia.

APAC is developing multiple retail media models

The region’s scale makes retail media attractive, but its fragmentation makes it complicated. Dentsu identifies platforms including Tmall in China, Shopee, Lazada and Grab in Southeast Asia, and Flipkart in India among the businesses helping drive the region’s retail media expansion. India is expected to be one of APAC’s fastest-growing digital advertising markets, while Southeast Asia is also seeing rapid development across commerce and super-app ecosystems.

India provides an indication of how quickly retail media can become financially significant. Amazon, Flipkart and Myntra together generated ₹15,573 crore in advertising revenue in FY25, a 26% increase from the previous year, according to The Economic Times. Australia offers another model. Retail media advertising there is forecast to grow 19.5% in 2026 to A$2.3 billion, with established networks such as Woolworths’ Cartology and Coles 360 competing alongside newer entrants. These markets illustrate why “APAC retail media” is difficult to define as a single category. China has enormous platform ecosystems, India has marketplaces and rapidly expanding quick commerce, Southeast Asia has super-apps and regional platforms, while South Korea combines sophisticated e-commerce with highly connected consumers. The result is opportunity, but also fragmentation.

The data advantage comes with a measurement problem

Retail media’s strongest selling point is also its biggest strategic challenge: data. Retailers can offer brands first-party information generated through their own commerce environments. This becomes increasingly valuable as privacy restrictions make some forms of third-party tracking more difficult. But more data does not automatically mean better advertising. Brands still need consistent definitions of audiences, comparable campaign metrics and credible attribution. If every retailer develops its own measurement framework, advertisers could end up managing dozens of disconnected networks rather than replacing fragmented digital advertising with something simpler.

The industry is already confronting this issue. Dentsu has noted that smaller retail media networks need to adopt programmatic capabilities and data partnerships, while fragmentation and aggregation remain challenges for the market. This will become more important as retail media moves beyond sponsored product listings. Retailers are increasingly extending their networks into video, connected TV, off-site advertising and physical-store environments. The more channels a network covers, the more important standardized measurement becomes.

The next battleground is not simply advertising inventory

For FMCG companies, retail media could become an important complement to television, social media, search and other brand-building channels. Its advantage is proximity to commerce, not necessarily its ability to replace every other form of advertising. That makes the next phase less about how many retailers can sell advertising and more about which networks can turn proprietary consumer data into reliable, scalable media products. McKinsey’s 2026 analysis points toward this next stage, arguing that commerce media networks will increasingly compete on omnichannel activation, trusted measurement and AI rather than simply on access to inventory.

For Asia, the challenge is even greater because the region does not have one dominant retail infrastructure. South Korea offers an important lesson, but its significance lies precisely in what cannot be copied. As Lee noted, differences in retail structures, logistics, platform competition and consumer trust mean that successful Korean models will need to be adapted rather than transplanted.

Retail media is becoming a new battleground for Asia’s FMCG industry because it brings advertising closer to the moment when consumers make purchasing decisions. Retailers can monetize their data and digital infrastructure, while brands gain access to audiences with stronger signals of commercial intent. But the region’s next challenge will be turning that opportunity into a coherent media ecosystem.

If retail media networks remain isolated, brands could face another fragmented advertising market, this time divided by retailers and commerce platforms. If networks can improve interoperability, measurement and responsible data use, retail media could become a more integrated layer connecting media, commerce and consumer behavior across Asia. South Korea’s experience suggests where the market may be heading. The bigger question for the rest of APAC is how much of that future can be adapted to local realities.

Quick Takeaways

• Retail media is becoming a major growth channel for Asia’s FMCG industry, as retailers turn their digital platforms, consumer data and physical assets into advertising inventory.
• South Korea offers an early example of this shift, supported by highly digital consumers, mobile-first shopping, fast delivery, reviews, price comparison and loyalty ecosystems.
• The opportunity is not limited to online ads. Retail media is expanding from sponsored product listings into off-site advertising, video, connected TV, apps and in-store media.
• APAC will not have a single retail media model. China, India, South Korea, Southeast Asia and Australia have fundamentally different retail structures, platforms, logistics networks and consumer behaviors.
• First-party retail data is retail media’s biggest advantage, giving FMCG brands potentially stronger links between advertising exposure and actual purchasing behavior.
• Fragmentation could become the industry’s biggest challenge. Different retailers may create separate audiences, measurement systems and attribution models, making regional campaigns harder to scale.
• Korea’s lesson for APAC is not to copy its retail model directly, but to understand how digital commerce, consumer expectations and data-driven retail can reshape FMCG advertising.
• The next phase of retail media will depend on measurement, interoperability and responsible data use, rather than simply increasing the amount of advertising inventory available.