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Google Makes Inroads into Asia via JD.com Investment
Google is investing $550 million into Chinese e-commerce powerhouse JD.com, whose backers include Walmart. Reuters reported that the investment would expand Google’s base in Asian markets, while also deepening its ties to the world’s largest brick-and-mortar retailer.
“The Asia-Pacific region is one of the largest and fastest-growing e-commerce marketplaces in the world,” indicated Karim Temsamani, Google’s president of Asia-Pacific operations, in a blog posting Monday. In Southeast Asia alone, he wrote, shoppers are expected to spend $88.1 billion online by 2025.
“These consumers in Asia-Pacific are ready to buy, but hard to please,” Temsamani wrote. “The growth of access to the internet and online retail has led to rising expectations for top-notch experiences at every step of the shopper’s journey.”
As part of the partnership with Google, JD.com will join Google Shopping. For JD.com, this could mean expansion beyond Asian markets into the U.S. and Europe.
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