| Rakuten to shut China Net 'mall'
JV with Baidu |
bill
msg:4444064 | 1:55 am on Apr 23, 2012 (gmt 0) |
Rakuten to shut China Net 'mall' [japantimes.co.jp]
Japan's top online retailer, Rakuten Inc., will scrap a joint virtual shopping venture with Chinese Internet giant Baidu, citing cutthroat competition in the rapidly expanding e-commerce sector.
The two firms rolled out a virtual shopping mall called Lekutian in China in October 2010, but the venture has struggled and will be shut down by the end of May, Rakuten said Friday. |
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We first noted that Rakuten was working with Baidu on an online shopping mall back in 2010 [webmasterworld.com]. That mall, Lekutian, opened in October 2010 [webmasterworld.com]. Rakuten says that it will write off the entire investment.
This will probably make it difficult for Rakuten to re-enter the China market in the future. Like when eBay pulled out of Japan for similar reasons. It was never able to jump back in.
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Leggewie
msg:4444093 | 4:30 am on Apr 23, 2012 (gmt 0) |
what were the mistakes made, what can be lessons learned for others? anybody know?
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bill
msg:4444125 | 8:11 am on Apr 23, 2012 (gmt 0) |
I haven't seen many details. There are comments about tough competition and bureaucracy being to blame, but nothing concrete. Like the message on the rakuten.cn homepage, it's all fluff without much detail.
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