The difference between Amazon and Alibaba: Amazon adopts a self-operated approach and controls everything. The buying and selling process goes through their hands. They have warehouses and sell their own products. Alibaba, on the other hand, acts as a platform and does not participate in sales. It only provides a platform for small businesses and brand manufacturers to contact consumers. After that, the buying and selling process is a direct communication between sellers and buyers.

Both Alibaba and Amazon focus on e-commerce business, supplemented by cloud services and digital media. Their main similarities are e-commerce and cloud computing business. The two e-commerce companies look very similar at first glance, but they are actually completely different.

The difference between Amazon and Alibaba

1. Business difference

Amazon adopts a self-operated approach and controls everything. The buying and selling process goes through their hands. They have warehouses and sell their own products.

Alibaba acts as a platform and does not participate in sales. It only provides a platform for small businesses and brand manufacturers to contact consumers. After that, the buying and selling process is a direct communication between sellers and buyers.

2. Political situation

At present, as Amazon further develops in its home country, the risk of government intervention is increasing.

Alibaba and the Chinese government have a very good partnership.

3. Share of retail industry

Amazon's online retail business in the United States has reached 40%~50%.

Alibaba's online retail business in China accounts for about 80%.

At present, the two e-commerce companies have matured in their respective local markets. The next step for both companies is to expand into the international market, so competition is inevitable.

Competition between Amazon and Alibaba

1. Market competition

In the expansion of the global market, Australia, Singapore and India are about to become the e-commerce battlefields for the two giants to compete.

Amazon currently occupies the North American and European markets. It has now fully entered the Australian market and is fully recruiting investors. It is also working hard to enter the Indian market and has also taken some actions in Singapore.

Alibaba entered the Southeast Asian market through Lazada and already holds 83% of Lazada's shares. Like Amazon, Alibaba has also bet on India and is entering the Australian market.

2. AWS VS Alibaba Cloud

In addition to competing in e-commerce business, Amazon and Alibaba also have cloud computing business, which is likely to become the next main battlefield.

Amazon is not only an e-commerce company, but also its ASW leads the world. Amazon Cloud Computing Service (AWS), as the world's largest cloud service provider, is a cash cow that drives Amazon's continuous expansion.

On February 6, 2018, Amazon AWS Cloud ranked first with $17.4 billion and continued to lead the cloud service industry.

Alibaba is also vigorously developing its own Alibaba Cloud service. According to the first quarter financial report of fiscal year 2018, the revenue scale of Alibaba Cloud in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2018 (the first quarter of the natural year) was 4.385 billion yuan.

3. FBA VS Cainiao Logistics

Now Alibaba has also started to develop its own Cainiao Logistics. Will it be able to compete with Amazon's FBA service in the future?