Visit to China (Hangzhou) Cross-border E-commerce Comprehensive Pilot Area and Cross-Board Trading Town

July. 1, 2016 Hangzhou - led by Mr. Ma Shuqun, students from 2014 and 2015 Global Manufacturing and Supply Chain Management (GMSCM) program visited China (Hangzhou) Cross-border E-commerce Comprehensive Pilot Area in Xiasha, Hangzhou. The group was received by Mr. Luo Hongsong, the Deputy Section Chief of the Management Commission of Hangzhou Economic and Technological Development Area and Hangzhou Export Processing Area of Zhejiang, and Mr. Qian Changsheng, the Chairman of Q-CITY.

Mr. Luo walked the group through various functional areas in the Park, including the areas for unloading, storage, picking, and loading, while briefing the students with a general idea of the process of cross-border e-commerce.

After the tour, Mr. Qian and his team brought a more in-depth view on cross-border e-commerce, which covers its key benefits to the consumers, the two different ways of working, and the vision.

The key benefit of cross-border e-commerce to the consumers was that they would be able to enjoy quality products from all around the world with reasonably low price and good availability, thanks to lower tariff and logistics consolidations. There were two key ways of working, which were deliver-to-order and build-to-stock then deliver-to-order. For both ways, consumers place orders on a certified e-commerce platform, such as Tmall International or Suning, and the logistics and customs clearance service were provided by the cross-border Park. Differences laid that for the latter, inventory was built up before consumers placed their orders, which meant better agility. As for today, cross-border e-commerce was more on import, the future as described by Mr. Qian, was to focus on export, which aimed to connect the local manufacturers with the international market. This would require quality and brand name as the backbone; however, he was confident on the vision.

In the afternoon, the GMSCM students visited the Cross-Board Trading Town, which was opened since March 2016, one of the 32 specialized towns, focusing on offering services for cross-board business. The students were showed around the stores gathered in the town. All goods sold there are all duty paid, with 2 price tags, one for on-spot buying price, and the other for on-line shopping price.

Followed by the CBT, the students also visited a leading cross-board trading company, JollyChic, who is leading in the business. Mr. Ding, one of the three co-founders gave the students a very vivid and detailed introduction of the business, as well as the explanation and expectation of the company itself. Based on the quick development of internet and big-data analysis, JollyChic hired over 100 technicians in the head office and a creative team in Silicon Valley, and developed its own sales APP by cooperating with leading e-commerce companies in target markets, such as Soug, Namshi and MarkaVIP. Meanwhile, JollyChic took the advantage of local manufacturing by cooperating with over 1500 suppliers, offering customers with various types of products, through data analysis over the customers buying behavior on different ends.

(GMSCM 2015 KONG Qingqin and LIU Yunqin)