Part 2 Intensive Reading
Text A China’s Other E-commerce Giant Follows Its Own Path
JD is a product of its founder’s ambitions. The son of a cargo shipowner, Mr. Liu grew up in a small city of east China’s Jiangsu Province, before arriving in Beijing to study sociology at Renmin University.
During his spare time in college, he wrote software code and earned enough money to buy a small restaurant near campus.After college, Liu Qiangdong worked briefly for a Japanese company before going into business for himself. He rented space at an electronics market in the city’s high-tech zone,
software code：软件代码
go into business：创业
called Zhongguancun, to sell software and electronics, including compact disc burners. Within a few years, he owned brick-andmortar electronics shops in three cities.
In 2004, when his stores began selling goods on the web,online shopping was just beginning to take shape in China, led by start-ups like Dangdang, Joyo and Alibaba’s Taobao site. JD,whose English name at the time was 360Buy.com, thrived on low prices and fast delivery, part of its motto today.
With money running low in 2006, Mr. Liu sought US $2 million from a Hong Kong SAR China venture capital fir. Thefirm, Capital Today, put up US $10 million instead, for a large minority stake. The stake is now worth close to US $2.4 billion,even after the firm sold some of its shares.
The capital injection helped JD expand its product offering beyond electronics and develop new systems and software. The expansion, in turn, helped lure bigger investors, such as the Waltons, the family behind Walmart Stores.
While Alibaba’s marketplace serves as a platform to connect buyers and sellers, JD buys goods from manufacturers and distributors and holds the inventory in its own warehouses, in a model that like Amazon’s.
In 2007, JD started building an integrated logistics network from scratch, promising to cater to customers from click to dropoff.
Today, the company has seven fulfillment centersand 118 warehouses in 39 cities. There are also 1,045 smaller pickup centers in about 500 cities.
Analysts call JD’s business model “a combination of Amazon and UPS”; other analysts say the company is beginning to look like Wal-Mart, focus on logistics and infrastructure and backed by a website.
JD has made it clear they will not only be a retailer but also an online supply chain and finance company. Retail is not profitable but it offers trading volume and cash flow. In the future, the main profits will come from finance and the supply chain.
Long overshadowed by its rival Alibaba, JD has emerged as China’s other online giant by carving out its own distinct identity.
compact disc burner：光盘刻录机
brick-and-mortar：实体店
start-up：新创企业
thrive on：以……兴旺/蓬勃发展
venture capital firm：风险投资公司
put up：提供
minority stake：少数股权
capital injection：资本注入；注资
manufacturer：厂商；生产商
distributor：批发商；分销商
inventory：库存清单
warehouse：仓库
logistics：物流
from scratch：白手起家，从零做起
click：点击
fulfillment center：物流中心
pickup center：自提中心
business model：商业模式
infrastructure：基础设施
online supply chain：网络供应链
trading volume:交易量
cash flow：现金流
Text B Major Types of E-commerce
There are a variety of different types of e-commerce and many different ways to characterize them. For the most part,we distinguish different types of e-commerce by the nature of the market relationship—who is selling to whom, like B2C,B2B, C2C, O2O, the exceptions are P2P (peer-to-peer) and m-commerce, which are technology-based types.
m-commerce：移动电子商务
1. Major Business-to-Consumer (B2C) Business Models (see Picture 1.1)
Picture 1.1 B2C Shopping Process
Consumer shopping on the Web (or companies sell their finished product to consumers on the Web), often called B2C.Within this category, seven different B2C business models are:portals (such as Yahoo, MSN), online retailers (often called“e-tailers”, which refer to “brick-and-clicks” like Wal-Mart,“manufacturer-direct” Dell.com, and “virtual merchant” Amazon,JD.com), content providers(like CNN.com), transaction brokers (like Hotels.com), market creator (eBay’s auction business model), service provider (Google Maps and Gmail) and community provider (Facebook, Twitter).
finished product：产品；最终产品
portal：门户网站
e-tailer：电子商务零售商
brick-and-click：结合在线电子商务和传统零售渠道的公司
virtual：虚拟的
transaction broker：网络交易经纪人
2. Major Business-to- Business (B2B) Business Models (see Picture 1.2)
Transactions conducted between businesses on the Web(companies might purchase the materials they use to make the products from the other companies on the Web), often called B2B (sometimes called e-procurement). There are two primary business models used within the B2B world: (1) Net marketplaces,which include e-distributors (supply products ＆ services directly to individual businesses, like Grainger.com), e-procurement companies (create and sell access to digital electronic markets,such as Ariba use “value chain management” software help both vendors and purchasers organize their procurement process),exchanges (independently owned vertical digital marketplace for direct inputs, like www.ChemNet.com)etc. (2) Private industry networks, which include single firm networks (e.g. Wal-Mart,P＆G) and industry wide networks.
Picture 1.2 B2B Network
e-procurement：电子采购；网上采购
e-distributor：电子分销商
value chain management：价值链管理
vendor：卖主；供应商
purchaser：买家
exchange：（垂直）交易所
3. Other E-commerce Business Models
C2C (Consumer -to- Consumer) (see Picture 1.3) provides a way for consumers to sell to each other, with the help of an online market maker such as the auction site eBay, www.taobao.com.
Picture 1.3 C2C Model
O2O (online to offline) (see Picture 1.4), which meansfinding consumers online and brings them into real-world stores.The consumer can purchase and make online payment, while the store can push the store information, promotion, products or services to consumer’s smartphone, e. g. meituan.com, ganji.com and the taxi-hailing APP, Didi Taxi.
APP：计算机应用程序
Picture 1.4 O2O Model
P2P (Peer-to-Peer) (see Picture 1.5) networks make money by encouraging a very large audience of Internet users to share files, and in the process, expose the audience to advertising messages. P2P networks are in essence advertising networks.Widely used P2P networks include BitTorrent (which is used for downloading large video files) and eMule.
Picture 1.5 P2P Model
Picture 1.6 M-commerce model
M-commerce (mobile commerce) (see Picture 1.6), refers to the use of wireless digital devices to enable transactions on the web. It involves the use of wireless networks to connect laptops,smart phones to the web. Once connected, mobile consumers can conduct transactions, including stock trade, in-store price comparisons, banking, travel reservations, and more.
Finally, you will also note that some companies use multiple business models. For instance, eBay can be considered a B2C market maker. At the same time, eBay can also be considered to have a C2C business model and a B2C m-commerce business as well (customers can bid on auctions from their smart phones or wireless web devices). You can expect many companies will have closely related B2B, B2C, and m-commerce variations on their basic business model. The purpose will be to use investments and assets developed with one business model into a new business model.
wireless digital device：数字无线传输设备
in-store price: 库存价格；店内的价格
New words and Expressions
