Tradeshift comes to China with localized product and mindset--Interview with Tradeshift CEO Christian Lanng

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Tradeshift comes to China with localized product and mindset--Interview with Tradeshift CEO Christian Lanng

By Han Shasha (People's Daily Online) 13:37, September 06, 2013

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Christian Lanng, co-founder and CEO of Tradeshift talks about their strategy in exploring Chinese market during an interview at its headquarters in San Francisco.

Eyeing China's fast-growing ecommerce market, Tradeshift, the global Facebook-style business interaction platform has established its Chinese business with an office in Suzhou, a city dubbed as China's Venice of the East.

Although the global business network was first started in 2009 in Denmark, Christian Lanng, co-founder and CEO of Tradeshift finds that "Chinese people get a very fast understanding of what Tradeshift is about".

Lanng summarizes Tradeshift as" a platform for all your business interactions and a platform based on relationships." He said, " The reason people understand Tradeshift is that in China, business is already so much based on relationships," he added, "It's clear that many new business connections, many new introductions are based on trust and who you know."

Tradeshift is a complete marketplace where now more than 5 million companies connect to seek business opportunities and discover new ways to do business in a digital world through invoicing, workflow, financial services and more online. It just puts the real world connections on line.

The platform is free for small businesses, which is common and widely acceptable in China. Christian emphasizes that they will provide permanent free services for small and medium enterprises. Tradeshift makes its money by operating the platform as a managed service for very large companies, like DHL. He said" it's like using a search engine. Advertisers has paid it, so others can use it for free." That's why it's free for small companies.

Starting his career in Denmark, Lanng is quite clear about the role of small business in a country. He said that the real strength of economy is always the small companies. In China, there are obviously millions of small companies. He said "if those small companies improve and prosper, the whole economy improves. If these companies have pains, these pains will influence large companies. It's like building a house. you need to fix the foundation first. " He said that the small companies in China in many ways are also the foundation of China's global success.

As a country of suppliers, China is intimately familiar with the pains suffered by small, growing companies that strive to do business with much larger corporations and multinationals. China's ecommerce has a large space to improve. Lanng said that although Alibaba is very successful," it's still a small part of it".

Facing fierce competition in Chinese e-commerce market, Lanng does not consider other players as competitors, more likely, he calls it a complementary relationship. He is now seeking the right partner from Chinese companies. He said "we will never get in a market alone. If we have a partner, we can have a better understanding of the local market."

Tradeshift is now building its "right product"--a localized transaction platform in China. Although Tradeshit has connected more than 5 million global companies on its platform, Lanng said they will establish business in China as a startup with Chinese employees, research team and more importantly, a Chinese version Tradeshift that totally fit the needs of Chinese market.

Lanng said Tradeshift has learnt a lot from other foreign companies, like eBay. He thinks that those companies tumbled in China should not just bring their successful products here. They should figure out what the value China needs and what they can bring. "I think to be really successful is not enough your company grow, but hopefully many Chinese companies may grow with us. That's always our criteria," he said.

（Editor：LiangJun、Yao Chun）