Week #6: Alibaba Withdraws Cainiao's IPO | TikTok USA's New Policy Poses Challenges to Overseas Vendors
Latest news and analysis on China's global e-sellers.
Here’s our pick for last week’s news:
Collectible Toy Retailer Pop Mart's Revenue from Overseas Markets Surges by 134.9%
3 New Sites Launched, Temu now is Available in 53 Countries
TikTok Rolls out Shop Mall in Singapore and Thailand
VIVAIA Tops Digital 100 Ranking of Fastest Growing Apparel & Accessories Sites
China's Gen Z Shopping Hub – POISON Global Puts More Efforts to Expand Overseas Markets
Alibaba Withdraws Cainiao's IPO and Plans to Buy out its Stakes for $3.75B
TikTok Shop Partners with VERB's MARKET.live for Livestream Shopping Services
TikTok USA's New Policy Poses Challenges to Overseas Vendors
TikTok's Owner ByteDance Hosts the First New Seller Seminar for Douyin in NYC
AliExpress Becomes First Exclusive E-Commerce Partner of UEFA EURO 2024
Collectible Toy Retailer Pop Mart's Revenue from Overseas Markets Surges by 134.9%
POP MART, the collectible toy producer based in Beijing, released its annual fiscal report for the last year. The company's revenue in 2023 was RMB 6.301 billion (USD 0.87 billion), a YoY increase of 36.5%, with revenue from overseas markets surging by 134.9% to RMB 1.06 billion (USD 146 million).
During the past year, Pop Mart launched its first offline stores in France, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Netherlands. As of December 31, the company had 80 outlets worldwide, along with 159 robot stores. "The growth of the overseas market has given us great confidence. Looking ahead to 2024, we expect the group's revenue to maintain a robust growth with a minimum increase of 30%, driven particularly by a significant surge of over 100% in overseas business." said Chairman and CEO Wang Ning.
3 New Sites Launched, Temu now is Available in 53 Countries
Pinduoduo's global e-commerce brand Temu has expanded its international reach by debuting three new sites in Georgia, Mauritius, and Malta. These new sites cover strategic regions across Western Asia, Africa, and Southern Europe. The Mauritius site represents Temu's continued focus on the African market, following its initial launch in South Africa earlier this year. With these new sites, Temu has expanded its global presence to 53 overseas markets spanning Asia, Europe, North America, Latin America, Africa, and Oceania.
Temu has taken a measured approach to expansion, strategically entering developed markets with stable infrastructure and policies - despite ongoing inflation. After this step, Temu aims to venture into less developed areas. Thus, the recent entry into Georgia and Mauritius could serve as a launchpad for future expansion into neighboring regions like Russia and Africa.
Furthermore, data from Business of APPS indicates that Temu has surpassed 100 million downloads globally in 2023. Since its launch in Japan last July, Temu has amassed over 15 million users there, nearly matching the combined user base of the country's three major e-commerce players. Meanwhile, in South Korea, Temu's registered user base has skyrocketed from 520,000 last August to 5.7 million as of this January - a nearly tenfold increase in just half a year.
TikTok Rolls out Shop Mall in Singapore and Thailand
TikTok's e-commerce platform TikTok Shop has launched TikTok Shop Mall in Singapore, a by-invite only channel exclusively for brands' flagship stores and authorized online retail outlets.
TikTok said in a statement that through TikTok Shop Mall, TikTok Shop aims to further enhance Singaporeans shoppers' positive experience by offering them a curated selection of local and international brands with guaranteed 100% authentic and original products, reliable customer service, and exclusive benefits.
This feature is also available in Thailand.
VIVAIA Tops Digital 100 Ranking of Fastest Growing Apparel & Accessories Sites
Women's fashion footwear brand VIVAIA captured the #1 spot for Apparel & Accessories in Similarweb’s annual Digital 100 ranking of the online businesses with the most impressive growth. The average monthly visits to vivaia.com grew 654.6%, year-over-year, between 2022 and 2023.
Established in 2020, VIVAIA is best known for women's footwear and is the leading brand under STARLINK, a top seller based in Shenzhen. As an eco-friendly DTC brand catering to global consumers, VIVAIA actively penetrates international markets, establishing distribution channels across Europe, North America, and Australia, while also tapping into e-commerce platforms like Amazon and eBay, along with its own DTC website, for sales.
VIVAIA champions the DTC model as the key for niche brands to thrive. By strategically leveraging overseas social medias, it has successfully introduced its eco-friendly ethos to consumers, riding the wave of sustainability and gaining attention globally.
China's Gen Z Shopping Hub – POISON Global Puts More Efforts to Expand Overseas Markets
Poizon is a fully-fledged fashion marketplace for authentic sneakers, apparel, bags, watches, and accessories from designer labels and luxury brands, as well as artwork. Before this, Poizon started as a content-sharing community with an emphasis on streetwear when it was founded in 2015. Two years later, the platform made its foray into e-commerce and rolled out dedicated authentication.
Recently, POISON Global is putting efforts to attract overseas vendors and brands from fashion and accessories to electronics to baby products. POISON Global adopts the half or full managed consignment model. This means all vendors need to do is simply to ship their products to POISON Global's overseas warehouses, and POISON Global will take charge of everything including listing, bidding and logistics.
Looking ahead, POISON aims to double down on its domestic market presence, with a keen focus on expanding its offerings in beauty, apparel, and personal care brands. Insiders reveals that POISON is making bold moves in cargo management and merchant recruitment, potentially setting up a showdown with competitors like Pinduoduo for access to genuine overseas brands.
Alibaba Withdraws Cainiao's IPO and Plans to Buy out its Stakes for $3.75B
On March 26, Cainiao announced to withdraw its IPO and listing application in Hong Kong. Meanwhile, Alibaba Group intends to invest up to USD 3.75 billion to acquire the remaining shares of Cainiao from minority shareholders and employees, after which Alibaba will take the full ownership. Through this move, Alibaba aims to reach deeper strategic synergies between its core ecommerce businesses and logistics services Cainiao.
"Given the strategic importance of Cainiao to Alibaba and the significant long-term opportunities we see in building out a global logistics network, we believe this is an appropriate time to double down on Alibaba's investment in Cainiao," Joe Tsai, chairman of Alibaba, said in a statement.
Joe Tsai also pointed that, "given the market conditions, Cainiao's IPO at this juncture would unlikely garner a valuation that reflects its strategic value to Alibaba's business nor achieve the original purpose of unlocking value for Alibaba shareholders."
TikTok Shop Partners with VERB's MARKET.live for Livestream Shopping Services
On March 27, Verb Technology Company, Inc, the force behind the popular livestream social shopping platform MARKET.live, announced MARKET.live's partnership with TikTok Shop, making it a service provider for TikTok Shop and an officially designated TikTok Shop Partner (TSP).
Under the terms of the partnership, TikTok Shop will direct consumer brands, retailers, influencers and affiliates to Market.live for a menu of paid services that include assistance in establishing a TikTok shop, hosting training sessions or webinars for potential TikTok Shop sellers, studio rental in both the West Coast and East Coast MARKET.live studios, content creation services, and TikTok Shop maintenance.
"We see very clearly the future of livestream shopping in the US and MARKET.live's significant role in that future," said Rory J. Cutaia, VERB CEO. "This is an extraordinary business partnership and our team will keep working hard to go beyond all expectations, no matter how high those expectations are right now."
TikTok USA's New Policy Poses Challenges to Overseas Vendors
TikTok now requires US registered entities to be 51% US-owned and chaired by a US passport holder, posing challenges for overseas sellers who previously operated through US entities.
The rule means those who used US entities to be recognised as US merchants need to be re-registered as overseas sellers with less traffic and support from the platform, putting overseas sellers at a disadvantage compared to US TikTok sellers.
Despite complaints and criticism, TikTok asserted their clear policies and requirements for all sellers on the platform, without any claims on the less prominence of overseas sellers.
TikTok's Owner ByteDance Hosts the First New Seller Seminar for Douyin in NYC
On Wednesday March 27th, ByteDance hosted Douyin E-Commerce Global New Seller Seminar in New York City, where the officials shared about China's market trend and the overview of Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok and the fastest growing cross-border B2C platform in China. The seller operations and business model were also introduced to help U.S. & global brands expand and grow in this dynamic market.
In November 2023, Douyin has amassed 752 million monthly active users in China. Through this move, ByteDance aims to attract more overseas sellers to Douyin. In contrast to TikTok's circumstances in the US, it can be a wise option.
AliExpress Becomes First Exclusive E-Commerce Partner of UEFA EURO 2024
Alibaba's cross-border e-commerce platform AliExpress secured a deal to become an official partner of UEFA Euro 2024, doubling down on its bet in the European market that echoed rival Temu's multimillion-dollar investments in the Super Bowl for two consecutive years.
As part of the increased investment in Europe, AliExpress will offer shoppers discounted prices in key categories, as well as interactive games and the chance to win time-limited prizes, including match tickets. The company is committed to connecting with global consumers and supporting them as they support their teams during UEFA EURO 2024TM.
"As football enthusiasm spreads across Europe, we will bring fans even closer to the action, with great deals on a vast selection of popular and trending products, as well as interactive games and the chance to win fantastic prizes," said Gary Topp, European Commercial Director, AliExpress.