Baidu, China’s leading search engine, is a “learning platform” that becomes smarter with increased user activity. Founded by Robin Li in 2000, it was designed to cater to search users, webpages, and advertisers. Baidu, like other learning platforms, can serve both human and digital agents, enhancing their service based on the overall and individual user activity.
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses the three types of network effects: direct, indirect, and standardization and interoperability. He explores how these different types of network effects can create value for businesses and consumers, and he discusses the challenges that businesses face in building and maintaining network effects. For example, he discusses how businesses need to invest in marketing and advertising to attract users, and how they need to keep users engaged with their products and services.
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses the competitive landscape in smart IoT logistics, comparing the strategies of JD Logistics and DHL. He argues that JD Logistics has a number of advantages, including its large network of warehouses and delivery drivers, its data-driven approach to logistics, and its focus on customer experience. He concludes that JD Logistics is well-positioned to win the race to become the leading provider of smart IoT logistics services in Asia.
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses how Adobe has been able to maintain its dominance in the software industry despite the rise of cloud-based alternatives. He argues that Adobe’s success is due to its focus on old-school software economics, such as network effects and recurring revenue. He explains that network effects make it more valuable for each user to join a platform as more users join, and that recurring revenue provides a steady stream of income that can be used to invest in new products and services.
Take-Away 1: Adobe Inc. is a good example of many of the strengths of traditional software economics. It has evolved and expanded over decades to become a full suite of creative tools. It is now trying to expand from creative tools to operating tools. Take-Away 2: However, purely digital companies need to protect their attractive […]
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses Baidu’s key strategic questions, including its best growth opportunity, whether it needed to go into content, and how it can compete in the attention market. He argues that Baidu’s best growth opportunity is in the cloud, but that it needs to be careful not to overextend itself. He also believes that Baidu needs to focus on its core search business and not get distracted by other ventures.
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses how digital economics can impact well-established competitive advantages like economies of scale. He argues that digital economics can create new competitive advantages, but it can also destroy old ones. For example, he cites the example of Amazon, which has been able to achieve economies of scale by using digital technologies to automate its warehouses and distribution network.