So Alibaba Investor Day was this week. Actually it was three days. And there were lots of presentations and publications. But people generally want to hear from Maggie Wu (CFO) and Daniel Zhang (CEO). Their two presentations on the final day are a big deal. I went through everything (so you don’t have to). And […]
Online insurance company ZhongAn was the first mover in “digital meets insurance” in China. A strategy Ant Financial would later refer to in its IPO filing as “InsureTech”. And in both the ZhongAn and Ant cases, we saw: An awesome digital strategy and vision in a very big market. Limited traction after years of effort. […]
Last week, I wrote about how mindless behavior, chemistry and habits can be demand-side competitive advantages, which I put under the catch-all title of “share of the consumer mind’. It’s a Warren Buffett term and one of the concepts in the Concept Library. I described demand-side (or revenue-side) competitive advantages this way: “…competitive advantages on […]
I have talked a lot about competitive advantages on the demand side (sometimes called revenue advantages). These are structural advantages that enable premium pricing, repeat purchases, higher ROIC and / or stable marketshare over longer periods of time. For example, I have spoken a lot on the podcast about switching costs. That is really my […]
Xiaomi is an important company. And it has really important strategy lessons. I think there are 5. But the big question that cuts across all of them is: Can the company’s operational excellence compensate for its weak business model? Here’s my take. Lesson 1: Xiaomi’s Foundational Asset Was World Class Tech Management. From its founding […]
Singapore-based Sea Limited, which runs Garena, Shopee and AirPay, is one of the biggest tech investment stories of 2020. In the first quarter of 2020, the company was trading in the $40 price range. It is now around $180, with a market capitalization approaching $100B. It has been a rocketship for investors this year. But […]
Luxury marketplace platform Farfetch has had a long courtship with JD, Alibaba and Chinese consumers. In the next update, I’ll go into my thoughts on Farfetch as a stand-alone company (basically, not good). But the more interesting questions for investors are: Is Farfetch going to get bought? What is the private market value to Chinese […]
I spent Singles’ Day 2017 visiting Alibaba and meeting with management (see Part 1 and Part 2 here). And one big highlight of the visit was a group influencer dinner with Alibaba Vice-Chairman and co-founder Joseph Tsai. He was always the guy I listened to about Alibaba. Jack Ma is famous but doesn’t really speak the language […]
Long-term investors search for high quality companies they can buy and hold. They ignore the near-term swings in stock prices and, instead, try to capture the larger creation of value in the enterprise over time. It’s a long-term wealth creation strategy. And it really works… …for a small number of companies. Yes, the results of […]
One of things I like about Warren Buffett is he is very open about his life. He talks a lot about his experiences, his wife, his father and his friends. And when students and younger folk ask him business questions, he often answers with personal advice. For example, at one of the lunches we had, […]