Global e-commerce opportunities

Global e-commerce is about leveraging electronic networks to tap global markets, and it includes the sum of all transactions taking place in the worldwide electronic market space. Transactions between global buyers and sellers can take the form of business-to-business (B2B), business-to-consumer (B2C), consumer-to-consumer (C2C), business-to-government (B2G), and other hybrid forms of transactions.

The market opportunity presented by global e-commerce is evident from projections that B2C sales will reach almost $1 trillion by 2012. The global B2B market is expected to be even greater than the B2C market, and B2B revenues are expected to surpass B2C revenues many times over in the coming years. Companies now can reach almost 1.9 billion online consumers worldwide via their global web presence. The online user population is expected to increase by almost 42 percent by 2014 (Wigder et al., 2010). Today, major e-commerce markets include the United States, the European Union, Japan, and China. Furthermore, there are signs that e-commerce activity and online population growth patterns now are shifting in favor of emerging economies such as China, India, Brazil, and others.