The founder of ebay was a computer programmer Pierre Omidyar, who is a Frenceh-born Iranian. The very first item sold on eBay was a broken laser pointer for $14.83. Astonished, Omidyar contacted the winning bidder to ask if he understood that the laser pointer was broken.
In his responding email, the buyer explained: "I'm a collector of broken laser pointers." Chris Agarpao was hired as eBay's first employee and Jeffrey Skoll was hired as the first president of the company in early 1996. In November 1996, eBay entered into its first third-party licensing deal, with a company called Electronic Travel Auction to use SmartMarket Technology to sell plane tickets and other travel products. The company officially changed the name of its service from AuctionWeb to eBay in September 1997.
Originally, the site belonged to Echo Bay Technology Group, Omidyar's consulting firm. Omidyar had tried to register the domain name echobay.com (the domain has recently been put up for sale) but found it already taken by the Echo Bay Mines, a gold mining company, so he shortened it to his second choice, eBay.com. EBay went public on September 21[6], 1998, and both Omidyar and Skoll became instant billionaires.The company purchased PayPal on October 14, 2002.
The domain ebay.com attracted at least 902 million visitors annually by 2008 according to a Compete.com study. This was thrice the numbers of walmart.com.
Beside ebay, Amazon.com is a very successful example of e-commerce business because of several reasons. Basically, there are three strategies that have helped Amazon.com to enhance its competitive advantage, including cost-leadership, customer differentiation and focus strategies.Amazon.com strives to be Earth's most customer-centric company where people can find and discover virtually anything they want to buy online. By giving customers more of what they want which include low prices, vast selection, and convenience, Amazon.com continues to grow and evolve as a world-class e-commerce platform.
