Marketplace 3.0: Rewriting the Rules of Borderless Business
Apr 2025 · Macmillan + ORM
3.9star
14 reviewsreport
Ebook
256
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About this ebook
The CEO behind Rakuten and Kobo reveals how his unique approach to empowerment and collaboration defies conventional wisdom, and isthe future of growth and globalization strategy.
If Web 2.0 described the shift from static to interactive life on the Web, then 3.0 is the next sea change — driven by personalization, intelligent search, and user behavior. And that evolution has huge implications for everything we see, buy and do online. Rejecting the zero-sum, vending-machine model of ecommerce practiced by other leading internet retailers, who view the Internet purely as a facilitator of speed and profit, Hiroshi Mikitani argues for an alternate model that benefits merchants, consumers, and communities alike by empowering players at every step in the process. He envisions retail "ecosystems," where small and mid-sized brick-and-mortar businesses around the world partner with online marketplaces to maximize their customer bases and service capabilities, and he shows why emphasizing collaboration over competition, customization over top-down control, and long-term growth over short-term revenue is by far the best use of the Internet's power, and will define the 3.0 era.
Rakuten has already pioneered this new model, and Marketplace 3.0 offers colorful examples of its success in Japan and around the world. Mikitani reveals how the company enforces a global mindset (including the requirement that all its employees speak English, even in Tokyo); how it incorporates new acquisitions rather than seeking to completely remake or sell them for a quick profit; and how it competes with other retailers on speed and quality, without sacrificing the public good. Marketplace 3.0 is an exciting new vision for global commerce, from a company that's challenging all the accepted wisdom.
If Web 2.0 described the shift from static to interactive life on the Web, then 3.0 is the next sea change — driven by personalization, intelligent search, and user behavior. And that evolution has huge implications for everything we see, buy and do online. Rejecting the zero-sum, vending-machine model of ecommerce practiced by other leading internet retailers, who view the Internet purely as a facilitator of speed and profit, Hiroshi Mikitani argues for an alternate model that benefits merchants, consumers, and communities alike by empowering players at every step in the process. He envisions retail "ecosystems," where small and mid-sized brick-and-mortar businesses around the world partner with online marketplaces to maximize their customer bases and service capabilities, and he shows why emphasizing collaboration over competition, customization over top-down control, and long-term growth over short-term revenue is by far the best use of the Internet's power, and will define the 3.0 era.
Rakuten has already pioneered this new model, and Marketplace 3.0 offers colorful examples of its success in Japan and around the world. Mikitani reveals how the company enforces a global mindset (including the requirement that all its employees speak English, even in Tokyo); how it incorporates new acquisitions rather than seeking to completely remake or sell them for a quick profit; and how it competes with other retailers on speed and quality, without sacrificing the public good. Marketplace 3.0 is an exciting new vision for global commerce, from a company that's challenging all the accepted wisdom.
Ratings and reviews
3.9
14 reviews
Arthur Lau
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May 11, 2013
Thoroughly enjoyed learning about Mikitani's opinions on cultural technology.
1 person found this review helpful
gelsi jeli
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April 4, 2013
About the author
Hiroshi Mikitani is the founder and chief executive of Rakuten, the third largest e-commerce marketplace company in the world, with operations in over a dozen countries across Europe, the Americas and Asia, and ranked 7th among Forbes' World's Most Innovative Companies of 2012. An Internet evangelist, he has more than 430,000 followers of his Twitter feed, and has spoken at many events including the eG8 Forum, DLD Conference and Y Combinator's Startup School. Mikitani has been featured in national and international broadcast and print media, including CNN, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Forbes, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Globe and Mail, The Economist, and the Financial Times, among others. Mikitani received an MBA from Harvard Business School, and in 2012, was presented with one of HBS's highest honors, the Alumni Achievement Award. He lives in Tokyo, Japan.
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