Where can you get a global view of e-commerce from the owner of a Japanese professional baseball team and the CEO of the most famous department store in Paris?  Why, the Global E-Commerce Summit in Monaco, October 26 – 28, of course.  Shop.org is the co-producer of this second annual global event along with the European E-Commerce and Mail Order Trade Association or EMOTA.

If your company is already conducting cross-border e-commerce, the reasons for attending this event are clear – you’ll tap into the most impressive gathering of global e-commerce executives in the world.  If you are one of the many U.S. online retailers looking at overseas expansion as a growth opporunity, you may also want to consider attending.  (And, if you’re a Shop.org member, you’re eligible for a substantial discount on your registration fee.)

There are two keynote speakers that stand out for me and who I look forward to hearing speak at the event.

Hiroshi Mikitani, Chairman, Founder and CEO, Rakuten

The first is Hiroshi Mikitani, Chairman & CEO, Rakuten.  If you aren’t familiar with Rakuten, you should be.  You may know them as the parent company of U.S.-based LinkShare.  But, they are also Japan’s leading Internet company with 2008 revenues of more than 2.7 billion USD.  They have a fascinating array of Internet businesses is Asia including in the No. 1 shopping portal and they recently purchased a 67% stake in Thailand’s largest e-commerce company.  Mr. Mikitani is the charismatic founder, chairman and CEO of this global Internet powerhouse.  In addition to their Internet interests, Mr. Mikitani also arranged for the purchase of the Rakuten Golden Eagles, a baseball team in Japan’s Pacific League.

Paul Delaoutre, Chairman and CEO, Galeries Lafayette

The other keynote speaker that has piqued my interest is Paul Delaoutre, chairman and chief executive officer of Galeries Lafayette.  Up until recently, pure-play ecommerce companies have represented the lion’s share of French online retail revenue.  Not anymore.  Major French retail brands are now flexing their e-commerce muscles and leveraging cross-channel strategies.  Galeries Lafayette is leading this trend.  It’s rare to find U.S. retail CEOs from large stores with hands-on e-commerce experience and even more rare outside of the U.S.  But, that’s exactly what Mr. Delaoutre brings to Galeries Lafayette.  Prior to coming to this famous French department store, from 1999 to 2004, Mr. Delaoutre was CEO for La Redoute, a leading mail order company in France, which he transformed into an international company as well as a web driven company.

Visionary keynote addresses from Mr. Mikitani and Mr. Delaoutre are just part of the reason to consider being a part of this event.  The full agenda includes e-commerce executives from Denmark, German, The Netherlands and more.

And, did I mention that this event is in Monaco?  By the way, thanks to some of the lowest airfares and hotel rates in recent memory, a trip to the Global E-Commerce Summit in Monaco is much less expensive than you think.

I hope to see you in Monaco later this month.