Signs (and news) of e-commerce growth are always exciting to follow.
United States
In the U.S., for example, eMarketer expects a 15% YOY growth in 2011, and some $362 billion by the end of 2016. Chris Goward‘s recent tweet read:
Good news! Ecommerce sales to reach $224.2 billion this year, up 15% from 2011 – eMarketer t.co/2xjVuiUs
— Chris Goward (@chrisgoward) March 22, 2012
I agree, this is a truly good news; and, hopefully, one of the signs that U.S. economy is healing. Here’s the corresponding eMarketer chart:
Europe
It is also noteworthy that not too long ago Forrester released their report on the state of European e-commerce, predicting 12.2% annual growth, reaching a total value of $230.4 billion by 2016. The United Kingdom and Germany remain Europe’s largest online economies, and “by 2016, online sales will account for more than 14% of total retail sales in the” UK, and for “more than 10% in Germany”. [source]
China
The above forecasts are exciting, but it is a news from China that really puts things into perspective. Earlier this morning Michael Vorel‘s tweet caught my eye:
China’s top Internet agency forecasts value of online shopping in the country to $2.86 trillion by 2015 t.co/S4O51Oos #ecommerce
— Michael Vorel (@michaelvorel) March 29, 2012
Apparently, two days ago the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued their newest Five-Year Plan for e-commerce, aiming at making China “the leading market for global e-commerce”, planning “to double the value of its e-commerce sales to 18 trillion yuan ($2.86 trillion) by the end of 2015“. [source]
Here are the corresponding charts:
Don’t know about you, but for me all of the above spells out one word: opportunity.