A free Business Accelerator on e-commerce is being held for entrepreneurs in Uzbekistan from August 1 to 31 this year, organized jointly with the Wildberries e-commerce platform and the Graduate School of Business and Entrepreneurship. Its purpose is to help them sell their products on domestic and foreign markets through the platform.

Presentations and lectures on effective tools and methods for selling through e-commerce are held online every day as part of the Business Accelerator. They are delivered by leading experts of the Wildberries platform and by representatives of companies that trade successfully on the marketplace, for entrepreneurs of Uzbekistan and managers of local companies.

On August 13, for instance, a practical session of the Business Accelerator featured a presentation by M. Gandzha, a leading expert of the Wildberries platform, on “The architecture of creating a product card on an e-commerce platform.” It covered the specifics of creating a product card for national goods, how information about a product is presented, its configuration and packaging, the requirements and conditions for creating a card, and the aspects that buyers pay attention to.

The session also featured a presentation by S. Bukreeva, Chief Financial Officer of PRO WB, on “Currency risks for sellers trading on e-commerce platforms.” Particular attention was given to the conditions for carrying out currency operations in the countries to which goods are exported.

Interest in working on e-commerce platforms is also growing among the entrepreneurs themselves, who are mastering the tools of e-commerce at the Business Accelerator. Nargiza Sulaymanova, head of Nargiza Atelye LLC, a ready-made garment manufacturer in Namangan region, said that taking part in the Wildberries business accelerator had given her the knowledge she needed on placing goods correctly on the marketplace, optimizing product cards and running advertising effectively. She singled out the practical advice on logistics and warehousing services as especially valuable, and added that she intends to increase sales through her online store substantially.

An entrepreneur from Bukhara, Khurriyat Zaripova is the founder of the Zarif Zulfiya family enterprise, which produces towels, bed sheets, pillowcases and other textile goods. She said that the Wildberries Business Accelerator program had given her important knowledge and skills in online sales, product advertising and access to foreign markets. In her view, trading through e-commerce platforms makes it considerably easier to bring national products to export markets.

A craftsman from Samarkand region, Nuriddin Mustafaqulov said that taking part in the Business Accelerator opens up convenient opportunities to bring the souvenirs he produces to new export markets. The practical sessions, he noted, provided a great deal of applied and useful knowledge: on organizing sales of souvenirs and gift items through the Wildberries marketplace, selecting and placing products correctly, working with customers, marketing, and increasing sales volumes.

As the world economy becomes more globalized, small businesses in most developing countries of Asia, Europe and Africa are gaining the ability to reach global export markets easily and at low cost — precisely because they make productive use of modern trading platforms. As participants in the Business Accelerator sessions point out, finding buyers on global markets for goods made in Uzbekistan, gaining new trading partners and increasing export potential today depend directly on the effective use of e-commerce platforms.