I wrote about Alibaba’s 11 growth strategies in the fall of 2020. At their investors day, management laid them out in pretty good detail. You can see my write-up at: Dissecting Alibaba’s 11 Growth Strategies. From Investor Day 2020 (pt 1 of 2). (Jeff’s Asia Tech Class – Daily Lesson / Update) This is my […]
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses whether ByteDance, the Chinese tech giant behind TikTok, can breach Alibaba’s dominance in the Chinese ecommerce market. He argues that ByteDance has a number of advantages, including its large user base, its data-driven approach to marketing, and its ability to innovate quickly. However, he also acknowledges that Alibaba has a number of strengths, including its strong infrastructure, its deep relationships with merchants, and its brand recognition. He concludes that it is too early to say whether ByteDance will be able to challenge Alibaba, but that the battle between the two companies is one to watch.
There is a lot to like about Alibaba (from a strategy and competition perspective). Massive, almost unprecedented, competitive strength. It’s a complementary platform and a digital-physical hybrid. That puts it at the top of my competitive strength pyramid. It is riding the mother of all secular trends – the rising wealth of Chinese families. And […]
Sea Limited is rocking and rolling. Jumping from gaming to ecommerce. Then to payment and financial services. And now to Mexico. There is a growing public consensus that the Sea management team is extraordinarily effective. That’s cool. But it would have been much better to know that two years ago, when the stock was much […]
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 […]
On a 2018 earnings call, Elon Musk said he disagreed with one of Warren Buffett’s core investment principles — that companies should use strategic “moats” to disengage with competitors. “If your only defense against invading armies is a moat, you will not last long,” Musk said. “What matters is the pace of innovation — that […]
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses how tech companies are creating “evil moats” by building habits and capturing the consumer mind. He argues that these moats are difficult to compete with and can lead to market concentration. He cites examples such as Facebook, Google, and TikTok, which have all created products that are highly addictive and difficult to switch away from.
It’s easy to get lost in all the factors and phenomena emerging as digital and data technology transform industry after industry. As I have argued before, there are actually four things happening at once: Accelerating digital transformation and / or disruption. New digital tools and data technologies keep emerging. There’s big data and AI. There […]
Take-Away 1: Hello bike-sharing is a marginally profitable, small services business. Its recent shift to ebikes (and subscriptions) is increasing its revenue and making it more defendable. But it is also changing the economics. Take-Away 2: Hello is trying to build a platform business model on its large user base. A marketplace for mobility (like […]