How Microsoft Could Disrupt The Ecommerce Platform Sector

SaaS
Written By Rick Watson

Sometimes I enjoy thought experiments. What would be something to shake up the eCommerce platform space?

Microsoft and Salesforce I think are the companies with the largest untapped opportunities. Despite going down-market in pricing often, Salesforce Commerce Cloud has trouble going down-market in terms of total cost of ownership (which is really the most important thing) relative to the newer cloud platforms.

I think these 3 companies are in play for Microsoft and CRM:

  • Square

  • Lightspeed

  • BigCommerce + Predict Spring

Before you say, Why Salesforce? Well, this would allow Salesforce Commerce Cloud to stay at the enterprise-level and Salesforce to allow an SMB/mid-market platform to stay at the lower level. Oracle used this strategy successfully when it acquired MySQL which a lot of people were surprised by.

I prefer Lightspeed or Square for these players because it includes a functional POS system. Whereas with BigCommerce, POS is not in the box. If they acquire BigCommerce, they should also acquire Predict Spring which is fast becoming a disruptor.

Personally, my pick is still Microsoft for these acquisitions because they have a big hole in their omnichannel retail offering once you look past Microsoft Dynamics. It's a tough market for them to continue to ignore.

Rick Watson

Rick Watson founded RMW Commerce Consulting after spending 20+ years as a technology entrepreneur and operator exclusively in the eCommerce industry with companies like ChannelAdvisor, BarnesandNoble.com, Merchantry, and Pitney Bowes.

Watson’s work today is centered on supporting investors and management teams incubating and growing direct-to-consumer businesses. Most recently, in partnership with WHP Global, Rick was a critical resource in architecting the WHP+ platform, a new turnkey direct to consumer digital e-commerce platform that powers AnneKlein.com and JosephAbboud.com.

Watson also hosts a weekly podcast, Watson Weekly, where he shares an unbiased, unfiltered expert take on the retail sector’s biggest players.

In the past year alone, Rick has spoken at many in-person and virtual events as well as podcasts on topics ranging from retail/ecom to supply chain/logistics and even digital grocery including CommerceNext IRL, ASCM Connect, and Retail Innovation Conference.

https://www.rmwcommerce.com/
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