阿里巴巴携手 Lending Club 为美国企业推出金融服务赊销保
阿里巴巴 与 P2P 金融网站 Lending Club 签订了战略合作伙伴关系,旨在吸引更多的美国企业通过该电子商务巨头的批发市场进行采购。两家公司将推出一项名为 阿里巴巴赊销保(theAlibaba.com e-Credit Line)的服务,美国公司可以通过该网站申请 5000 至 30 万美元的信用额度,从而在阿里巴巴网站上完成采购。
该项目最终将推广到美国以外的地区。
尽管阿里巴巴统治着中国的电子商务市场——市场份额约为 45%,去年该公司的增长速度却有所放缓, 部分原因来自京东等对手更加激烈的竞争 。另外,阿里巴巴自从去年 9 月完成创记录的 IPO(首次公开募股)以来,财报表现一直让投资者忐忑不安。上周该公司披露的财报中, 截止 2014 年 12 月一个季度的收入低于预期 ,部分原因为移动业务方面的持续投资。
为了开发电子商务业务新市场,阿里巴巴采取了双管齐下的策略。在中国,该公司 发展物流系统瞄准小城市和农村市场 。同时,赊销保之类的举措可能会帮助阿里巴巴(以及 Lending Club)吸引新的国际客户。
这两家公司表示双方协议 期限长达数年,并且属于独家协议 。
除了提供资金贷款以外,赊销保还包括了交易保障的伴随服务,买家延期收到货物或者货物不符合清单描述的话可以进入纠纷处理流程,并有可能获得退款。这一点显得尤其重要,阿里巴巴一直受到批评,指责它没有尽到打击网站上假冒商品的责任。
中国国家工商行政管理总局 最近撤下了一篇白皮书,该白皮书指出阿里巴巴员工收受贿赂及以其它方式纵容无耻商家在该网站上销售假货 ,然而阿里巴巴处理假货投诉已经有好几年的时间。事实上, 淘宝被美国贸易办公室从“恶名市场”(notoriousmarkets)黑名单中移除只是两年前的事情。
阿里巴巴在 IPO 之前已经采取了一系列的打假措施,包括 从网站上撤下 9000 万件可疑商品 ,但其批发市场的开放性导致它仍无法避免假货混入的风险。
交易保障计划同样会根据产品质量和发货速度给卖家分级。投诉平台和质量保障项目的存在一定程度上会说服那些对阿里巴巴极大丰富的商品感兴趣、但忌惮其恶名的买家。
阿里巴巴还采取了其它一些措施鼓励更多的国外公司使用其旗下网站,包括在澳大利亚 推出淘宝和支付宝 ,以及 阿里系公司蚂蚁金服进军美国和俄罗斯市场 。
在赊销保之前,阿里巴巴集团为希望使用其平台的中小企业推出了多项金融服务项目。上周该公司公布了为中国女性卖家设立的贷款项目 ,昨天该公司 揭晓了一项扶持香港青年企业家的基金 。
翻译:顾秋实 来源:techcrunch
Alibaba And Lending Club Launch Financing Program For U.S. Businesses
Alibaba.com and peer-to-peer financing site Lending Club have inked a strategic partnership designed to get more U.S. businesses to buy inventory from the e-commerce giant’s wholesale marketplace. The two will offer a new financial service called the Alibaba.com e-Credit Line that will let American companies apply for credit lines of $5,000 to $300,000 through the site, which they can then use to make purchases there.
The program will eventually expand beyond the U.S.
Though Alibaba dominates China’s e-commerce market, holding about 45 percent of the market, its growth stalled last year thanks in part to increasing competition from rivals like JD.com. Furthermore, Alibaba’s earnings have worried investors since its record-setting IPO in September. Last week, the company disclosed revenue for the quarter ending in December that was below expectations, due in part to ongoing investments in its mobile business.
In order to develop new markets for its e-commerce businesses, Alibaba has taken a two-pronged approach. In China, it is targeting smaller cities and villages by developing its logistics system. Meanwhile, initiatives like Alibaba.com e-Credit Line may help Alibaba (and Lending Club) secure new international customers.
The two companies said their agreement is multi-year and exclusive.
In addition to capital, the Alibaba.com e-Credit Line also comes with a trade assurance, which allows buyers to open disputes and potentially get a refund if they receive goods that are late or don’t match listing descriptions. This is especially important because Alibaba is constantly faced with criticism that it does not do enough to prevent the sale of counterfeit goods on its site.
China’s State Administration For Industry And Commerce recently backed down from a report that said Alibaba employees took bribes and otherwise made it easy for shady merchants to sell fake goods on it sites, but the company has dealt with complaints for years. In fact, Taobao Marketplace, was removed from the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative’s “notorious markets” list only two years ago.
Alibaba has responded with a series of anti-counterfeiting measures, including purging 90 million suspicious listings from its sites before its IPO, but the open nature of its wholesale marketplaces still make running into knock-offs a risk.
The trade assurance program also ranks suppliers based on the quality of their products and shipment speed. Having a platform for disputes and a quality guarantee may help persuade merchants who are interested in Alibaba.com’s vast selection of goods, but wary of its reputation.
Other initiatives Alibaba has undertaken to encourage more foreign companies to use its sites include launching Taobao and Alipay in Australia, one of China’s key trade partners, and expanding its affiliate, Ant Financial, in the U.S. and Russia.
Alibaba.com e-Credit Line also follows several other programs that Alibaba Group has launched to provide financing for SMBs who want to use its platforms. Last week it announced a loan program for female business owners in China, and yesterday it unveiled a foundation to help young Hong Kong entrepreneurs.
支付服务Stripe与会计税务服务Intuit联手,为小型企业和劳动者更好地追踪自己的财务
创业公司 Stripe 致力于为随“按需经济”兴起的一大批新型服务增强支付功能,这些服务为劳动者提供了各种按需赚钱手段。与此同时,为小型企业和个体经营者开发会计及税务软件的 Intuit 致力于帮助那些劳动者更好地追踪自己的财务状况。
因此,Stripe 和 Intuit 联手开发一款“在按需劳动者收到付款时立刻识别为收入,并帮助他们冲销工作相关费用从而优化税金”的产品也就合情合理了。
通过这一合作产品,在使用 Stripe 支付的按需平台上工作的劳动者将能够方便地连接 Intuit 最新的个体经营者版 QuickBooks 在线软件 。连接完成后,QuickBooks 产品就能立刻将支付款项识别为收入,并由此帮助劳动者追踪自己的财务状况——尤其是在义务纳税方面。
据 Intuit 个体经营者解决方案的副总裁、总经理亚历克斯·克里斯(Alex Chriss)称,大部分 1099 劳动者(译注:即收入为税前收入、年底报税的个体经营者)通常都不知道自己每月、每季或者每年的收入。部分原因在于,与拿工资的员工不同,他们不会收到定期的工资清单——相反地,他们是从所工作的按需平台上收到不定期的支付款项。
另外,他们不善于记录可以用来冲销税额的开支,不过这又是另一个话题了。
为了吸引不断增长的按需劳动者或者 1099 劳动者,Intuit 将个体经营者版 QuickBooks 免费开放。每月 7.99 美元则会获得一些付费功能,比如允许用户在软件中连接银行账户和信用卡,从而追踪收入和支出并予以分类。
Intuit 希望以免费试用的方式,通过 QuickBooks 让劳动者对自己的财务状况有更多的了解。比如说,能够估算出需要缴纳多少的每季税金和年终税金。这就避免了收到巨额税单或者因每季纳税不足而被处罚的可能性。
为了简化收入追踪流程,QuickBooks 中集成 Stripe 的功能将会向从使用 Stripe 作为支付手段的公司获取收入的劳动者免费开放。据 Stripe 战略合作关系主管克里斯蒂娜·科尔多瓦(Cristina Cordova)称,其中包括了 Lyft,Sidecar,Summon,Flywheel,Handy,Homejoy 以及 Washio 这样的公司。
由于这些公司以承包商的形式雇佣劳动者,他们无法提供税务方面的建议或福利。然而通过直接在 QuickBook 这样的产品中追踪收入,那些个体经营劳动者就能够更好地管理自己的财务。
另外值得注意的是,双方的合作只是帮助到了一部分按需劳动者,并不是所有的。比如说 Uber 司机就无法享受这一福利,因为 Uber 并不使用 Stripe。不过这些劳动者仍然可以使用付费版 QuickBooks 连接自己的银行账户。
无论如何,这不正是免费增值商业模式的美妙之处么?
Stripe Partners With Intuit To Help On-Demand Workers Keep Track Of Their Finances
Startup Stripe helps to power payments for a large number of new services offering up ways to make cash as part of the growing “on-demand economy.” Meanwhile Intuit, which makes accounting and tax software for small businesses and the self-employed, wants to help those workers keep better track of their finances.
So it makes sense for Stripe and Intuit to work together on a product that will instantly recognize earnings that on-demand workers receive and help them optimize their taxes with write-offs for work-related expenses.
Through the partnership, people who work for on-demand platforms that make their payments through Stripe will be able to easily connect with Intuit’s new QuickBooks Online Self-Employed software. Once that’s done, the QuickBooks product will be able to immediately recognize payments as income, and as a result will be able to help workers track their finances, and especially their tax obligations.
According to Alex Chriss, who is VP and GM of Intuit’s Self-Employed Solutions, most 1099 workers generally aren’t aware of their monthly, quarterly, or annual income. That’s in part because they don’t get the same income statements as salaried employees — instead they receive irregular payments from the on-demand platforms they work for.
They also aren’t doing a good job of tracking expenses they could deduct from their taxes, but that’s another issue.
To court the growing base of on-demand or 1099 workers, Intuit makes its self-employed QuickBooks software available to use for free. For $7.99 a month it also offers some paid features, like enabling users to connect their bank accounts and credit cards to the software in order to track and categorize income and expenses.
The hope is that by doing so, QuickBooks can provide more visibility into their worker finances. For instance, being able to estimate how much they would need to pay in quarterly and year-end taxes. That can eliminate the possibility of receiving a big surprise tax bill or being hit with fines for not contributing enough in quarterly taxes.
To simplify the process of tracking income, the Stripe integration is being offered for free to workers who receive income from companies that use it for payments. That includes companies like Lyft, Sidecar, Summon, Flywheel, Handy, Homejoy, and Washio, according to Cristina Cordova, who is the head of strategic partnerships at Stripe.
Because those companies hire workers as contractors, they can’t offer tax advice or benefits. But by tracking income directly in a product like QuickBooks, those workers can generally do a better job of managing their finances.
Anyway, it’s worth noting that the Stripe partnership will help some on-demand workers, but not others. Uber drivers, for instance, won’t benefit because Uber doesn’t use Stripe. But those workers will still be able to pay QuickBooks to connect their bank accounts.
Anyway, isn’t that the beauty of the freemium business model?
来源:techcrunch