Global e-commerce to exceed $2 trillion in 2015 as Asia soars ahead

Worldwide e-commerce is set to grow well beyond $2 trillion ($2,000 billion) this year driven byhigh double-digit growth in China and the rest of Asia and continued strong growth in North America

Global e-commerce grew by 23.6% to $1,552 billion in 2013, the association’s latest Global B2CE-commerce Report showed. Worldwide online sales were expected to grow by 22.9% to $1,907 billionlast year, and then by a further 18% this year to reach $2,251 billion.

Asia Pacific overtook Europe and North America in 2013 to become the world’s largest e-commerceregion, and looks set to extend its lead this year, the research for the association of Europeane-retailers found. B2C e-commerce sales in the Asia Pacific region surged by 44.5% to $567.3billion in 2013, driven by the dramatic growth of online shopping in China.

B2C e-commerce sales in Europe grew by 17.1% to $482.3 billion while North America increased by10.1% to $452.4 billion that year, according to the global report. Latin American e-commerce salesgrew by 21.5% to $33.2 billion while the Middle East and North Africa region grew even morestrongly by 32.7% to $14.7 billion.

With total B2C e-commerce sales of $419 billion in 2013, the United States was still the clearleader in the world as an individual market, but the emergence of second-ranked China isremarkable. Partly due to the success of e-commerce giant Alibaba, Chinese B2C e-commerce grew by78.5% to $328.4 billion. For 2014, China was even forecast to surpass the US and become the world’snew leader in terms of e-commerce, Ecommerce Europe said.

“The way in which the Chinese e-commerce market is growing is very impressive. From a B2Ce-commerce turnover of $23.4bn in 2010 to $328.4bn in 2013, the country has almost closed the gapwith the global leader, the United States. For 2014, it is even forecast that China will overtakethe US for the top position,” commented Wijnand Jongen, Chair member of the Executive Committee ofEcommerce Europe.

Behind the USA and China, there is a considerable gap to the UK ($142.3bn), Japan ($136.7bn) andGermany ($84.2bn), which complete the top 5 countries. Other fast-growing countries for B2Ce-commerce in 2013 included Indonesia (+100%), Russia (+50.5%) and Mexico (+41.4%).

People from North America and Europe were on average the biggest spenders in the world in 2013,as they spent $1,928 and $1,828, respectively. In comparison, in Asia-Pacific the averagee-consumer spent $1,268. With regard to the online expenditure per e-shopper in individualcountries, the UK ranked head and shoulders above the rest in this regard. At $3,471, the Brits areahead of the Americans ($2,216) and Australians ($2,167).

The association pointed out that the country with the second-largest e-commerce turnover andgrowth rate, China ($1,087) is not ranked in the top 10 of countries in terms of average spendingper e-shopper. The same applies for the top 10 of countries regarding Internet penetration. At45.5%, China is well behind countries such as the UK (88.0%), Japan (86.3%), Germany (86.0%) andthe US (81.9%).

“When we take into account that China is not even in the global top 10s of expenditure pere-shopper and Internet penetration, we can all but conclude that Chinese e-commerce is only at thebeginning. It will continue to grow in the next few years partly because more Chinese consumerswill find their way to the Internet. In addition they will be willing to spend more money online asthey will grow more familiar with Internet shopping,” Jongen added.

Ecommerce Europe’s Global B2C E-commerce Report was based on research by GlobalCollect,Informatica, RichRelevance and Salesupply. Figures in the Ecommerce Foundation reports are based onthe Global Online Measurement Standard for E-commerce (GOMSEC) and established in cooperation withnational e-commerce associations and GfK.