The Whole Foods deal, worth $13.7 billion (€11.6bn), has been criticised by antitrust lawyers across the US, arguing it will give the online retailer an unbeatable head start in the online grocery delivery market (Walmart is the only competitor doing anything to keep up but is still a long ways behind). That being said, the vast majority of all retail sales – in the US anyway – still take place in-store, with the online retail market still only representing around 10 per cent of total retail sales.ĭespite the widely-held belief that online shopping will grow significantly in the coming years, the recent acquisition of US high-end grocery chain, Whole Foods, was a brilliant move by Jeff Bezos and Co who aim to take control of the online grocery delivery market long before most competitors have even managed to secure a domain name for themselves. Studies vary but it is estimated that somewhere between 40 per cent and 55 per cent of all web shoppers go directly to Amazon for product searches. Amazon’s reaction to watching popular third-party products sell like hot cakes? Start making them itself. Increasingly however, it is becoming less of an open marketplace where various brands and manufacturers compete for consumer business. While my quasi-Veblen purchases may sit comfortably in the “luxury items” section of any Junior Cert economics textbook, Amazon can and will sell you anything you like – from toilet paper to a defibrillator. My zeal for conspicuous consumption from the Seattle-based giant isn’t waning but I needed to make it more difficult for my impulses to get the better of me (for now at least). Not for one second do I regret the purchase of my waterproof iPod, my camping tent that can be erected in under five seconds, or my environmentally friendly reusable Nespresso pods. To test a true SaaS solution for B2B integration, start your free trial of Babelway today.I recently cancelled my Amazon Prime account, a premium monthly subscription service entitling members to free and fast delivery of products purchased as well as access to Amazon’s impressive film, music and literature libraries, etc. You’ll solve the pain of a missing document, and enjoy transparent monitoring, early problem identification, and fewer mistakes. Cut out the middleman and connect directly to your partners for full visibility and control over your supply chain. With a true SaaS solution for integration, you can increase the agility and reactivity of your company without experiencing the frustrations of managing internal software.ĭon’t fall into the middleman trap. Obstacles like this cost you time, money and effort, a critical disadvantage in today’s complex supply chain. Losing an order or an invoice is not a minimal disruption. If your messages ever get stuck or lost, you may have a middleman problem. Just be sure to distinguish between vendors that go between you and your partners, and vendors that connect you directly. Now with cloud-based solutions like Babelway, you can leverage a platform that connects directly to your partners without running the software yourself. In the past, companies could only achieve direct partner connectivity with internal software. When you cut out the middleman, you have full visibility into all of your document flows. If messages are either with you or with your partners, you won’t risk them getting lost somewhere in between. How can you tell the difference between a true SaaS solution and a middleman? The key is direct connectivity to your partners. The challenge is that new outsourced providers are entering the market every day. It would be ludicrous to call the postman a Software-as-a-Service solution, and it’s equally risky to rely on an external integration service provider with your critical business documents. It’s analogous to dropping a letter in the mail once a document is in the courier’s hands, you lose all visibility into when – or if – it will reach its destination. In reality, you’re not getting a software, but a service – from a middleman. While many outsourced integration service providers market their solutions as SaaS platforms, don’t be fooled. In reality, you’re just getting a middleman. Many companies fall into the trap of outsourcing, thinking this is the solution. As document transfer has evolved, many companies have moved to outsourced solutions after experiencing the frustrations that come with maintaining internal integration software.
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