China's Alibaba To Outsell Amazon, eBay Combined

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China's Alibaba To Outsell Amazon, eBay Combined

Posted by Soulskill on Tuesday September 11, 2012 @04:10PM from the but-do-they-have-free-shipping-for-25-bucks dept.

hackingbear writes "China's largest e-commerce firm, Alibaba Group, expects to sell merchandise this year worth more than that sold by Amazon Inc and eBay combined. The company is aiming for 3 trillion yuan ($473 billion) in annual transaction value from its Taobao e-commerce units in the next 5 to 7 years, rising from the 1 trillion yuan of sales expected for 2012. 'From their annual reports we did a rough calculation and we were similar last year but we are growing faster than them this year, so this year we are probably larger than them,' Zeng Ming, Chief Strategy Officer of Alibaba, said of Amazon and eBay."

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I have the desire! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-11 16:13 · Score: 5, Insightful

I have so much desire to order from Alibaba, but I can't quite figure out how to verify that I won't be screwed. It seems almost guaranteed.
1. Re:I have the desire! by fragMasterFlash · 2012-09-11 16:24 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Most of the EBay sellers I buy from anymore ship directly from Asia. I doubt purchasing from Alibaba would be much different, so long as the seller accepted payment from well vetted processors such as Dwolla, Square, AmazonPayments or even those PayPal creeps.
2. Re:I have the desire! by phantomfive · 2012-09-11 16:28 · Score: 2
  
  Because they are going back into .com mode. Remember the late 90s, when Amazon's stock grew as fast as their losses? It was because their revenue was growing, and they were making a loss on every sale.
  
  Same deal now, but stock buyers expect eventually their profits will grow to match their revenue, much like in the 90s. This is probably true but in my opinion there are other good deals without such a high p/e ratio.
  
  --
  "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
3. Re:I have the desire! by seven7h · 2012-09-11 16:51 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  I recently figured this out. There is another site Ali Express which caters to individual buyers. All prices are listed along with delivery costs. It seems to have a nice filter / search function. ,
  
  Also if you are concerned about the equipment arriving and not working, there is buyer protection, where they will hold your money until you are satisfied withe purchase. I didn't have to use this so it may be difficult to get the refund, all I can say is I was satisfied with the service I got and I would use it again.
  
  (Note; I am not affiliated in any way with Alibaba or Aliexpress)
4. Re:I have the desire! by drkim · 2012-09-11 19:23 · Score: 2
  
  I've bought stuff through them and their retail site: aliexpress
  It's pretty safe. You can search for $0 shipping options if you like.
  They run the escrow between you and the actually seller. Your money get 'verified' before the order goes in.
  Then the seller ships to you. Once you get the order (and it usually comes way faster than DX) you have to log on to Alibaba and indicate that you got the stuff, so they can release the money. Feedback is important, too.
  One seller tried to push me off Alibaba and get me to buy direct, but I didn't want to lose the escrow protection.
  I've only had one defective product problem, but the seller was very careful to make good.
5. Re:I have the desire! by dadelbunts · 2012-09-11 19:55 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  You can message and even chat with the sellers. I bought xbox 360 controller parts for 6 dollars shipped. It took over a month to get here, but it was cheap.
In other news... by Nemyst · 2012-09-11 16:18 · Score: 4, Insightful

In other news, 1.35 billion people (China) is more than 1.13 billion people (Europe and North America combined).
Should we really be surprised by this? China's simply catching up to the levels first world countries are at, and will most likely exceed them since they don't have the petty squabbles that Europe and the US have. That is, unless China's economy crashes.
1. Re:In other news... by guttentag · 2012-09-11 17:54 · Score: 2
  
  China's simply catching up to the levels first world countries are at, and will most likely exceed them since they don't have the petty squabbles that Europe and the US have.
  Yes, in China the party decides which squabbles are petty and which are not. (See inset photo on linked page of thousands of "protesters" in Chengdu carrying banners with slogans like "Even if China is covered with graves, we must kill all Japanese" after some Japanese activists erected a Japanese flag on an island Japan owns but China wants.)
2. Re:In other news... by jlar · 2012-09-11 23:07 · Score: 2
  
  Wrong. Japan officially annexed the formerly uninhabitated islands in 1895. Japan furthermore claims that the islands were not under Chinese control prior to that. The Chinese claim that they have been a part of China since at least 1534. This is obviously not a clear cut case.
What's the big deal by Dyinobal · 2012-09-11 16:22 · Score: 4, Insightful

What's the big deal about this? I doubt they are eating into amazon or Ebay's customers, all they are doing is expanding into the china and Asian markets where they have very little if any serious competition. I guess amazon could be jealous but I imagine expanding into china would be more hassle than it is worth.
1. Re:What's the big deal by Sycraft-fu · 2012-09-11 16:41 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  For some reason, there are people who think the US is DOOMED if China should overtake it in any way shape or form. They have this idea that there is #1, and there is third world shithole, with nothing in-between. So if the US loses its place of primacy, even in some things, then it is fucked.
  I find this very funny going to Canada all the time which I doubt is #1 in anything, except for having the most Canadians. However it is an exceedingly nice country with a good standard of living, and so on. Turns out that there are lots of places that aren't #1 that are great places to live.
  Also I always take anything coming out of China with a HUGE grain of salt since making up numbers and false economic make-work is the routine over there.
  Regardless it doesn't matter. I don't shop at Amazon because they are "#1" I shop at Amazon because they are a good place to shop. Same reason I shop at Target. No, they aren't the #1 physical retailer, that would be Wal-mart in the US at least. I like Target better though. Turns out that not being #1 is working out ok for them.
2. Re:What's the big deal by slippyblade · 2012-09-11 17:07 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  And here's the clincher. The US isn't #1 in *anything* right now except military spending and wealth concentration.
3. Re:What's the big deal by kenneth_hk_wong · 2012-09-11 17:21 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  Actually, Amazon is in China: www.amazon.com.cn Never use it though.
  I moved to Beijing from Los Angeles, a little over a year ago. I thought that my online ordering days were over -- loved that I could order things from Yugster, or Newegg, or TigerDirect and receive within a couple of days, but I was so wrong. Yes, Taobao is great, and they have an authentication system (with security tokens) for both buyers and sellers that is pretty serious. Way more complicated than US online transactions. Many foreigners haven't figured it out, but my non-Chinese speaking wife has. She could start a business ordering for "laowei". Never mind taobao, there's also 360buy.com. I order before 10am and it arrives same day at my office if they have it in stock. Their website tells you accurately whether they do have the item in stock.
  Prices are sometimes seriously good. Retail margins are very high in the B&M world compared to the West. What has impressed me is that so many people have jumped on the online train. There are chinese people that order EVERYTHING online, groceries, toilet paper, EVERYTHING. Shipping is normally $1-2USD. Ridiculously low. There may be many parts of China that look like they are developing, but with respect to online, they are ahead of us. I'm still shocked sometimes.
4. Re:What's the big deal by kenneth_hk_wong · 2012-09-11 17:33 · Score: 2
  
  I'm not Chinese, but I'm temporarily living here, and you sir, are correct, as far as I'm concerned. Taobao, Youku, Baidu and Sina are the Ebay, Youtube, Google and Twitter. What's wrong with spreading the wealth to the local peeps? Rich, American billionaires don't NEED to be that much richer. How much is enough?
  Yes, the rate of change (I hesitate to automatically label things reforms because it's different from what was done in the past. Reform to me implies improvement.) may be too slow for social democrats, but it's a 5,000 year old civilization with now history of democracy. Let them change a their own pace -- they are patient and that's what they will do anyway.
5. Re:What's the big deal by evilviper · 2012-09-11 17:36 · Score: 2
  
  I doubt they are eating into amazon or Ebay's customers, all they are doing is expanding into the china and Asian markets where they have very little if any serious competition
  No, they aren't REMOTELY similar to Amazon or EBay. It's a site for Business-to-business (B2B) sales of bulk item shipments. Sure, you'll find Android tablets on there, but there will be a 1,000 unit minimum order, and they'll already have factored in the cost to SHIP TO THE USA. Anyone who has spent 5 minutes on the site should know exactly what Alibaba is, and Amazon they aint.
  
  What's the big deal about this?
  Nothing... Absolutely, positively, NOTHING about this story is noteworthy in the SLIGHTEST. But that's most of what we get on /. these days. If, say, Ars Technica and Popular Science used slashcode or some other moderated system, with comments featured promiently, I would stop comming here in a second...
  
  --
  Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
6. Re:What's the big deal by Ambvai · 2012-09-11 17:49 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Lies: http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/because-every-country-is-the-best-at-something/
7. Re:What's the big deal by evilviper · 2012-09-11 17:58 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  The US isn't #1 in *anything* right now except military spending and wealth concentration.
  The US is #1 among all countries in overall GDP, overall manufacturing, aerospace, information technology, music, movies, TV, video games, automotive last I checked (GM, Ford, Chrysler combined), most heavy machinery (eg. CATerpillar) and many, many others.
  
  --
  Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
8. Re:What's the big deal by drkim · 2012-09-11 19:32 · Score: 2
  
  I'd rather be #1 in quality than quantity.
  ...but quantity is job #1 ...!
this is the reason - idiotic story by slashmydots · 2012-09-11 16:30 · Score: 3, Interesting

Last time I was on Alibaba, I saw listing after listing for tons (literally the measuring unit) of scrap metal and recyclable or post-recycled stuff. So yeah, a $100,000 bucket of scrap aluminum doesn't show up on Amazon a whole lot. This is about as apples to apples as comparing Brian Williams to a crunch wrap supreme taco.
Fun fact, the largest gross sales in the US online are, in order:
1. Amazon
2. Newegg
3. eBay
1. Re:this is the reason - idiotic story by kenneth_hk_wong · 2012-09-11 17:40 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  You aren't looking in the right place. Alibaba is merely the parent company. They own taobao.com who owns tmall.com The latter two are the two main places to go for cheap EVERYTHING and a lot of consumers in China know this too.
Its a b2b site by nagasrinivas · 2012-09-11 16:49 · Score: 2

Its where you buy things in bulk for a business. Doesnt make sense comparing it to consumer retail sites at all. And how surprising should this be? China as a huge supplier - hardly news.
1. Re:Its a b2b site by nedlohs · 2012-09-11 17:09 · Score: 2
  
  They mention the B2C site in the brief article, I would hope they are only counting it when doing the comparison. Since I'm pretty sure neither amazon or ebay sells anything like rice with a 1000 ton minimum order, crude oil with a 2 million barrel minimum order, or iron ore with a 150000 ton minimum.
Apples and oranges by Grayhand · 2012-09-11 17:17 · Score: 2

Alibaba is an industrial supplier. It's like saying Tyson sells more chicken than Kentucky Fried Chicken. Why is this a story?
1. Re:Apples and oranges by Zouden · 2012-09-11 18:52 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  The article is about Taobao, which is the consumer subsidiary of Alibaba.
  
  --
  "A week in the lab saves an hour in the library"
Re:Outsell in junk, not in anything meaningful. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-11 18:16 · Score: 2, Insightful

No, unlike Japan, they have learned the lesson that you can make anything a little worse and a little cheaper -- and sell a lot more to the typical American or Chinese consumer. They do make some high quality stuff, but most of it is the save-now-swear-later crap that consumers want.
Unfortunate name by rossdee · 2012-09-11 19:49 · Score: 4, Funny

When I hear the name AliBaba my first thought is "40 Thieves"
Not exactly inspiring confidence in the business.
I guess it means something else in Chinese.
Re:The West has Ariba by drkim · 2012-09-11 19:55 · Score: 2

Not even in the same league.
I just tried a quick test search in both Alibaba and Ariba Discovery (searched for: "thrust bearing")
Alibaba: "65,366 Product(s) found"
Ariba Discovery: "No results found."
AliExpress is the way to go by BenJeremy · 2012-09-11 23:45 · Score: 2

I had a vendor give me an invalid tracking number and didn't ship the product I bought, but the nice thing is that AliExpress ESCROWS the payment. That means the seller doesn't get paid until I get the product.
I quickly got a refund (faster than a current eBay case I'm dealing with), and ordered a slightly different product from a different (and more reputable) vendor... I got that product without any issues (2 years ago, 10" Android Tablet with GPS, still use it today).
I wouldn't have a problem at all using AliExpress. My only advice is to select vendors with plenty of feedback to avoid hassles.
Yeah... by Balinares · 2012-09-12 00:30 · Score: 5, Funny

Yeah, like, for every honest guy you get 40 thieves!

--

-- B.
This sig does in fact not have the property it claims not to have.
The reason that... by sudden.zero · 2012-09-12 04:40 · Score: 2

...they will probably meet this goal is, because they sell knock-off junk where Amazon and eBay for the most part sell authentic goods. For example look at this knock off Samsung Note II http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/631593035/5inch_android_4_0_mtk6575_wifi.html that they are selling for roughly a third the price as the real thing. If you look at the box it comes in at the bottom of the ad it even says Note II inside a mock Samsung logo.