Global Marketing News – 19th May 2015
Indian ecommerce could attract $25 billion in investment
A report by consulting firm, India Opportunity Advisors shows that with enough foreign investment, the e-commerce sector in India could reach $60 billion in sales by 2020.
The report says that despite Indian e-commerce experiencing a growth of 100%, year-on-year, it needs to attract more than $25 billion over the next six years for it to reach its potential.
Its current business-to-business model can’t continue alone and foreign direct investment is needed to boost its business-to-commerce marketplace.
Reports from other countries show that mutually supportive marketplace models can help the sector to flourish. However, for this to happen the rules for foreign investment need to be adapted accordingly.
The e-tailing sector in India is still in its early days and with the right investment could be valued at $76 billion by 2021.
Nordic ecommerce on the rise
During the first quarter of 2015, Nordic consumers spent 36.5 billion Swedish Krona on online retail; 7% more than the same time last year.
While all Nordic countries saw an increase, Denmark has the highest number of online shoppers, with 76% of its population shopping online.
In a report published by PostNord, a Nordic postal company, surveys showed that while a range of available delivery methods is crucial, different countries have different expectations.
A third of Danish and Swedish online customers expect goods to be delivered within three days, while people in Finland are prepared to wait five.
While most online shopping is conducted on a computer, Nordic countries are following the global trend of using a smartphone for shopping, with Sweden having the most mobile shoppers. Swedes are also more likely to buy goods from the UK, US and China than from their own, or neighbouring countries.
2015 a good year for ecommerce in France
Fevad, the French Trade Association has published the latest e-commerce figures for France and in the first quarter of 2015, French online sales grew by 13.7%, compared to 11% the year before. This marks a new phase for French e-commerce after recent years have seen sales level off.
The increase in French e-commerce websites could have something to do with this rise. There are currently 164,200 active e-commerce websites in France, compared to 14,500 ten years ago. There are also 35 million online consumers.
Not all the figures are on the up though. The average transaction has dropped from 82 Euros to 79. But this figure, coupled with the increase in online consumers, could be another good sign. It could indicate that people don’t just shop online for big goods but order smaller items more frequently.
Alibaba buys stake in US ecommerce site
The Chinese e-commerce company has acquired more than a 9% stake in US online retailer, Zulily. The Seattle-based website sells mainly children’s toys and clothing.
Alibaba isn’t looking to acquire Zulily outright, but is reported to have bought shares for around $56 million.
Zulily shares have recently plummeted amid decreasing sales figures and an inability to hold onto their customers. However, shares spiked this week after news of Alibaba’s stake.
This comes as Alibaba’s new CEO, Daniel Zhang takes over. It is hoped that his strong track record and international know-how will boost China’s cross-border e-commerce market.
Young entrepreneur launches Storm, a search engine to rival Google
And finally, amid recent investigations into cheating and fears about online anonymity, it looks like Google has a rival.
The young developer behind the open-source web browser, Waterfox, is offering users online privacy while ignoring traditional advertising methods. He plans to give a percentage of online purchases to charitable organisations and social enterprises.
20-year-old Alex Kontos hopes that his new search engine, Storm, will tempt users away from Google, while raising money for charity. The company is currently in talks with some major players in the charity sector.
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Cal O'Connell
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as for the e commerce trend in 2015, i find all of our decision are correct. bulk order is not popular, people are tending to buy smaller orders. and european countries are paying more interest on ecommerce, thus dhgate.com adjusted the business policy in the beginning of the year and start to develop the multi language sites. while, india is a potential market, alibab has already paid efforts to invested, this is right.