Ace Hardware reenters Indonesia after shortlived exit

For 29 years, global home improvement giant Ace Hardware dominated the Indonesian home improvement scene, thanks to the Kawan Lama group, its local partner back then. That partnership ended in 2024. Kawan Lama built Azko, a local brand, on the ashes of the breakup, converted all the Ace Hardware stores into Azko outlets, and enjoyed instant presence in Southeast Asia’s largest economy. Ace Hardware, meanwhile, quietly vanished from the market it once controlled.

But the American company was not going to let its seat in the most populous country in the region cool down for too long – barely seven months after its last signage was taken down, Ace Hardware was revealed to have signed a franchise agreement with an Indonesian retailing conglomerate for its return. In Part 1 of this two-part series, Asia correspondent Jennee Grace U Rubrico traces the developments that led to the reentry of the…