There was an interesting report about China ecommerce trends released by Coresight Research, which specializes in retail meets tech consulting. It’s run by Deborah Weinswig, who I’ve crossed paths with a few times in the last couple of years. I find their research to be very data-driven and generally close to my own thinking. So […]
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses whether Shopee, backed by Tencent, can beat Lazada, backed by Alibaba, in the Southeast Asian e-commerce market. He considers factors such as market share, investment, and strategy. For example, Shopee has a larger market share in Indonesia, while Lazada has a larger market share in Thailand.
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses how big Ant Financial, the financial arm of Alibaba, could become. He considers factors such as its current size, its growth rate, and its plans for expansion. For example, Ant Financial is already the world’s largest mobile payments company, and it is growing at a rapid pace.
In Part 1 (From Big, Dumb Bureaucracies to Zero-Human Operations (pt 1 of 2), I made the following argument: In the industrial age, enterprises were built on the advantages of scale. Companies went from workshops and small factories to big factories capable of mass production. Superior scale gave companies multiple advantages, including cost efficiencies and […]
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses how Meituan can compete with Alibaba in the Chinese services marketplace. He considers factors such as geographic expansion, focus on transportation or hospitality services, and ancillary opportunities such as financial services or cloud services. For example, Meituan could expand into new markets, such as Southeast Asia, or it could focus on its core strengths, such as food delivery and ride-hailing.
Most of this course has been about strategy. Well, the intersection of strategy and digital. Basically, Michael Porter meets Jack Ma. But an important part of the executive tool kit is M&A. If you’re going to run a company or be a senior manager, you have to know how to buy other companies. You have […]
In Part 1 (Why the #1 Business Solution to Coronavirus in China Is Live Streaming, Especially Taobao Live), I argued three big things are happening in digital China right now. Covid19 is radically altering the behavior of hundreds of millions of consumers (and businesses), resulting in what is being called the quarantine economy. Everyone is […]
One of the big digital China / Asia stories of 2019-2020 has been the movement of Alipay into services. And I don’t think people have quite realized what a giant Alipay (i.e., Ant Financial) has become in China and increasingly globally. From a recent article by Technode: In what Alipay CEO Simon Hu dubbed the […]
In this podcast, Jeffrey Towson discusses the future of e-commerce in Asia, with a focus on Alibaba’s acquisition of Lazada. He argues that this acquisition will help Alibaba to create a more interconnected Asia, where consumers can shop from anywhere in the region. For example, he notes that Alibaba could use Lazada’s logistics network to deliver goods to consumers in Southeast Asia, which would help to reduce shipping costs and make it easier for consumers to buy from overseas retailers.
Much of our discussion about digital platforms (Alibaba, Tencent, etc.) has been about their business models. And all their strengths, which are formidable. But I haven’t talked much about the experiences of the user groups on these platforms. What does this mean for merchants and brands selling on Alibaba? For restaurants on Meituan? For content […]