Apple appoints a new commerce chief, ebay hires a CPO – Ecommerce stories of the week

Apple appoints a new commerce chief, Google becomes a $1000 stock, eBay hires a CPO from Apple and Alibaba is no Amazon..

Apple is a brand trying to regain its vibrancy after the passing of their inspiration and leader Steve Jobs. However, one of the things Jobs did that gets lost in all the iDevices and rumors is the fact that Jobs understood the importance of retail. He was the only big technology CEO thinking about the long term effects of retail on his business.

When I travel, I make a point of visiting the local Apple store if they are in the country. Why? Apple has in my opinion created the closest execution of what I believe retail will be in the next 5 years. The news that Apple has appointed Angela Ahrendts as its new chief of retail is not a surprise at all. Ahrendts brings a few things to the table for her new role. She has turned around a brand that was almost dead into a highly successful global fashion brand. She has ensured that Burberry is a dominant player in Chinese luxury retail and lets be honest, Apple has battled in the emerging markets. I agree with Greg Betinelli that Ahrendts is going to have her hands full as Apple is a completely different challenge in comparison to Burberry.

Google had their earnings call this week and they had a massive quarter. Wall Street loved them and then the stock became a $1000. I suspect that in the next 12 months that will increase to anything in the range of $1250 – $1500.(Please note I do not own Google stock nor is this to be seen as financial advice).

Why? Google Shopping will have a massive 4th quarter as PLA’s will make a lot of revenue. Secondly, they are now beginning to show their hand related to commerce. Local is where they are going to be focusing on.  The local reviews and “City experts” is all about another data point for the Mountain view behemoth. Yelp is officially been placed on notice..  Google is now going to flex its commerce muscles – first by adding data to their Trusted stores program “when consumers roll over the Trusted Stores badges on e-commerce sites—the badges are typically found in the bottom corners of the sites—they will see performance data from StellaService.” They will also be adding (depending on user settings) customer images and reviews to ads.

The stories that caught my attention this week ending 18 October 2013:

  1. eBay Hires Apple E-Commerce Exec RJ Pittman for New Chief Product Officer Role – If you wanted to understand how important marketplaces are to eBay then this appointment is the sign. Pittman will have to help eBay redesign their marketplace on both mobile and desktop devices.  eBay Marketplaces President Devin Wenig added that “We’re placing a lot of emphasis on the user experiences, and so this feels like a natural evolution.”
  2. Alibaba to transform China’s ‘e-conomy’ with $500 bln marketplace – Alibaba’s 2 ecommerce business Taobao and Tmall accounted for 3 billion of the 5.69 billion parcels moved around China in 2012. The scale that Alibaba has should concern the rest of the ecommerce ecosystem as I see them becoming a bigger player in the next 5 years.
  3. How Open APIs are Disrupting the Ecommerce Business Model – Real time data and information is becoming a necessity for ecommerce businesses. It helps add value for users who are looking to buy a product or for developers who are leveraging your ecommerce platform.
  4. The Price Network – This was a fascinating read and made me think of a social experiment that will be a by product of a digital world. What is the price of item X in Brazil, South Africa, UK and Thailand. It reads a lot like the Big Mac Index but just on a much bigger scale. “He sees his company as something like a blend of Google Street View and the Consumer Price Index: a window into the world’s stores to help us learn about the experience of the people behind the prices.”
  5. Another e-commerce startup adds an offline outpost: Rent the Runway opens first showroom – I must admit this physical store opening by ecommerce companies is baffling me. Why? You are giving all of your traditional advantages (no rental costs, lower capitals needs etc)  up to be closer to the customer.
  6. Snapdeal Raising More Money From Ebay; $150-200M In All: Report – Snapdeal raising more capital for me sounds like a reactive move after Flipkart’s massive round of investment. Is India really such a big opportunity?
  7. Refinery29 ditches commerce, raising $20 million to double down on content – The whole content meets commerce movement seems to be systemically shifting to content first. The past week saw Vox Media (owner of SB Nation and The Verge) also raise a mega round of capital. The commerce play will be down the road as it will be a logical extension to the dying print industry.
  8. Andreessen Partner Says Only Amazon’s Jeff Bezos ‘Inspires Universal Fear – Who is afraid of Jeff Bezos? Everyone. I generally agree with this post and the original post as Bezos has a few things that few other ecommerce executives have. He has a track record, his business (Amazon.com etc) has been around the longest in the ecommerce space and he has an incredible focus on the customer.
  9. Chinese Internet Icon Jack Ma Is Working Closely With Lesser-Known Billionaire Friend On Big Logistics Plan – “When it was announced in May, Cainiao which means “rookie” or, more literally, “a green bird”–was described as a national logistics backbone that would support Alibaba’s huge daily trade and China’s e-commerce landscape” – If Alibaba gets this logistics business right (which I think is the case then the whole ecommerce landscape will change. Why? Scale and results. Alibaba has scale unlike any business (Amazon is the exception) but they are then in the position to move out of Asia..
  10. Alibaba Isn’t the Amazon of China – Alibaba is not the Chinese version of Amazon. It is a combination of a Google, eBay and Amazon as the business has many similarities to those businesses. Alibaba makes almost a 100x more operating profit margin than Amazon. A great post by Juro Osawa.

Bonus links:

  • SoleRebels Wins Domain Name Claim Against Oliberte Boss – “Ethiopian eco friendly footwear company, SoleRebels has won an arbitration proceeding in a domain name dispute against the owner of Oliberte shoe company.” Businesses protecting their IP is very important but in a case like this it is even more important as SoleRebels is an up and coming global brand.
  • Is Algeria ready for an online supermarket? – The grocery retail business is an global disruption phase. In developed markets it is dealing with omnichannel opportunities and in the developing markets grocery shopping is getting online.
  • SA e-commerce stores should think global – PayPal – Cross border commerce is a great idea but in South Africa currency control via legislation is very stringent. Those two issues go hand in hand. To be continued..
  • Wonga picks up Rocket’s BillPay to aid European expansion – Wonga is slowly moving into becoming a global digital payments business. BillPay will allow Wonga to have more traction in Europe. This is also a strategic move for Wonga as they under political pressure in the UK over their loans business.
  • 30% orders placed from mobiles: Snapdeal – 12 million visits per month on mobile with 60% of the mobile users being new to Snapdeal. 75% of which involve COD – very interesting stats for a young business.

Onwards..