27. September 2016

Glossary

“E-commerce” is short for “electronic commerce” and refers to the online retail business. The term, while theoretically covering the entire world of internet trading, is used essentially for buy-and-sell processes. On top of that, customer services and online banking are considered e-commerce, and some market players even include mail-order retailing in their definition of e-commerce.

27. September 2016

Glossary

This term refers to prime sites in more or less clearly delineated areas like town centres or the heart of logistics regions that are deemed particularly stable and low-risk. These areas are favoured under a long-term investment strategy.

27. September 2016

Glossary

The acronym stands for “corporate social responsibility” and implies a concept of holistic accountability in business. A company implementing the concept will typically seek to reconcile the interests of its business stakeholders with communal, social, and environmental concerns.

27. September 2016

Glossary

The term “Brexit” is a portmanteau word blending the words “British” and “exit.” It was coined in connection with the UK’s referendum on whether or not to leave the European Union, and now refers to both the process and the fact of the UK’s exit from the EU.

27. September 2016

Glossary

This term refers to a nascent trend by vendors or retailers to keep the logistics process in-house, including the last-mile delivery. In Germany, the practice has been adopted by Amazon and Zalando, among others.

27. September 2016

Glossary

“Business to business,” as the acronym spells out, refers to the relationship between corporates. This means that goods or services are provided for another company rather than for an end-consumer.

27. September 2016

Glossary

The acronym, whether it is spelled out “business to consumer” or “business to client,” refers to the business relationship between a company and its end consumers. It is most frequently used in the e-commerce industry.

27. September 2016

Glossary

The term refers to building works on plots pre-used for industrial purposes over long periods of time, or to special development areas formerly zoned as railway sites, for instance. Such areas may also include former military sites or backfilled open-pit mines. Land of this type is in any case subject to extensive repurposing, and often implies elevated threats of soil contamination or unstable subsoil conditions. This increases the potential cost risk in the form of waste disposal costs or measures to stabilise the subsoil, among others. A residual risk of follow-up costs remains even beyond the completion of such works (redevelopment, decontamination, etc.). On the bright side, brownfield sites often come with superb transport links that date back to their previous use for industrial purposes or because they used to be frequented by heavy goods traffic. Development costs can thus be lower than those of greenfield development, not least because the planning permission is already in place. Whether or not the existing permit can be used for the contemplated development must be clarified on a case to case basis.

27. September 2016

Glossary

A so-called box plot is a chart used to visualise how various characteristics are distributed. The box plots used in the survey represent the distribution (position and measure of dispersion) along a scale. The so-called whiskers extending from the boxes represent the minimum and maximum figures, meaning the outliers. The box itself marks the area in which half of all data are located. The shaded band inside the box represents the median that bisects the distribution. One quarter of the data is above the median (shaded in orange) and one quarter below (shaded in blue). Since these areas each represent 25% of the figures, they are referred to as quartiles. The left margin of the box marks the 25% quartile, whereas the right margin of the box marks the 75% quartile.  

27. September 2016

Glossary

This quarterly barometer compiled by bulwiengesa since 2012 represents an analytic tool that has been very well received by the German financing market. The BF.Quartalsbarometer score is highly meaningful because it captures around 90 percent of the funding volume approved in Germany. It is based on a quarterly poll that bulwiengesa conducts among a panel of around 200 senior industry experts. The barometer has been published in collaboration with the company BF.direkt, hence the name.