Ebay is reportedly about to announce a strategic partnership with xiu.com, a Chinese online retailer of luxury goods.
The partnership will see the domain of xiu.com changed to ebay.xiu.com. It is also reported that 20 per cent of eBay’s top-ranked merchants are to be displayed on Xiu’s open platform.
Ebay launched in China in 2002, however, sales and impact gradually waned in the Chinese consumer-to-consumer (C2C) market after it was overtaken by Alibaba Group-operated Taobao.com which according to Forrester Research now holds more than 75 per cent market share.
Xiu was founded by Ji Wenhong and Jin Huang in 2008. It sells middle to luxury brand name fashion products such as bags, shoes, ornaments, cosmetics and home decor. In 2011, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers invested US$20 million in the company, followed by a second fund worth US$100 million from Warburg Pincus.
Meanwhile, Chinese online retailer 360buy has expanded overseas with the launch of international website to offset fiercer competition in the domestic market.
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