Knowledge@Wharton analyzes Chinese "Ueber-Ecommerce" company alibaba.com:

"But the company knows it must continue to innovate. "Currently, Alibaba's management is considering new sources of revenue," says Sandulli. "They may begin to charge commissions for their AliPay service. They may also launch a new service that allows Chinese customers to search for offers using keywords. They are also starting to consider ways to increase their advertising revenues."

Wharton's Aron says obtaining new sources of revenue will be pivotal for Alibaba going forward because of some inherent shortcomings in its B2B business model. Typically, firms like Alibaba have primary revenue streams (derived from charging customers for value-added services); secondary streams (subscription fees and listing fees); and tertiary revenue streams (advertising and fees for providing links to other sites).

"Most of the B2B companies that went under in the U.S. [when the Internet bubble burst in 2000] did so because the revenue stream was tertiary, which is easily lost," Aron explains. "The problem with SMEs is that, by their nature, you're restricted to making money off commissions and advertising." Another shortcoming is that Alibaba at the moment offers none of the value-added services that major corporate buyers and sellers look for, such as the ability to track shipments from start to finish in real time -- known as "pick, pack and track" -- or manage invoicing or escrow accounts."

I always admired alibaba.com. They have started at pretty much at the same time as Newtron and solely focused on the 'simple' business like subscription and advertising while newtron did focus from the first minute on b2b transactions and heavy negotiation workflows. As it turns out the transaction support software for sourcing and negotiation have succeeded to some extend in the US (Procuri. Perfect, Emptoris) but have largely failed to get traction in the less information age countries (most of Europe and Asia).

So they have really done a great job in executing their strategy.

Read the full analysis.