STRATEGY
The next era of business — how B2B e-commerce is shaping the post-pandemic world According to John Caplan, President of North America and Europe for Alibaba.com, ‘there is no way to thrive for the future unless you’re digital’. Addressing the AMBA & BGA Global Conference live from New York City in the US, Caplan helped build a picture of how eCommerce is shaping the post-pandemic world. Citing data from the US International Trade Commission, he demonstrated that business- to-business (B2B) eCommerce is now six times greater than business-to-consumer (B2C) eCommerce globally, with the B2B eCommerce market currently valued at $23.9 trillion USD, and B2C eCommerce at $3.8 trillion USD. He added that nearly two decades of change had been forced through in a matter of 14 months by the Covid-19 pandemic, with companies having to adapt swiftly, reimagining the way they do business. However, despite these indicative figures, he was keen to point out that much global business success still relies on traditional connections and the trusted relationships that have developed as a result. Caplan, who is leading the transformation of Alibaba.com, argued that being an ‘analogue business’, relying on older technology such as fax machines, is not sufficient for participation in either local economies or the global economy; business leaders should be using eCommerce to ‘go global’, he said. During the session, he was able to share advice and tips for the ‘new leaders of tomorrow’. For example, he explained that leaders ought to be thinking globally, rather than limiting thinking to the territory in which they are working. ‘Since we’re all connected digitally, your customers and opportunities ought to be global,’ he asserted. ‘The best markets to go into are the most complicated ones’, he added, referring to the global supply chain of goods. Virtual reality in Business Schools: life in the goldfish bowl Goldfish now have a longer attention span than people do, due to the impact of technology, the abundance of information at our fingertips, and the ubiquity of screens among the world’s younger generations. This is how Alain Goudey, Chief Digital Officer and Professor of Marketing at NEOMA Business School, emphasised the need to look at different ways of reaching and engaging with students. ‘Two years ago, a study showed that human attention was about eight seconds per minute… In the year 2000, it was about 12 seconds per minute. That means for a six-hour day of class, you only get 45 minutes of attention from your students. That’s very low, and it’s really important to have that in mind because it’s not going to get better,’ he warned. To address this, Goudey has been exploring the use of virtual reality (VR) in teaching, so far using the technology to provide two case studies to NEOMA students. His research into the impact of these indicates that the use of VR is at least as good as traditional text-based learning, or any other learning medium. Added benefits include a break from the routine for students, which fuels their engagement in class. The use of VR also feeds into NEOMA’s belief that learning is more about the overall student experience than mere provision of information. For Goudey, it’s also about keeping pace with the other learning options open to prospective students, who have immediate access to expertise via their smartphones at any hour of the day or night. Business Schools ‘need to become more digital to be more competitive,’ he believes, ‘augmenting pedagogy through technology’.
JOHN CAPLAN
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