9 April 2015 – Global Marketing News
Google set to face antitrust charges in Europe
After 5 years of antitrust investigations, it appears that the EU is preparing to file charges against Google.
The EU has been approaching companies that filed complaints against Google to ask for their permission to publish the complaints publically, a move that experts say suggests that the EU is in the final stages of preparing the charges.
A source close to the investigation has suggested that the charges could be filed within the next few weeks.
Google stands accused of deploying tactics to boost the ranking of its own services, whilst pushing rival services offered by competitors further down the search results by demoting the value of their links or simply refusing to list them altogether.
If the EU does file the charges against Google, it would be the most high profile case since a similar probe into Microsoft, which resulted in the tech company paying almost 2 billion US dollars in fines in 2012.
If any charges against Google were successful, the search engine may be forced to pay fines of up to 10% of its revenue, which could total as much as 6.6 billion US dollars.
Ma visits India, pledges to help small Indian businesses sell online
The CEO of the Chinese ecommerce giant Alibaba Jack Ma has met the Indian Prime Minister in his second visit to India in last 4 months.
Ma said the purpose of the visit was to discuss how Alibaba could help empower small Indian businesses and help them to sell their products online.
This is in line with Alibaba’s ambition to expand internationally over the next 3 years to become a global ecommerce platform.
In a recent statement, Alibaba said: “Over the next three years, one of the key strategies for Alibaba is to globalise and to make sure that we can help more small businesses around the globe [to] use our services to do business.”
Electric cars to go on sale on Amazon in Japan
Amazon has started selling electric cars on its Japanese site.
The BMW i3 and BMW i3 Range Extender models went on sale on the site from Wednesday last week, with BMW hoping that the arrangement with Amazon will help them to reach a wider audience in Japan.
It will not be possible to simply the buy a car with one click, however. Once a buyer has clicked the button to purchase a vehicle, they will receive a phone call from BMW where they will need to provide evidence that they have a parking space and access to a charging point.
The i3 model can travel 229km on one charge, while the i3 Range Extender model can travel 300km on one charge.
Yahoo Japan PPC account opening and set up
Yahoo Japan has a large share of search queries in Japan. Failing to use Yahoo Japan therefore means that you could be missing out on at least one-third of the market's opportunities. Sponsored search is Yahoo Japan's paid search advertising platform specifically designed for the Japanese audience, allowing you to target by location, time and date, and giving you insights into Japanese consumer habits. We will set up a PPC account for you on Yahoo Japan, enabling you to run your paid search campaigns and access valuable data to help strengthen your presence in the region.
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Online takeaway ordering growing faster than global GDP
A report by Market Reports Online has found that the popularity of online takeaway ordering is growing faster than global GDP.
It discovered that the US is the largest market, ahead of the UK, Canada, Brazil, Italy, Spain and France.
It put the growth of online takeaway ordering down to increasing internet penetration, increasing smartphone and tablet penetration, urbanisation and increasing demand from developing countries.
The wider variety of food options, payment options and the ability to leave online reviews were also put forward as reasons why consumers are increasingly turning from offline to online takeaway ordering.
Unique opportunity for marketing technology start-ups
And finally, innovative marketing start-ups will have the opportunity to showcase their business ideas at the Cannes Lions Festival later this year.
Cannes Lions Innovation and Unilever are teaming up to find 50 pioneering marketing technology start-ups, which will then be invited to the Cannes Lions Festival on 25th and 26th June where they will have the opportunity to demonstrate their business products and services to top brands and agencies.
To enter, start-ups must meet 4 requirements: they must be obviously different to existing competitors, be relevant to the marketing industry, have achieved incorporated status within the last 5 years, and raised less than 10 million US dollars in equity funding.
Entrants can submit their businesses at http://foundry.unilever.com/foundry50/
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Cal O'Connell
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