Tencent and JD.com invest $863M into e-commerce firm Vipshop to battle Alibaba
Summary
The deal is being made with long-time partner JD.com, which will invest $259 million into Vipshop, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange.It went public in a lackluster 2012 listing, but it is seen as a strategic ally for Tencent and JD.com in their ongoing battle to rival Alibaba, which is China’s largest e-commerce firm by some margin and has had an incredible financial performance this year .That was the same rationale for Tencent’s investment in JD.com in 2014 — the company is the closest direct rival to Alibaba — and it doubled down to become its leading investor last year.Together, Tencent and JD.com have worked on frontier investments — particularly in Southeast Asia where both have backed Uber rival Go-Jek , and JD.com has done other deals in Indonesia and Thailand — but now they are converging again to boost their position on fashion e-commerce.Tencent will help Vipshop into the wallet section on Weixin — the Chinese version of its popular WeChat app — while it JD.com will grant the company a prominent position on its main page and within its Weixin ‘mobile store.’ JD.com said it will also “assist Vipshop in achieving certain GMV targets” through its e-commerce platform.