Amazon.com will open a store on Chinese e-commerce platform Pinduoduo today, in a sign of how the US firm’s China strategy is evolving after it shut its own online store in the country, reported Reuters.
Amazon closed its Chinese marketplace in July, having found it difficult to gain traction in the face of intense competition from entrenched, home-grown rivals like Alibaba Group Holding’s Tmall marketplace and JD.com.
It said at the time it would increase its focus on selling goods from abroad to Chinese buyers via its global platform. It also has a Kindle store on Tmall.
Alibaba and JD.com have traditionally dominated China’s e-commerce market but that status quo was recently disrupted by four-year-old Pinduoduo, which is popular with China’s lower-tier city residents. A Reuters source said Amazon’s Pinduoduo store would carry goods from overseas.