A new digital on-demand online marketplace named SAIJAI has launched in Thailand and is setting its sights on democratizing home care in the country.Borne from a dynamic consumer behavior shift over the past sixteen months to home-based lifestyle needs, the start-up brand is eyeing the Care From Home (CFH) marketplace, a key beneficiary from the

A new digital on-demand online marketplace named SAIJAI has launched in Thailand and is setting its sights on democratizing home care in the country.Borne from a dynamic consumer behavior shift over the past sixteen months to home-based lifestyle needs, the start-up brand is eyeing the Care From Home (CFH) marketplace, a key beneficiary from the digital acceleration of the sharing economy, and Thailand is the first market it its regional rollout plans.

The global sharing economy is expected to be valued at USD335 billion by 2025. In Thailand, where over 75% of Thais have mobile phones, a population base of nearly 70 million, the sharing economy has become a major commercial force that is has swiftly become a mainstream economic engine.

In the words of SAIJAI’s co-founder Michael Kenner, the current global crisis has created the single most significant business opportunity of our lifetime. “When you look deeper at today’s quantum flight to digital business models, the reality is that the present situation has only been an accelerator of what was going to happen anyway.”

SAIJAI’s key services are rooted in home care but have diverse segments such as the rapidly aging Thai population, tutoring and education, childcare, and household services. Its approach to raising the bar on caregiver training, health, and safety for clients and creating a platform of unique services is just the starting point.

See SAIJAI video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qjsD5ecYl8

At the current point of development, SAIJAI has moved into its strategic MVP (minimum viable product) stage and is in the process of its first funding round. The front-end of the marketplace is already online and registering positive gains in traffic by using specifically targeted organic growth. One key milestone for early proof of concept has been the successful onboarding of over one thousand care providers across all of Thailand.

Kenner who heads Digital Broker Ventures (DBV) is a serial digital entrepreneur with a growing list of start-ups including leading Thai proptech group FazWaz, digital media platform The Thaiger, online price comparison hypermarket Tadoo, and MyMediTravel.

His co-founder in SAIJAI is well-established hospitality consulting professional Bill Barnett of C9 Hotelworks, so the combination of tech, business development, and demonstrated expertise has SAIJAI well positioned in the crowded house of new businesses. One of the most compelling advantages of the new group is it has the ability to leverage a critical mass of established platforms to capture synergies and ignite a quantum leap in growth.

Accessing the homecare space in Thailand, Barnett adds “our focus is a Thai-language model, that addresses the far-larger domestic market versus typical offerings for expats. For us, the size and evolving demographics of an aging population make this a no-brainer”.

In terms of the right time, right product paradigm, SAIJAI is engaging and providing critical jobs for the significant base of displaced skilled workers from Thailand’s challenged hospitality and service sectors. The flexibility for these caregivers to manage their own schedules, and work on an ad-hoc or part-time basis is an emerging trend that is set to become a new workplace norm in the disruptive years ahead.