2021-22 Blue Paper on European Cross-Border Scale-Ups and their strategic importance in facilitating intra-continental trade & export

Cross-Border Commerce Europe releases its 2021-22 blue paper exploring the state of play of European Cross-Border Scale-Ups and their strategic importance in facilitating intracontinental trade and export. Founders from European leading Scale-Up retailers contributed to this first report.  

Brussels – 30 June 2022. Cross-Border Commerce Europe, the platform driving cross-border e-commerce in Europe, publishes its latest blue paper providing a summary from eight round table sessions between founders from nine leading retailers making up the Cross-Border Commerce Europe Scale-Ups High Level Group including Brouwland, Emesa, Greenweez, INF, Internet stores, Livehelfi, Maison Lab, StartSelect, and Zizzz.

The in-depth report results from eight round table brainstorming sessions held under the auspice of chairman Ulrich Seldeslachts, CEO at LSEC – Leaders in Security. He acted as the chairman, guiding the discussion between Scale-Ups founders representing multiple retail sectors and the EU Member States. Seven Senders acted as CBCommerce’s knowledge partner.

This 20-page Blue Paper report, available on the CBCommerce website, aims to address the current and upcoming challenges for Scale-Ups and provide best practices to support and catalyse Scale-Up innovation, which will lay the foundations of Europe’s next shopping experience.

Throughout Europe, e-commerce Scale-Ups are faced with obstacles preventing them from focusing on their day-to-day business: European legislative burdens, complex regulations and Member State-specific challenge.

This document was developed to give insights to the whole European Scale-Ups market, EU and Member State Policy Makers, financial markets and investors, and partners of the European cross-border ecosystem. It provides an in-depth analysis into the following topics:

• About eCommerce Scale-Ups in Europe
• Target audience
• Market orientation, entry best practices and challenges
• Digitalisation challenges related to commerce platforms and marketplace platforms
• Compliance challenges (GPDR, PSD2, E-commerce, …)
• Facing differences in taxation and “Green fees”
• Challenges in logistics (distribution)
• Challenges in fraud and fraud detection
• European Commerce Scale-Up companies SWOT

You will find hereunder some initial learnings and takeaways from the report. Access the full report for detailed analysis and best practices.

• Scale-Ups tend to expand their activity to other countries to maintain growth momentum and acquire new customers. While their audience, logistics and payment systems make marketplaces seem an easy way to enter new markets, they equally come with their challenges.
• When Scale-Ups consider going beyond their own borders, they are usually confronted with similar questions, ranging from market intelligence to logistics to localised marketing. Transport across Europe and Member State / EU regulations are not optimised for Cross-Border Commerce. The various challenges faced by Scale-Ups in Europe are highlighted by SevenSenders’ and YouGov’s case study, deep-diving into the online shopping preferences of nine European countries. An overview of the study is included in the report.
• For these rapid-growing companies to flourish, Europe and its Member States must recognise their significance, the setbacks they face and, importantly, encourage their aspirations.
• Examples such as Zalando Lounge, Hello Fresh and Ankorstore demonstrate the successes of growing European Scale-Ups as major commerce drivers. These companies create niches and new business models, encourage European authenticity and eco-friendliness, and disrupt traditional retail operations.
  
• Finally, the report tackles the key issue of online fraud facing European commerce Scale-Ups. It takes many forms in cross-border e-commerce. Beyond the PSD2 (Payment Services Directive 2) and innovative approaches in transactional security, fraud continues to be a problem. In 2020, Google identified a 250% increase in phishing sites between January and March.

On the matter, Chairman Ulrich Seldeslachts (CEO at LSEC) contributes “pan-European support for a continuous exchange of intelligence amongst European commerce providers is recommended. Special attention should be given to the overall infrastructure improvement for online identities to be better connected to physical entities, strengthening the overall trust and reducing the impact of fraud.”

“This blue paper provides insights and best practice cases as stimulation for radical innovation and tangible action for Scale-Ups operating in the European e-commerce industry”, concludes Carine Moitier, Founder of CBCommerce.eu. “Scale-Ups provide a great opportunity to grow the total production, export and retail and B2B sales across Europe. It is key that European Commission Policy-Makers recognise their importance.”

About Cross-Border Commerce Europe

Cross-Border Commerce Europe is the European network and knowledge platform for all eCommerce and omnichannel players present in at least three countries in Europe. CBCommerce.eu brings the different actors in contact with each other to increase visibility, share knowledge and figures, and discover trends and specificities of each European country.

Press coverage

DACH

Onlinemarktplatz
Cross-Border Commerce Europe: grenzüberschreitend agierenden Scale-ups aus Europa
https://www.onlinemarktplatz.de/212477/cross-border-commerce-europe-grenzueberschreitend-agierenden-scale-ups-aus-europa/

Klamm
Cross-Border Commerce Europe: grenzüberschreitend agierenden Scale-ups aus Europa
https://www.klamm.de/news/cross-border-commerce-europe-grenzueberschreitend-agierenden-scale-ups-aus-europa-14N212477.html

Postbranche
Cross-Border Commerce Europe veröffentlicht Blue Paper 2021/22
https://www.postbranche.de/2022/06/30/cross-border-commerce-europe-veroeffentlicht-blue-paper-2021-22/

Belgium

PUB
CROSS-BORDER COMMERCE EUROPE PUBLIE SON “BLUE PAPER SCALE-UPS”
https://pub.be/fr/cross-border-commerce-europe-publie-son-blue-paper-scale-ups/

The Netherlands

Emerce
Nieuw onderzoek Cross-Border Commerce Europe
https://www.emerce.nl/wire/nieuw-onderzoek-crossborder-commerce-europe

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