NONE: ONLINE-ADS>> Europe Slowly Warming to The Internet
ONLINE-ADS>> Europe Slowly Warming to The Internet
Klaus Arnhold (webmaster_at_shuttlemedia.de)
Sun, 20 Oct 1996 23:10:33 +0100
Dear listmembers,
maybe this is of some interest to American marketers. There is some
interesting aspects in marketing Europe because you will be faced with
the fact that your prmotion activities need to be indivually customized
to each European country. And if somthing works in France it does not
necessarily mean that it does the job in Germany.
Although they speak German as well but I doubt that something worked
out for Germany will be succesfull in Switzerland as well.
Please take a look at the attached articel.
Kind regards
Klaus Arnhold
(karnhold_at_shuttlemedia.de)
Europe Slowly Warming to The Internet
- -------------------------------------
While the U.S. burns with Internet fever, Europe has taken its
time going on-line. But growth there is expected to outstrip the
U.S. this year, and companies ready to enter the market with
local languages and local partners stand to clean up....
With some 520 million people living in Europe, the market there is
vast. According to the San Jose-based research firm Dataquest
Inc., by mid-1996 there were about 5 million European Internet
users (nearly 2 million of whom were in the United Kingdom); by
the end of this year, Dataquest expects Europe will hold 20
percent of the world's active on-line population, or roughly 9.7
million people. U.S. companies such as Ascend Communications
Corp. of Alameda, Calif., a $150 million networking equipment
maker, are counting on Europe's present and future hunger for
bandwidth. "Our business in Europe is growing faster than in the
U.S.," says Curtis Sanford, Ascend's vice president of
international sales.
Europe has traditionally lagged behind the U.S. in technology
adoption by one to two years, and the Internet is no exception.
Europe is now playing catch-up with North America, where 70
percent of on-line users reside. However, Europe has already
begun an impressive ramp-up: While Dataquest expects the North
American on-line user group to grow by 64 percent this year,
European Internet users will see their numbers increase by 124
percent, albeit from a smaller base....
The greatest growth in European Internet usage is, not
surprisingly, in the business-to-business segment, since home
computer ownership is nowhere near that of the U.S. Since the
European Community came into full bloom at the end of 1992,
cross-border commerce has placed particular emphasis on
electronic data interchange (EDI) applications. Companies are
suddenly able to do business outside their national borders,
creating a need for dispatching and receiving business documents,
reports and data--precisely the sort of applications for which
the Web was designed. A study last February of 100 major companies
by the U.K. firm WebSite Consultancy (http://www.twsc.co.uk)
found that the primary motivation for constructing Web sites was
to provide 24-hour access for international customers and
prospects. ...
OPPORTUNITIES AWAIT
If Europe views the U.S. as a laboratory for major technological
change, then the adoption of the Internet as a cost-effective
alternative to wide area network (WAN) architectures has been
duly noted. In June, the Paris-based research firm Benchmark
Group reported that more than 50 percent of the major French
firms had Web sites or were in the process of building them.=20
But the rise of the Internet is just one of several major changes
taking place in Europe, including the creation of the EC, the
entrance of Eastern Europe into the free market and the
deregulation of telecommunications and its transition from analog
to digital technology. The combination of these dynamics has
resulted in an unprecedented amount of investment in
telecommunications infrastructure. The London "Financial Times"
has estimated that sales of telecom hardware, software and
integration services will hit $200 billion this year in Europe.
The frenzy of upgrade and expansion is forcing the major and
emerging European players to buy the most advanced products, and
much of their shopping is with U.S. vendors.
By 1997, the greatest Internet opportunities in Europe will be for
infrastructure hardware and software products rather than for
consumer-driven applications. The applications will come later,
and the key to their success is localization. [Editor's note:
A new European company is emerging to assist clients in localizing
their Internet presence, and promoting the resulting multilingual
Websites: EuroLinks: http://www.eurolinks.com. More about that
company in the next "Internet TImes on 1 November.]=20
There is excellent bundling and licensing potential among the
European PC manufacturers, such as ICL and Siemens Nixdorf
Informationssysteme AG, for Web software development tools,
e-mail and searching technology. These large OEMs are eager to
offer increased value to fatten their thin profit margins.
European distribution channels for Internet products are
evolving, and the few large, independent ISPs are shaping up to
be the most advantageous. They're rapidly moving to low,
flat-rate billing models--Demon charges just =A310 ($15) a month
for unlimited access--and, as a result, are seeking ways to
distinguish themselves and boost revenues by providing roaming,
faxing and telephony products.
But if the ISPs are the most immediate targets for resale or
licensing of Internet technology, the large telecommunications
carriers are the likely long-term market dominators. Besides the
marketing pull of their brand names, these large service carriers
have financial muscle and control over telephony infrastructure
costs, enabling them to undercut the ISPs. France Telecom, for
example, expects to have 2 million Internet users over an
installed base of 10 million modem-equipped PCs by the year 2000.
However, it isn't yet clear whether users of the company's highly
successful Minitel service are willing to buy expensive PCs to
replace the Minitel devices now provided free...
Carter Alexander, President of European Marketing & Sales (EMS),
<calexander_at_emsgroup.com>, quoted from "Upside" magazine
(http://www.upside.com/print/nov96/europe.html)
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