China to spend 350bn online by 2015
2012-04-12 17:39:03
Half a billion internet users and an economy which, although not immune to international economic pressures, is still on the up means that China is poised to experience a massive ecommerce boost.
Add in an anticipated 200-million more users and the Asian superpower could become the world’s biggest ecommerce market by 2015.
According to the Boston Consulting Group(BCG), the country’s online market could be worth as much as US$350-billion by then.
China already has more online shoppers than any other country — around 193-million — but overall spend remains higher in the US.
BCG warns, however, that although China may soon be buying more than traditional Western markets, its buying habits won’t be the same. This is one of the reasons China isn’t an easy market for outside players to crack.
Another reason is that three big players — Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent — are already dominant in search, ecommerce, and social “and are working hard to consolidate their positions and move into new fields”.
More specifically, Alibaba has near stranglehold on the ecommerce market. According to The Next Web, its Tabao service is responsible for around 90% of consumer to consumer transactions. Alibaba.com meanwhile, has a 50% market share in the business to business sector.