Amazon unveils Amazon Coins, Google acquires Channel Intelligence, eCommerce industry news from Turkey, Poland and much more

It is Sunday night (which became Monday Night) and if I look back at the past week then the stories from this week is the calm before the storm. The storm refers to the ongoing battles seen in the ecommerce industry across the globe.

Let me be clear, 2013 is slowly becoming a fight between Amazon and Google in the US. Amazon Coins is to be available from early May and is a genius move from Amazon. Virtual currency is huge business in China and something that been lacking in Amazon’s arsenal.  It seems that the currency is to drive usage on the Kindle Fire and also closes the loop in terms of transactions that are to be done on the Amazon appstore. This announcement highlights the fact that apps and ebooks are now a bigger focus for the Seattle behemoth.

The other big story this past week is the Channel Intelligence acquisition by Google. Google is spending millions of dollars on ecommerce and acquisitions to bolster its Google Shopping product. Channel Intelligence is a commerce enabler that has some of the biggest retailers (Target, Best Buy and Staples) in the US as clients. The acquisition poses some interesting questions. One, does all the current clients stay with Channel Intelligence after the Google acquisition? What is the gain from the acquisition for Google Shopping? Also does Channel Intelligence become an autonomous business inside Google? The one thing that this acquisition highlights for me is that data is an important part of Google strategy at regaining market share back from Amazon in ecommerce.

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Google Shopping taking market share from Amazon, Amazon posts results and Andreessen predicts the death of retail.

The second month of the year has started and last week was dominated by Amazon’s results. Amazon posted results that lead to a stock price increase. I think anybody that keeps an eye on ecommerce in North America would not be surprised with the record number of sales that Amazon did in 2012. The results did contain a few interesting snippets; third party marketplace transactions were more than those of merchandise sold my Amazon. I believe strongly that this trend will continue in the coming months. Secondly, digital media and in particular eBooks created several Billion dollars in transactions. This was a significant disclosure by the CFO of Amazon during the analyst call. Will Amazon ever become a profit making machine or will it continue to be a low margin high volume business?

Wired featured an article this week on Google’s Plan to Snatch Shopping From Amazon Is Working – It is linkbait and in all honesty contains thoughts that I don’t agree with. The big issue I have is that the author misses one thing. I agree with the fact that shoppers in the US either start shopping with a search on Google or open their browser on Amazon.com. The search on Google is being infiltrated by Product Listing Ads and in all honesty it is becoming more difficult to find non Google businesses in the search results in the US. What the author misses completely is that Amazon has a very successful loyalty program called Amazon Prime and that ensures that users don’t bother with doing any commerce related searches on Google. So my questions is simple, how does Google’s plan work with the users going directly to Amazon.com?

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Will Google Shopping Become a Marketplace? Google exceeds expected financial results, Amazon invests in a  text to speech service and much more.

The past week contained quarterly results for Google.  Google exceeded the market expectations primarily due to its advertising business. Google’s results were very interesting as international revenue was 54% of  Q4 revenue generated. The Motorola acquisition is in my mind a long term financial disaster for both companies. Google will continue to sell assets that Motorola Mobility business had until they are left with almost nothing. Did anyone else notice the lack of facts about Google Plus during the results presentation?

One idea that continually raises its head is the thought that Google Shopping might become a marketplace. It makes sense as Google has a lot of services that can be used to create the commerce value chain. Google Wallet, Merchant feeds, Google Trusted Stores, Bufferbox which can be used as a logistics solutions and an advertising platform that be used to build a solid competitor against Amazon. Whether Google wants to play in the marketplace space is another question for another post.

I missed mentioning eBay’s results from the 16th for some unknown reason. I think eBay is no longer a company that can be seen as a commerce nobody. Yes, I know their search is broken and that they are not seen a traditional ecommerce businesses. I must confess, eBay has flown below the radar for a while and I think 2013 is a year in which they make their case for being an Amazon competitor. Yes, I said it. Amazon competitor. Disrupt the disruptor and John Donahoe has done that with his mobile play. In my own mind, eBay is the furthest advanced in terms of of mobile commerce than any of the big players. Thus the lessons they have learned is going to benefit them greatly in the long run..

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Foundem starts legal proceedings against Google in the UK, Bezos does not care about profit margins and 2012 was a good year for South African ecommerce

The first real  working week of 2013 is in the record books and the news from across the ecommerce globe confirms it. Legal issues is starting to make news again and it seems that the word “anti-competitive” is back in the lights. Google has been accused of being anti-competitive by UK vertical search engine Foundem. The European part of the Google ruling has not been done and may potentially not be like those seen with the FTC.

Secondly, the Bazaarvoice acquisition of Power Reviews may also be potentially create results that ensures that the acquistion ensures changes to the Reviews market in North America. I am not a lawyer but it seems anti competitive acquisitions by companies that have potentially have huge implications on a specific market or vertical always creates activity for the Department of Justice.

One other story that has really interesting implications is Rakuten’s decision to “retire” buy.com and rebrand the business to Rakuten Shopping. It is becoming clear that this is the strategy that Rakuten does. Acquire a business, rebrand it and then potentially change the business model. Marketplaces seems to be their business model of choice.

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