Overview
Products
Competitors
Cluster Contribution
eBay Now
eBay Now is a new service from eBay which provides a local shopping service with the promise of delivery
in under an hour. eBay Now began as a service called Milo, with the goal of making shopping local easy. Milo was at
roughly 25 employees before its acquisition. Their relationship with eBay started off as a partnership, allowing eBay
and Milo's services to integrate at a technical level. Eventually eBay decided to purchase Milo for $75 Million in 2010.
Ted Dziuba was a Co-Founder and Software Engineer for Milo, and we had the pleasure of getting to speak with him.
Ted shared his insight of starting up a company, and shared his story of struggling to find investors, raising money,
and finally being acquired.
Local Delivery
eBay Now offers applications for your mobile device, plus a website which is found at now.ebay.com. To use
eBay now simply find a product you want to purchase, and order it. When you place an order, it gets sent to the ‘valet
driver.’ The valet will then go to the nearest store selling your product and purchase it for you. The valet then delivers
the product to the customer within an hour. All the customer pays extra is a five dollar fee for delivery. Currently eBay
Now is only offered in the San Francisco Bay Area, and the Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens areas of New York.
The service will soon be coming to Chicago, and other markets.
Locations
- San Jose
- San Francisco
- SF Peninsula
- NYC Queens
- Manhattan and Brooklyn
Amazon Local
Amazon offers a Local Express Delivery system similar to eBay Now. Amazon Local
promises same day delivery for orders placed before a certain time, say 11a.m. local time. While a competitor to
eBay Now, Amazon Local only works when the order is placed before a certain time. eBay Now works whenever you
like, within an hour.
Google Shopping Express
Google promises delivery within a few hours while using their Google Shopping
Express. Currently this service is in beta, and is only available to customers in San Francisco. Google Shopping
Express works similarly to eBay Now. You search for a product, find the best price, order. You can specify delivery
times from ‘Any Time Today’ to between a range of hours. Google plans on using a subscription model to charge $60
- $70 a year for the service.
Silicon Valley
eBay’s offices are located in San Francisco. This is outside the majority of the ‘Silicon Valley’ area, but still
located in an area close enough to keep up with other local competitors and innovators within the cluster. For
example, because of their close proximity to Google, the accusation of Milo for eBay, into eBay Now is likely a reason
Google has felt the need to offer a same day delivery service to compete. And because competition leads to more
innovation, it is good for both parties they are located in the same region and compete for the same customers.
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