The world has barely glimpsed e-markets’ capabilities. What could economic platform technologies look like if applied to growth and inclusion at massive scale?
E-Markets as a public utility: What’s different?
POEMs (Public Official E-Markets) would have government underpinning. That gives them breadth, depth, solidity, and regulated predictability: a stark contrast to today’s mishmash of markets. The enabling legislation should then ensure operators maximize their return by delivering:
- Seamless markets: POEMs is not a vertical platform battling to dominate its niche. It pulls together resources from across its thousands of sectors to meet each buyer’s need. A suite of transaction mechanisms maximizes convenience. Mandated franchisees inhibit centralizing and keep each sector vibrant.
- Atomization: The flat-rate, percentage, system charge in each purchase is calibrated to reward operators for small transactions. Instead of upselling within a silo, POEMs aims for “broadselling”, meeting the buyer’s need in an insured, backstopped, package from many small sellers, not necessarily one big one.
- Information: Anonymized, data from POEMs is public. Operators are motivated to harness it with tools allowing – for example – anyone to explore options around market entry, pricing, and times to offer for any skill or asset.
- Investment: With returns linked to market activity, POEMs will encourage market interventions that increase its users’ options, activity, and earnings. They can come from government, philanthropy, or profit seekers.
- Externalized innovation: Banned from taking a position in any of their markets, permitted to operate only the core service, POEMs spawns spin-off opportunities that its operators can’t exploit. Instead of building a monolith, they are incentivized to tend an evolving eco-system of value-adding apps.
In this section:
→ Scope of “POEMs”: How is the platform structured?
→ “POEMs” in the Home: An opportunity-seeker logs-in.
→ “POEMs” for Businesses: A small company exploits its new facility.