In total, ecommerce platforms supporting business trade will make up 27% of the USD 25 trillion market by 2020, according to the ‘Future of B2B Online Retailing’ report issued by Frost & Sullivan research company. The move to ecommerce is facilitated by a transfer away from costly legacy systems, as well as the advantage of automating many of the time consuming and costly aspects of procurement.
Large ecommerce businesses have recently attracted considerable attention, with the IPO of Alibaba raising a notable USD 21.8 billion. Each year, the use of ecommerce-based platforms is increasing, a recent research from Capgemini shows. In 2014, the UK ecommerce business-to-consumer (B2C) market grew by 12% and now accounts for 24% of the retail spend.
China and the US are set to lead the B2B online market, of which the latter is anticipated to double its revenue contribution to USD 1.2 billion by 2020. These platforms are, like their B2C counterparts, often being developed to facilitate a wide range of businesses. Thus rather than providing a facility that is one-to-many, the development of the market will see more many-to-many businesses arrive.
In the B2B sector, the complexities that wholesale ecommerce platforms need to deal with are of a magnitude bigger than in the B2C sector. Businesses tend to buy in bulk and in greater variety while, unlike in the B2C setup, prices are variable. The necessity for flexible shipping introduces further complexities into logistics solution.
Every day we send out a free e-mail with the most important headlines of the last 24 hours.
Subscribe now