In Part 1, I laid out some of the challenges of doing ecommerce in groceries. And two innovative business models that attempted to make it work. One by Alibaba Freshippo and one by Dingdong. Both very interesting. Both, especially Dingdong, being unprofitable. In the past month, both companies have announced operating profits. That was really […]
In the past month, two Chinese ecommerce companies focused on on-demand grocery ecommerce have announced they reached operating profitability in 2022. The two companies are Freshippo (i.e., Alibaba) and Dingdong (i.e., Maicai), both of which I have written about previously. They are both innovative business models focused one of the last subsectors for ecommerce, which […]
This week’s podcast is about assessing specialty ecommerce companies (i.e,. the anteaters) vs. the ecommerce giants (i.e,. the lions). Which will survive? Which will thrive? You can listen to this podcast here or at iTunes and Google Podcasts. Here is the link to the Q&A on Sept 7: Live Chat with Prof Jeff on Asia Tech Strategy Here […]
Given the political shake-up in China tech, I’ve been shifting my focus to smaller companies that: Are not of a size that puts them on the radar for anti-trust regulation. Will benefit from government constraints on the giants. So I’ve recently written about NetEase, the #2 player in gaming in China. Is NetEase a Buying […]
There are a lot of interesting ecommerce plays at the intersection of food and on-demand services. Meituan, GoJek, Grab and Dingdong to name a few. I recently wrote about how Dingdong was doing on-demand fresh produce as a specialty ecommerce play. Dingdong vs. Oriental Trading: How to Spot the Specialty Ecommerce Winners (1 of 2) […]
In Part 1 – and in Podcast 90 (Can Dingdong Win in Groceries and Specialty Ecommerce?), I teed up questions about how specialty ecommerce companies win and lose. It’s a really useful strategy question to think about. Here’s why. Imagine a small ecommerce company emerges and gets some traction with a clever product. Or in […]