John Kozloski
BUSN412 Business Policy
June 16, 2011
Case Analysis eBay: Expanding into Asia
Company: eBay: Expanding into Asia
Industry: Online Auction Industry
Company Website: (www.ebay.com)
COMPANY BACKGROUND: The founder of the online auction site “eBay” is a computer programmer Pierre Omidyar in San Jose, California, established on September 3, 1995. The primary function of eBay is online auctions and uses to reach a wide range of individuals all over the world. The website took off quit quickly so Omidyar hired Jeffery Skolls as president to handle the day to day operations. The former president of eBay’s Marketplaces, John Donahoe is the current president and CEO. Donahoe joined the company in 2005 and managed to double the profits and revenues for his unit. The company is posting a net income of $1.78 billion and revenue of $8.54 billion for 2008, which is up from the posting of 2007 that are a net income of $348 million and revenue of $7.6 billion (Dess, 2010). “Since its beginning in 1995, eBay has enjoyed strong revenue growth and was a dominate player in the online auction industry (Dess, 2010).”
SWOT ANALYSIS: Strengths: There are three main strengths to how eBay has been successful: products, sense of community, and aggressive expansion. “eBay had an array of product categories and trading platforms that offered a range of pricing formats, such as fixed pricing (Dess, 2010). A sense of community, a trust between buyers and sellers is the primary means to all of eBay sites and platforms. Third is its ability to aggressively expand “to compete effectively and create a global trading platform (Dess, 2010). Weaknesses: One of eBay’s major weaknesses is its inability to expand and compete in certain international markets (Dess, 2010). One example of this is their ability to expand into the Asian market place; eBay has yet to understand the Asian population and also has I failure to compete with