Developments and Development Directions of Electronic Trade Platforms in US and European Agri-Food Markets: Impact on Sector Organization



M. Fritz, et al. / International Food and Agribusiness Management Review Volume 7, Issue 1, 2004

Table 2: Platform Characteristics in the Analysis Framework___________________

Market orientation

Implementation mode

Market specifics

Top-down

Agri-food

Bottom-up

Vertical stages of chain

Process organization

Along whole chain1)

Value-added services (VAS)

Stage specific

Transaction support

Product categories

Logistics

Agri-food products general

Finance

Specific products only

Negotiation

Non-food

Multimedia

Operating radius

Provision of information

Regional

Market information

National

Process information

Continental (Europe, North America)

Supply chain management

Worldwide

Coordination mechanisms

Organizational structure

Dynamic (auction etc.)

Cooperation with other ETPs

Static (catalogue)

Ownership

Mixed (e.g., RFx3))

Neutral

Revenue model

Market participant

Joint investment by members

Single enterprise

Fee for VAS

Consortium

Fee time-based membership

Organizational form

Fee transaction-based

Seller/buyer n:1

Seller/buyer 1:m

Seller/buyer n:m (n>>m; n<<m)2)

Seller/buyer n:m (n~m)

Remarks:

1) Baseline characteristics in italics

2) n>>m: n fragmented compared to m

_____________3) RFx: Request for (quote etc.)

Variations in the Platform Infrastructure During 2000/2002

The agri-food platform infrastructure in the US and Europe has dramatically
changed during the short period between the years 2000 and 2002 (fig. 3). Only
about 30% (25) of the 85 platforms identified in 2000 remained as trade platforms in
2002. About 45% (38) went out of business altogether, about 25% (19 platforms)
changed their focus to activities other than trade platform or merged with other
platforms (3). Furthermore, of the 36 agri-food platforms existing in 2002, about
30% (11) entered the market after the year 2000. This result contradicts the notion
of a ‘first mover advantage’, an observation that has been made by others as well
with regard to Internet-related businesses (Liebowitz, 2002, Gallaugher et al.,
2000).

The combination of platform closures at one hand and new entries at the other hand
might indicate deficiencies in business models of early platform enterprises that
new entries might have avoided. However, late entrance was no guarantee for
success. Of 18 platforms that entered the market after the year 2000, only 11
remained active whereas the others (almost 40%) discontinued their activity shortly
after their market introduction.

© 2004 International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IAMA). All rights reserved.



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