Suning Book Business Backed up by Dangdang?
Jack Ma, founder, chairman and CEO of Alibaba Group once said that “buying stuff from elsewhere then reselling them online is a stupid business model”, well, how about buying from your competitor rather than channels and then reselling online?
Unbelievable yet might be the sure thing at least to Gong Wenxian, VP of etailer 360hqb.com, who broke the news to local media that Suning.com purchased books from Dangdang.com, another Chinese online general store to build up its own book inventory.
Alibaba(阿里巴巴)グループの創業者、会長兼CEOであるJack Ma(馬雲)氏はかつて、「どこかから商品を買ってオンラインで再販するとは馬鹿げたビジネスモデルだ」と言っている。では、通常の流通経路ではなく競合企業から商品を買ってオンラインで再販するのはどうなのだろうか?
信じがたいが、少なくとも360HQB.com(華強北在線)の副総裁Gong Wenxian(龔文祥)氏にとっては確かなことかもしれない。同氏は地元のメディアに対し、Suning.com(蘇寧)は自社の取扱い書籍を構築するために、中国の別の総合オンラインショップDangdang.com(当当網)から本を仕入れているというニュースを発表した。
Suning went online its book business in last November with a grand and generous campaign of “Free books in 72 hours” – basically all the book-related payments would be refunded as virtual balance in every shopper’s Suning account that could be used to buy other items from the B2C service, and they can keep the books. The eyes-grabbing campaign was a hit then and made to the headlines of a vast majority of local publications.
According to Gong, who is also a long-time Chinese ecommerce observer and tipster, Suning’s book promotion was backed up by Dangdang, “Actually (Suning’s) books were provided by Dangdang. The strategic cooperation between the two was aiming to compete with 360buy.com”, he said.
長年にわたって電子商取引を観察し助言者でもあるGong氏によると、Suningの書籍販売活動はDangdangによって支援されており、「実際に(Suningの)本はDangdangから提供されている。この2社の戦略的提携は360buy.com(京東商城)と競争するためである」と同氏は語った。
長い間、中国のeコマースを調査し続けてきたGongによれば、Suningの本のプロモーションはDangdangによって支えられているとの事で、「実際(Suningの)、本はDangdangによって供給された。2社の戦略的強力は360buy.comに打ち勝つのを目的としている」と彼は語った。
Neither Dangdang nor Suning confirmed the claim. Dangdang said there’s no official partnership between them but could not rule out the possibility that Suning made orders from Dangdang.com directly and then resold them through its own website while Suning rebuffed Gong’s speculation saying all the books were provided by Chinese publishing houses.