Alibaba's 11.11 Singles Day Sales Hit US$38.4 Bln

By Azlee Nor Mahmud KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 13 (Bernama) -- Alibaba Group Holding Ltd announced it generated US$38.4 billion (US$1=RM4.15) in gross merchandise volume (GMV) on Nov 11, 2019 -- its ‘11.11 Singles’ Day’ global online shopping extravaganza, an increase of 26 per cent compared with 2018. Taobao and Tmall President Fan Jiang said the successful event indicated the future of consumption trends for brands and consumers. “We are meeting the growing demand of Chinese consumers and helping them upgrade their lifestyles, while introducing new users to our digital economy from across China and around the world,” he told Bernama on Wednesday. Notable highlights of the global shopping festival included the first minute and eight seconds, whereby the GMV settled through Alipay reached US$1.0 billion, while in the first hour, GMV amounted to US$12.0 billion. There were more than 200,000 participating brands and one million new products launched for the 11.11 event. A total of 299 brands surpassed US$14.3 million and 15 of those brands notched US$143.0 million in GMV, including Apple, Bose, Estée Lauder, Gap, H&M, L’Oréal, Levi’s, MUJI, Nestlé, Nike, Philips, The North Face, Under Armour and Uniqlo. Meanwhile, Southeast Asia's leading eCommerce platform Lazada concluded yet another record-breaking 11.11 global shopping festival, with close to 10 million more users and more than double the number of selling sellers across the region compared to last year. Some 26 brands recorded sales of over US$1 million across the region during Lazada’s 24-hour sale. In addition, more than 4,000 sellers achieved over US$10,000 in sales. Lazada Group chief executive officer Pierre Poignant said the increased awareness of 11.11 meant that more brands and sellers have come on board and users have greater choices in what to get. The e-commerce giant was glad that 10 million more users have chosen its platform as their key destination during the world's biggest shopping festival, he added. “The record-breaking performance of Lazada's 11.11 signals a strong Southeast Asian consumer market, and reflects the vibrancy of the Internet economy," he said. The 11.11 sale also marks the annual showcase of Lazada's leading infrastructure as it handles peak orders. This year, the fastest delivery in the region was made in just 80 minutes in Malaysia and over 1.5 million items were shipped from Lazada warehouses across Southeast Asia within 24 hours. The event also saw increased wallet adoption with one in three Lazada Malaysia buyers using the wallet as their payment of choice. Homegrown small and medium enterprises across the region registered strong performance, including Ellips, the first Indonesian brand to participate in this year's Tmall 11.11 Shopping Festival under the Lazada-Tmall Global Partnership. Thailand fashion seller Copper leveraged Lazada's social commerce engine to achieve 100 times sales compared to a normal day. Malaysia's Desa Project, a programme inspired by the Taobao Village model and which helps rural Malaysian farmers start their e-commerce journey selling heritage produce, sold out its entire inventory during 11.11. -- BERNAMA