Alibaba and Intersport: Why New Retail Could Be Powerful in Sports Apparel (3 of 3)

In Part 1 and Part 2, I gave some background on sports apparel in China and detailed my visit to the first Tmall – Intersport store in Beijing. It was pretty great. With lots of new digital initiatives. Note: the above picture is what happens when you change the gender setting on the magic mirror. […]

3 Lessons in Digitizing Sports Apparel from Intersport and Alibaba (2 of 3)

Several years ago, I got a message (via LinkedIn) from Robin Trebbe, who was at that time the Managing Director for China / Asia Pacific for Intersport International. They had a new project with Alibaba that was trying to digitize the sports apparel business. I jumped at the chance to do a visit. Note: I […]

Digitizing Sports Apparel: My Visit to the Tmall – Intersport Store in China (1 of 3)

Will “new retail” change sports apparel? It turns out it’s a really interesting question. Sports apparel retail is people buying running shoes, Nike gear, yoga pants, sweatshirts and so on. At first glance it looks like pretty standard apparel retail. Requiring lots of stores, good inventory management and effective marketing. So that certainly presents lots […]

The Coronavirus Quarantine Economy Supercharged Taobao Live and the China Digital Consumer Network (Tech Strategy – Podcast 19)

The coronavirus quarantine economy has supercharged the growth of live-streaming and KOLs (key opinion leaders) in China. Taobao Live, a live-streaming platform owned by Alibaba, has seen its user base and sales grow significantly in recent months. This trend is likely to continue as the Chinese economy reopens and consumers increasingly turn to digital channels for shopping and entertainment.

Alibaba, Complementary Platforms and Why Dinosaur Packs Are Scary (Daily Update – Jeff’s Asia Tech Class)

I consider digital platforms the super predators of the business world. They are like that Indominus Rex dinosaur in the movie Jurassic World that is part T-Rex and part velociraptor (photo here). And when it breaks free (which always happens in those movies), it runs around eating everything on the island. Because it is the […]

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