E-commerce: Washington gets confrontational with Alibaba

By

Matthieu Guinebault

Published
Dec 21, 2015

According to the US, the Chinese giant's anti-counterfeiting features are too slow, cryptic and complex to use. The Taobao platform in particular is targeted in a report by the US Trade Directorate.
 

Though the report recognises that the Chinese e-commerce leader has implemented devices to fight the sale of imitations, it also highlights how a great many US brands regard the devices as ineffectual and lacking accountability. The USA have indeed regularly denounced for many years the group's relative leniency with regards to counterfeiting.
 
However, the US government agency has refused to add Alibaba to its black list of counterfeiting markets, a list the group was removed from in 2013. Since then Alibaba took its first steps on the US market.

"They ought to be those who uphold the highest standards," lamented in November on CNBC Juanita Duggan, president of the American Apparel and Footwear Association (AAFA). "We simply cannot understand how it's not in [Alibaba's] interest to work with us towards a process that would allow the creation of a respectable market."
 
In the fiscal year closed at the end of March, Alibaba recorded revenues for €11.2 billion (CNY76.2 billion), with a spectacular 45% yearly growth. Mobile sales amounted to €2.61 billion (CNY17.8 billion), skyrocketing by 514%.