An exploratory study of cross border e-commerce (CBEC) in China : opportunities and challenges for small to medium size enterprises (SMEs)

Development of cross border e-commerce (CBEC) is one of the major enablers of SMEs access to overseas market opportunities. The boom in China’s cross border e-commerce has been exponential. It has made China the world’s largest cross-border market with over 200 million cross-border online consumers. This paper explores the opportunities and the challenges for SMEs to leverage the China’s CBEC to find and develop new customers in markets outside their domestic ones. It aims to help small to medium enterprises understand the unique Chinese e-commerce ecosystem and develop an appropriate e-commerce strategy that enables them to enter the Chinese e-commerce ecosystem. This research reveals that the significant growth opportunities and challenges for those SMEs poised for business expansion into Chinese market via CBEC and offers a detailed understanding of the China’s cross border ecommerce system.