Introduction
TradeCard Inc. (www.tradecard.com) developed TradeCard as a financial supply chain service. The TradeCard platform aligned the documentary and financial requirements of a domestic or international trade transaction with the physical movement of goods, eliminating time-consuming and error-prone manual processes. By streamlining and enhancing the steps necessary for purchase order approvals, payment decisions and settlement, TradeCard provided a cost-effective, practical and patented service for financial supply chain management. When TradeCard Inc. started in February 1999, some of the challenges the Company faced involved building the network of players and service providers in the TradeCard system, changing the mindset of global traders who conducted large-dollar transactions to use TradeCard, and building a technical infrastructure that had the ability to provide a seamless online settlement transaction and secure electronic solution involving a network of global players. TradeCard expanded rapidly after 1999. By the end of 2002, TradeCard had attracted over 100 service providers in the TradeCard system and over 600 companies were using TradeCard. The Company improved the service offering by “unbundling” solutions to fit the special and customised needs of its customers.
New York-based TradeCard Inc. had offices in San Diego, San Francisco and Chicago, and international offices in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Seoul and Taipei.1 In November 2002 TradeCard Inc. decided to enter China. Not only was China considered to be the biggest market in the world, but most of TradeCard’s biggest customers in the US, Europe, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and around the region had their products manufactured in the mainland. With China’s accession to the WTO, foreign companies, including TradeCard Inc., were eyeing China as a very attractive market. However, China had yet to develop its legal, financial and technological infrastructure to accommodate international players. How then could a structured B2B online trade transaction management service such as TradeCard be marketed to China? How could TradeCard Inc. create a critical mass of users in the China region? What would be the best means to achieve that?