Why Local Gel Brands Are Rarer Than Local Shoe Brands
Sports nutrition is a harder category to localize than footwear or apparel -- it requires food-safety certification, ingredient sourcing, and shelf-stable manufacturing, which raises the barrier to entry well above sewing a shoe or a shirt. That's part of why the region's gel shelves are still dominated by international names like GU, SiS, and High5, even in markets where local shoe and apparel brands have real market share.
Against that backdrop, Thailand's Dever and Indonesia's Strive stand out specifically because they cleared that higher bar -- both were built from the ground up by local dietitians and food scientists rather than imported and relabeled, which is a genuinely different starting point from most of the shelf.
Thailand's Dever: Built by a Dietitian, Not a Marketing Team
Dever Energy Gel launched in 2011 after registered dietitian Anon "Deer" Adirojananon identified a gap in Thailand's sports nutrition market and built the product with a team of dietitians, food scientists, and Thai national athletes -- a formulation-first origin story rather than a brand extension of an existing sports company. It's since become Thailand's best-known domestic energy gel brand, sold in both 40ml and 100ml formats across Mixed Fruit, Lemon, and Cola flavors.
Dever has also expanded into electrolyte tablets, which matters for anyone building a full race-day nutrition plan around a single regional brand rather than mixing and matching imported products. The brand now ships into Malaysia and Singapore as well as its home Thai market, so it's realistic to source ahead of a race rather than only buying on the ground.
Indonesia's Strive: The Country's First Local Gel
Strive is generally credited as Indonesia's first locally-produced energy gel, built around a maltodextrin, date extract, and ginger formula rather than copying the standard imported-gel recipe outright. At roughly 90 calories a sachet, it's positioned as an accessible, low-friction option for runners who want something easy to digest during high-intensity efforts.
The brand has leaned into the local-running-culture angle further than most nutrition companies do, collaborating with Indonesian apparel makers on race-day kit rather than staying purely a nutrition product -- a sign it's building toward being a genuine local running-culture brand, not just a gel.
Building a Region-Specific Nutrition Plan
For runners racing across multiple Southeast Asian countries, the practical takeaway isn't necessarily switching your entire nutrition strategy to local brands -- it's knowing what's realistically available if your usual gel doesn't show up at packet pickup or an aid station. Dever's flavor range and electrolyte tablets make it the more complete option if you're basing a full nutrition plan around one regional brand.
As always with race nutrition, test anything new in training long before race day -- a gel that agrees with one runner's stomach won't necessarily agree with another's, regardless of where it's made.