TMCNet:  Rakuten: On Course to Become a Genuine Global Player?

[July 22, 2014]

Rakuten: On Course to Become a Genuine Global Player?

(M2 PressWIRE Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Dublin - Research and Markets (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/xfmfqm/rakuten_on) has announced the addition of the "Rakuten: On course to become a genuine global player?" report to their offering.

Japan is the only major ecommerce market where a home grown incumbent, Rakuten, achieves higher gross merchandise sales (GMS) than Amazon, on both Amazon Retail and its marketplace combined. (The other market is China, but Amazon's laggard position in the country is not due to Alibaba's inherent competitiveness and business model, but an unlevel playing field and CP intervention skewing the market home grown players.) How has Rakuten made domestic leadership and holding off Amazon possible? We believe that there are learnings that can be copied into other markets and that in time new local champions could emerge to knock Amazon off its perch in the France, Germany or the UK.

Irrespective of the industry, leading loyalty players could learn from Rakuten's disruptions of global e-commerce. The key competitive edge in its unique business model with a diverse portfolio of businesses is the Rakuten Super Points loyalty scheme which generates loyalty and stickiness for both consumers and merchants and drives significant cross shopping effects. The super points look likely to develop into the first truly global scheme on a vertical basis including consumer finance, retail, travel, streaming content, sport etc and also horizontally across markets (Japan, USA, Germany, France, UK etc).

Rakuten Ichiba's focus upon quality ensures that only reputable businesses are allowed to trade carrying extremely little risk of poor products and elevating Rakuten as the premium marketplace. Clearly conveying these qualities throughout its global expansion is essential if it is to have an impact in the global e-commerce space. Therefore, Rakuten offers something different to its rivals but these strengths can also be viewed as weaknesses.

The principle of quality merchants and products prevents Rakuten having the scale of Amazon and eBay as it is far more picky about who can sell on the site. This is a major drawback in Rakuten's quest to become a global leader as it arguably needs a vast network of merchants to drive network effects and rival the big two.

This report probes into these matters and much more in great detail to provide a fascinating insight into this impressive yet relatively unknown e-commerce company whose innovative ideas, energetic expansion and strong adherence to its principles is to be admired. The great question is whether Rakuten will build as much brand awareness as Amazon and eBay have with consumers.

Key Topics Covered: - Executive summary: Rakuten 2014 - The core of the business model: the marketplace - Context - Japan - Online Retailing in Japan - Introduction: Rakuten's business model - Recent Key Developments - Financials, KPI and Benchmarks - Comparison Amazon & Rakuten, who leads the market? - Rakuten's strategy - Rakuten's overseas operations - the EU - Overseas operations - emerging markets - USA & Japan - the biggest opportunities? - Outlook - Sources For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/xfmfqm/rakuten_on CONTACT: Research and Markets, Laura Wood, Senior Manager.

[email protected] Fax from USA: 646-607-1907 Fax from rest of the world: +353-1-481-1716 Sector: Retail (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/categories.asp?cat_id=90&campaign_id=xfmfqm) .

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