Nicolas Khaliliyeh's Profile

Nice blog Hanif!. Snapchat still have plenty of users at Q1 18 (191 million), therefore what changes Snapchat needs to make? Maybe release new “cool” features? Expand its target market from Young people to a more extended population? partner with other social media?
Just thinking cause Snapchat still has a big user base…

I agree with NR. I was thinking what eBay can still do to compete with Amazon?. At least, I believe that eBay MarketPlace for pre-owned things is much better than Amazon (more suppliers), thus maybe eBay can concentrate its efforts to build a better platform focus in pre-owned things. In addition, Amazon doesn’t allow you to choose between a fixed price and an auction format in comparison with eBay, therefore I strongly believe that eBay needs to try to differentiate with this kind of feature in its platform over Amazon to win the race (that is loosing since along time ago).

I agree that Nike has been able to embrace digital technology much faster than its main competitors including Adidas, Puma, etc. However, you don’t see any thread from other competitors including Under Armour, Lululemon, among others. Finally, do you know the sales of Nike in its different sales channel? (Stores, Wholesales, Online, etc.)?

Hi Wendy,

100% agree with your comment. I’m pretty sure that some partnership, specially with Walmart’s main competitors could be affected after the M&A. However, customers can still buy in Walmart’s competitors through the platform, but they have to pay a delivery fee (Walmart don’t charge delivery fee) plus an increase in prices. Of course that after Walmart’s acquisition, customers have more incentive to buy in Cornershop through Walmart channel. Is the trade-off for Walmart between acquire more customers (through Cornershop platform) and acquire e-commerce expertise (buy the platform vs build the platform) vs. potential Cornershop’s partnership losses.

Hi Jose,

Last winter break I went to Chile and I saw some “Rappi-Motorcycles” in the street of Santiago making deliveries. I think that the main difference is that Cornershop focus more in “Supermarket” deliveries while Rappi in “convenience stores”. Try to dig in more about customer segment about each platform, partnership, etc.

See you in class next monday

Hi NR,

Thanks for your comments. Cornershop knew that would be difficult to compete against big players, thus they focus on creating an amazing platform, easy to use, better delivery, etc. Walmart and big players had their own e-commerce platform for delivery but weren’t as good as Cornershop. Those applications were difficult to use, the foods in bad conditions / poor selection, etc.

In addition, 20% of Cornershop revenues came from purchases in Walmart. Thus, Walmart knew the potential of this platform and tried to acquire several times before buying it for $225 million a few months ago. Maybe, Cornershop’s founders knew that Cornershop alone would not be able to compete against Amazon or other big players in the future. (Also the “exits” for them was amazing. Founded in 2015 and after 3 years sold for $225 million! Awesome). In addition, Cornershop was a kind of “inspiration” for new Chilean entrepreneurs trying to create the new “big-endeavor” in our country. Just for your knowledge, Cornershop just replicates in Chile and Mexico the business model of Instacart in the U.S, they didn’t come up with a new “big idea”. Thus, I’m pretty sure that is plenty of room to implement U.S tech in developing countries before the arrival of Uber, Airbnb, etc.

Its seem a cool platform which involves a daily problem in our society about “what to do with the things that we don’t want after some time”. At least, in some industries such as the assemble furniture business (Ikea, Steelcase, among others) there are trying to change the business model from “sell” to “rent” the items to the customers for a monthly fee in order that customers have the chances to give back what they bought after some time. Thus, do you think that some companies will move in that direction shrinking the potential business for this platform? On the other hand, the platform facilitates the transaction (take care of the “pick up” and “delivery” between both parties) or just works as an intermediary (connect both parties like “Craiglist” and other apps)?

It seems that Quibi is trying more to add to viewers’ choices than cannibalize existing content / compete directly with Netflix and Amazon. Thus, the platform will need to invest a lot of money in new content, especially considering that “the average price to produce a drama has almost doubled from two or three years ago to more than $5 million an episode, according to Bloomberg Intelligence”. (1) So, I strongly believe that Quibi is an extremely risky bet or “It’s an asymmetrical risk and reward” on mobile video considering the current players, big investments, among other arguments discussed above. However, I’m pretty sure that is difficult for us to have a clear “big picture” of Quibi given that big/powerful investors are supporting this new tech endeavor. So, what are the things that we are missing in the puzzle? Why investors are so confident about this new venture?

(1) https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-20/hollywood-makes-a-big-bet-on-jeffrey-katzenberg-s-quibi

It’s difficult to understand why vendors will prefer to have listed its products in Shopify over Amazon? I know that Shopify has associated with Amazon, but is difficult to understand the real value that Shopify provides to its vendors. On the other hand, customers are going to prefer to buy in Amazon than in Shopify given Amazon’s prices, large assortment selection, etc. How Shopify can success or growth without Amazon’s partnership? In addition, Does Shopify offers an additional service to the customer like Amazon’s FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon: pick, pack, and ship your orders)? Do you think that Shopify will need to provide this service to make the platform more attractive to vendors?
Finally, Do you think that maybe Shopify will become more like a “branding/marketing” value for companies than an “E-Commerce platform”?

At least in the US, Instacart is pretty successful with a current valuation over $ 7.6 Billion. Ocado, another online grocery retailer, is valued at $ 2.3 Billion, among others. Thus, I don’t know if I agree with you about “Cornershop’s approach that may make this more successful than similar platforms have been in the US”. I strongly believe that there are a lot of profitable On-Demand E-Commerce groceries in the U.S, specially Instacart, and Cornershop just tried to replicate the same business model in Latin America. Moreover, One of its main Co-Founder, Daniel Undurraga mentioned: “I think Instacart can build a profitable business in the US, as can we down here.” In addition, Daniel Undurraga lived in San Francisco for almost five years and was infatuated with the wide variety of on-demand services available and realized that Latin Americans would enjoy similar services, too. On top of that, nobody else in the region was providing them.

On the other hand, Mexico and Chile are totally different markets starting that Mexico’s population is over 120 million people vs 15 million people in Chile. Moreover, Undurraga mentioned: “Mexico was the most obvious place to start the business, since it is the largest market in Latin America. It is a country that allows you to scale very easily,” explains Undurraga. What’s more, Undurraga and his partners worked for Groupon Mexico, so they know the market well and have a large network that helped them start the business. “We chose Chile because I’m Chilean, and we have our engineering team based there,” he adds. Thus, I think that cause most of the Founders were Chilean, was easy for them to start the business in that region, but they knew that without Mexico it would be impossible for them to scale the business considering the small Chilean market.