The stakes are high. Researchers, including GartnerGroup and Forrester Research, predict exponential growth in online consumer shopping through retail methods and auctions. That's up from 650m in 1998. But this will not necessarily apply to the SA market. As a result it has achieved massive volumes and the Holy Grail of Internet trading - liquidity and profitability.
Huge volumes are crucial to success because the revenues from each transaction are usually small.
And costs are high. Most industry analysts and participants agree that not all four leading auction players in SA can survive. Acquisitions, mergers and liquidations are likely to occur. The only question is when. A number of smaller auction sites have already folded or simply disappeared from the Web.