"When the e-commerce channel is fully developed, retailing will be a multichannel activity, with online the leading channel for domestic and cross-border sales in most product categories."

"Nowhere is the rapid expansion of e-commerce more apparent than in Asia. China is leading the way, shedding its identity as solely a production center and emerging as a burgeoning consumer market, with an increasingly affluent and populous middle class eager to embrace online technologies and adopt the developed world’s consumption styles. Asia’s e-commerce growth rates are in the double digits in most product categories."

"The main growth, so far, is mostly domestic, as barriers to cross-border transactions are constraining the growth of cross-border e-commerce in Asia as well as in Western markets. These barriers include the following:

• Unreliable and Lengthy Transit Times. Consumers want shorter, more precise, and more reliable delivery windows for both domestic and cross-border purchases.

• Complex and Ambiguous Return Processes. Fully tracked, easy-to-arrange returns should be a standard option on all e-commerce sites.

• Customs Bottlenecks. At present, dissonant customs practices create significant scheduling uncertainty for shippers. Customs regimes need to be harmonized and their timing made more predictable.

• Limited Transparency on Delivery. Some parcels aren’t tracked at all, and the tracking information that does exist lags the actual delivery by about six hours. Tracking is linked to specific delivery windows, decreasing the value of the information for short transit times.

• Price Opacity. International shipping options are often complicated by VAT and customs charges, and shoppers can’t determine the final landed cost of an item, even after they click “buy.” This uncertainty discourages purchasing.

• Limited Ability to Alter Delivery Times and Locations. At present, if consumers’ plans change, they cannot change delivery times or locations for internationally shipped goods if the parcel is already in transit, as they can with most domestic deliveries."

"Cross-border e-commerce currently accounts for 10 to 15 percent of total e-commerce volume, depending on region. That share is sure to expand as the barriers are dismantled. By 2025, annual global cross-border e-commerce revenues could swell to between $250 billion and $350 billion—up from about $80 billion today. Asia will account for some 40 percent of those cross-border revenues, making it far and away the center of the e-commerce world. Europe will account for about 25 percent of revenues, followed by North America at 20 percent."

"It turns out that domestic e-commerce isn’t so domestic after all. Already, roughly 70 percent of the revenues of domestically anchored carriers in midsize European countries have some kind of cross-border component. In some cases, that component is a direct infeed from a foreign player; in others, a foreign player uses local fulfillment to complete a delivery; in still others, a domestic company assembles and ships goods with international content."