Prior to business school, I was working at Rakuten (http://global.rakuten.com/en/), Japan's largest e-commerce marketplace. My department was in charge of expanding Rakuten's global e-commerce footprint. The Holy Grail for our team was developing a way to create a global, language neutral e-commerce website that had competitive shipping prices that were comparable with domestic alternatives.
This mind boggling trifecta of trouble bedeviled me for years. The first problem, the global reach of the site, was solved through legwork and lots of funding. We reached out to individual countries through joint ventures, acquisitions and a few local startups.
The second issue, the language compatibility, was solved with a more legwork, keyword indexing and crowd-sourcing. The third problem, however, proved to be much more difficult. I will be very interested to see how FiftyOne solves this last problem. They seem to have the first two pretty much figured out, and a great global reach with premium brands (Barney's, Williams Sonoma etc…). They have amazing growth, with their annual sales growing 310%year-over-year, starting with $25 million in 2009 to $77 million in 2010. That sort of hyperbolic growth is very encouraging for the industry and serves as validation for the promise of a global e-commerce system.
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FiftyOne completed integration in May 2011 with DHL which allows it pass big shipping cost savings due to sheer volume of international shipping through this carrier. Prior to using DHL Fiftyone was using another logistics company.
http://www.fiftyone.com/news-events/fiftyone-partners-with-dhl-to-deliver-superior-global-consumer-experience
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