Walmart rips up China online strategy, starts again with stake in Alibaba rival

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Walmart Stores Inc has sold its Chinese online grocery store in return for a stake in the country's no. 2 e-commerce firm, ripping up its previous strategy in efforts to cure ailing sales in one of the world's toughest retail markets.
The deal will see the US grocery giant swap its Yihaodian platform for a 5% stake in Inc, worth about $1.5 billion by the firm's latest market value. The move also gives Walmart a ringside seat in bitter rivalry with Chinese e-commerce leader Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.
The sell-off, announced on Monday, is a significant shift for Walmart in China, where it operates more than 400 bricks-and-mortar stores. The firm has been shuttering underperforming outlets and grappling with soft online sales in the world's second-biggest economy since it bought full control of Yihaodian in July last year, saying the site would play a leading role in its China strategy.
"The reality is that e-commerce is hyper-competitive in China and it is tough for any platform to make money," said Ben Cavender, Shanghai-based principal of China Market Research Group. "Selling up in return for a 5% stake in is a good way of staying in the space while reducing the risk."
The deal echoes a strategy adopted by other international retailers and consumer goods makers - selling a local unit for a stake in a Chinese partner in order to prosper in a cut-throat marketplace. France's Danone SA sold its Dumex brand last year to raise its stake in local dairy giant China Mengniu Dairy Co Ltd.
Walmart 's tie-up gives it access to nationwide logistics and warehousing networks, as well as its over 150 million users - helping expand the US firm's reach with China's increasingly tech-savvy middle class.
For the deal could provide a boost in its intensifying competition in the fast-growing online grocery business with Alibaba - a market set to boom to nearly $180 billion by 2020 from $41 billion last year, according to data from food research body IGD. Read More

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