Companies setting up a business-to-business marketplace to make transactions more efficient for buyers and sellers should carefully consider the best ownership structure. New research suggests that owning the marketplace outright can give a company greater control, security, and access to suppliers but can also create regulatory problems and channel conflicts. Depending on the business objective, creating a spinoff or startup can be an effective strategy for launching a B2B marketplace. Business-to-business marketplaces, like their consumer-facing cousins, help streamline purchasing by giving buyers and suppliers an online platform for conducting transactions. Once a company decides that it wants to create a marketplace to make transactions more efficient and extend its market reach, it must start by deciding on an ownership structure: Should the marketplace be kept in-house or spun out as an independent business' And is it worth bringing in partners or other owners' Each type of...
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