Alibaba’s (9988) food delivery business said the industry has entered “a new phase of positive competition,” after mainland authorities repeatedly urged the tech giant and its rivals to stop cutthroat competition.
Taobao Flash Sale and its partner Ele.me jointly announced they recorded over 90 million daily orders over two consecutive weekends.
The figure, excluding zero-yuan promotion and self-pickup orders, rocketed from 10 million orders on the sixth day after the Taobao Flash Sale launched at the end of April.
Taobao launched Taobao Flash Sale to leverage Ele.me's delivery network, marking Alibaba’s entry into a retail price war with JD.com (9618) and Meituan (3690).
Alibaba said 1.4 million shops recorded growth in daily orders and profit, especially small and medium-sized ones, and on-time delivery rate maintained at 96 percent despite two weeks of heavy rain across China.
Alibaba also stressed that competition drove up employment, with the number of people employed in the catering industry on its work communication and collaboration platform DingTalk increasing by hundreds of thousands since July.
Meanwhile, China's market regulator said it will strengthen oversight to curb unfair competition involving substandard and excessively low-priced products, as part of efforts to ensure a healthy market development in the country's next five-year economic plan.
CICI CAO
