Geographic proximity, supply chain and organizational glocalized survival: China’s e-commerce investments in Indonesia

Abstract

Chinese e-commerce companies are in the ascendant into the overseas market, while still lack adequate academic attention. Adopting case study and public policy approaches, this article applies the symbiosis theory, based on the fundamentals of the development data of Chinese e-commerce companies in the Indonesia market, to construct an evaluation model and proposes a strategic orientation to reaching an embedded survival and further development. Through understanding the structural characteristics and developing status of different types of Chinese e-commerce companies going overseas, a detailed investigation to the Chinese e-commerce companies investing in Indonesia has been conducted. Findings show that the production capacity cooperation stage of the two countries has a trend of asymmetric symbiosis gradually developing towards symmetric symbiosis. To promote a continuous economic cooperation between China and Indonesia, this article proposes that the national-level collaboration policies, cross-border e-commerce value chain, as well as organizational-level coordination are the key sectors for reaching the vision of symmetric symbiosis between the two countries. Sectors in infrastructure, trade, capital, and people’s mindset intimacy also contribute to construct a symbiosis mechanism for capacity cooperation between the two nations.