Asos and H&M pull sales in Russia after Ukraine invasion
Fast fashion giant Asos has ended sales to Russia following the country’s invasion of Ukraine.
“We’ve been watching the shocking events in Ukraine in horror and disbelief,” the pureplay tweeted yesterday evening.
“We’ve concluded it’s neither practical nor right to continue to trade in Russia & today have suspended sales there. We’re supporting the humanitarian effort and our thoughts are with the people of Ukraine.”
In FY21 Russia and Ukraine represented around 4% of group revenue and contributed approximately £20 million to group profit.
Other companies to take action include Apple, Google, Nike and H&M.
The latter, the world's second biggest fashion retailer, said it was deeply concerned about the tragic developments in Ukraine and "stood with all the people who are suffering".
"H&M Group has decided to temporarily pause all sales in Russia," it said in a statement.
This came after it closed its stores in Ukraine due to concerns over the safety of its staff and customers.
Microsoft Cloud
Asos recently signed a new agreement with Microsoft that will see it continue to use Microsoft Cloud as its preferred cloud platform for the next five years.
The retailer taps Microsoft Azure and its AI capabilities to power its digital platforms and support new data led workstreams.
Through the renewed partnership, it will work with Microsoft to launch new projects to support and accelerate its strategic growth plans.
These focus on unlocking new customer experiences and business capabilities, such as Asos’ Partner Fulfilment programme, which aims to expand the range and availability of products, and maximise demand conversion, customer choice and stock availability.
Cliff Cohen, CTO at Asos, said: “Over the past few years, we’ve rebuilt our technology platform to ensure we have the foundations in place to support a truly global business.”
“As we embark on our next phase of growth, we see Microsoft as a critical partner that is trusted and can provide a comprehensive set of cloud and AI solutions as a key enabler for evolution of our customer offering, particularly in delivering new business capabilities to support our growth strategy and embedding data driven insights across our business.”
