The digital marketplaces of today

​​​​​​​With its annual report "Best Global Brands 2016," brand consultancy Interbrand published an overview of the world's most important brands of 2016. In the top 10 alone, six companies are listed that work with a platform model - including Apple, Google, IBM, and amazon. In the B2C sector in particular, digital platforms are being developed as disruptive business models. These are based in part on already established products or services or are geared to smart trends in digitization. They offer a forum that simplifies and promotes the exchange, interaction and communication between two and more participants, and in some ways even controls it. A system that has been around for millennia in the form of bazaars or weekly markets. But today, the Internet is the location of the marketplace, which is open at all times. Here, platform providers and users come into contact on a digital level, or more concretely: Companies with (potential) customers.

Basically, a distinction must be made between two types of platform: On the one hand, there are those that enable targeted product- and service-related exchanges. These include Uber with its online mediated ride service and amazon as the largest mail order company for books, electronic items and much more. On the other hand, operating systems such as Linux, Windows and Android are software-related development platforms; they are used to create and exchange data.

Both platform types ensure that a specific target group can choose the optimum offer for itself between different providers. At the same time, providers - especially in the B2C sector - can reach almost every Internet user - worldwide. Platform technology therefore enables both sellers and buyers to use an enormous network. This results in unprecedented exchange potential.

 

EIM-based platforms in the B2B sector

Platformization is also becoming increasingly relevant for the B2B sector in order to digitize and link processes in a targeted manner. Many employees already benefit from smart devices and the associated increased convenience through speed, transparency, and networking; aspects that also benefit external service - i.e., in the direction of customers, suppliers, or other partners. For example, a supplier in the industrial sector can automatically link the items order confirmation, production and shipping. As a business model, digital platforms also ensure a reduction in transaction costs; at the same time, they encourage players along the entire value chain to jointly develop new innovations.


In order for B2B companies to benefit from the new network effects of digitized markets, they need a concrete platform strategy. Above all, this includes a holistic technology. Enterprise Information Management (EIM) forms the infrastructural starting point for digital business models by enabling and supporting a wide variety of platform types. Clear functions make it easier for users to reach their goals quickly and easily. At the same time, an EIM can be variably adapted to the respective needs of the target group. As a web portal, it is the central marketplace, accessible via login data, for all participants in the entire value chain. Here, documents and information are exchanged in a structured, fast and secure manner. Geared to specific company services, apps also provide individual access to the platform. This service tool can be used via mobile devices regardless of time and location.


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Providers and users change the market

Even as a B2B company, it is important to adapt a digital platform to the needs of its own target group. A reciprocal relationship between platform provider and user should be ensured to enable constant optimization of the existing technology. If users are given the opportunity to influence the applications and user-friendliness of a platform, they ensure that it also becomes interesting for other users.

In this way, platform-based business models are changing existing market structures. The developing platform economy offers companies the opportunity to respond more quickly to competition on the market and to fill gaps profitably. According to the digital association Bitkom, however, the challenge in Germany in particular lies in the fact that a large proportion of companies are still not even aware that a development toward the platform economy is taking place or what is behind this term. Targeted education is therefore still needed to ensure that digital platforms are also used as a holistic business model in this country.