Auction News

Alibaba Group has announced that Zhang Wei, the former COO of Star Group China, formally joined Alibaba Group. According to Cai Chongxin, CFO of Alibaba, Zhang Wei will be senior vice president and in charge of the strategic investment department of the group. Her main responsibilities will be to help Alibaba and its subsidiaries evaluate trends of new businesses through cooperation, investment and acquisition, and to grasp new strategic opportunities in the Internet industry.

On chinatechnews.com

eBay has bowed to pressure from its users and scrapped a plan to force customers to use its wholly-owned payment subsidiary, PayPal.The move comes just days after a fiery meeting in Sydney, where eBay sellers attacked the plan and accused the company of becoming aggressive, monolithic and dictatorial. The meeting was convened by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, which was investigating whether eBay should be giving legal immunity from sections of the Trade Practices Act over the PayPal plan.

By James Thomson

Members of the Internet Merchants Association (IMA) say the Board of Directors and the Ethics Committee butted heads in recent days. The organization is composed of eBay and online sellers. Some members say the tensions began when the Board overruled the committee's decision in an ethics matter and failed to act transparently, and a few have said they believe the group may be in danger of disbanding. Suzanne Hallam of aGenius-Marketing.com wrote about the incident on her blog, writing that she had been "recent Chairman of Ethics and Moderation for one of the trade groups dealing with internet commerce and ebay sellers," a reference to IMA. In the post, Hallam wrote that "things were done in the back room and not reported to the members."

By Ina Steiner

MANILA, Philippines -- eBay is looking to provide support for Filipino developers who can create promising applications running on its marketplace, a top regional executive said. eBay recently announced it is opening up its portal to third-party application developers, a move similar to that made by social networking site Facebook and online software provider Salesforce.com. By opening itself to third-party developers, eBay is turning to its community for innovation while spurring new services for buyers and sellers. eBay mounted a regional competition looking to encourage developers to create innovative applications for local markets like the Philippines.

By Lawrence Casiraya

Ebay was yesterday ordered to pay nearly €40m ($63m) to the French luxury goods group, LVMH, in a court ruling the internet auction site admitted could have wider implications for online commerce.The Paris court ruling said Ebay had failed to prevent counterfeit products being sold over its website and had breached selective distribution agreements for luxury perfumes.Ebay immediately announced it would against appeal the ruling which it said would buttress restrictions on the way goods could be sold and, hence, on consumer choice. "Today's ruling is about an attempt by LVMH to protect uncompetitive commercial practices at the expense of consumer choice," it said.

By Nikki Tait

PARIS — EBay said it would appeal a French court’s order that it pay 38.6 million euros ($60.8 million) in damages to the French luxury goods company LVMH, the latest round in a long-running legal battle over the sale of counterfeit goods on the Internet. LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, a maker of high-end goods and fashion and luxury products, successfully challenged eBay for a second time in the French court, arguing that 90 percent of the Louis Vuitton bags and Dior perfumes sold on eBay are fakes. The court ruled Monday that eBay, which earns a commission on the sales, was not doing enough to stamp out counterfeit sales.

By DOREEN CARVAJAL

Bangalore (PTI): Banking on an online platform auction house, SaffronArt, closed a record sale featuring rare and significant works of Indian modern and contemporary artists registering a total sale value of around Rs 39 crore. Hosted on an innovative and interactive online platform, the auction featured the work of globally-sought painters, sculptors and installation artists, including S H Raza, Subodh Gupta, Jagdish Swaminathan and Rashid Rana. World records were set for eight artists, including Subodh Gupta, Hema Upadhyay, Badri Narayan, K M Adimoolam, Justin Ponmay, Chitra Ganesh Bose, Krishnamachari and Anita Dube.

On hindu.com

$2.98bn in sales during the first quarter. The amount of money changing hands in online auctions in China increased by more than a third in the first quarter, new research reveals. Consumer-to-consumer (C2C) auctions generated $2.98bn in sales during the first three months of the year, a quarter-on-quarter increase of 36.4 per cent, according to local research firm Analysys International. The surge in spending came despite severe weather during January, which cut power to wide areas and left hundreds of thousands stranded in railway stations and on roads throughout the country.

by Simon Burns

I received a flurry of emails today regarding a Buy.com listing on eBay. The latest accusation from members is that Buy.com is peddling porn in the comic book category, referring to item number 180258161717. eBay allows sellers to list adult items on its site, but requires sellers to put them in the "Mature Audiences" category. eBay requires members to provide credit card information or alternative verification to access the Mature Audiences section, "which helps ensure that minors are not freely accessing adult material." eBay also bars sellers from accepting PayPal for adult items.

By: Ina Steiner

So far, eBay has mainly sold technology and lifestyle products in India. It’s now banking on Pop Culture.

Mumbai: Walk the red carpet with Bollywood celebrities at the annual International Indian Film Academy (Iifa) awards.In an attempt to attract young people, and promote aggressive bidding as well as the “collectible culture” here, that’s the kind of product online auction platform eBay Inc., California, USA, is selling these days at a starting bid of Re1 on its Indian site.

Namitha Jagadeesh

eBay Australia have for the second time delayed implementation of the PayPal only policy, but this time a little more permanently. On the 21st May Australian users became obliged to offer PayPal on all listings, and it was planned that eBay Australia would go PayPal only on the 17th June. This was then delayed until July 15th but now pending the outcome of the ACCC decision PayPal only on eBay Australia has been postponed indefinitely. eBay apologise to users for the change saying it “regrets any ongoing uncertainty that this further delay may cause” and that “eBay appreciates the feedback received from the Community and will use this input to consider where we can make improvements that benefit both buyers and sellers.”

On tamebay.com

eBay, the world’s leading online marketplace Wednesday announced the launch of its Developer Programme in Southeast Asia. Active since 2000, eBay’s Developer Programme has approximately 70,000 members and offers developers around an outlet on the Web to monetize their applications.The South East Asia Developer Programme follows the recent unveiling of Project Echo, a plan to integrate third-party applications directly into the world’s largest ecommerce site. The pilot of the scheme, available later this year, will make third party-applications and features for eBay’s Selling Manager feature directly accessible to eBay business sellers.

On sda-asia.com