Alibaba Group launches a new music group with Gao Xiaosong as its chairman. (Photo : Reuters)
Amazon, the largest online retailer in the U.S., has opened a store on Alibaba's online platform Tmall in order to attract more Chinese consumers.
On Tmall, Amazon is offering Chinese online consumers items such as imported foods, shoes, toys, kitchenware and more others.
This is not the first venture of Amazon on Tmall. Last year, it established a store on Tmall to cater to those interested in the Amazon Kindle Reader. Chinese e-book readers had the chance to purchase their readers through this.
This is also not the first time that Amazon tried to attract Chinese online consumers. A decade ago, the giant online retailer tapped into the Chinese market through the acquisition of Joyo.com, which was a renowned online retailer of books, music and videos in China. In 2011, Joyo.com was rebranded into Amazon.cn.
For its part, Alibaba is welcoming of the said strategy. It believes that Amazon's presence could further improve the shopping experience of Alibaba's customers and widen the selection of items that Chinese online consumers can shop for.
Analysts also believe that Alibaba stands to benefit from this deal. Amazon, being one of the world's most credible online retailers, could help Alibaba achieve a higher level of credibility, especially since it recently faced aggressive scrutiny from Chinese authorities. Alibaba had been accused of selling counterfeit goods on its platform, dampening its reputation in the eyes of many consumers.
Many also noted that this decision by Amazon came after Alibaba's announcement that it would open a data center in Silicon Valley, which could compete with Amazon on the cloud.
