Online retailer Vipshop settles down in Xinjiang

Liu Haijiang(L) Toutunhe district's Standing Committee member, and Tang Yizhi(R), senior vice president of Vipshop (China) sign the strategic cooperation agreement on April 8 . [Photo/uetd.gov.cn]

Xinjiang residents can now receive their online orders within a day thanks to the online retailer, Vipshop, who recently established a regional headquarter in the province. Vipshop's new headquarter project will be located in Urumqi's Economic and Technological Development Zone in Toutunhe district.

Toutunhe district held a strategic cooperation signing ceremony with Vipshop - which is headquartered in Guangzhou, Guangdong province - on April 8, and the two sides reached agreements in developing online businesses in Xinjiang.

Vipshop is expected to invest 1 billion yuan ($161.3 million) into the construction of its Xinjiang operation headquarter, which will cover 33 hectares of land. The Xinjiang project is expected to bring in sales of 20 billion yuan in six years and contribute 200 million yuan in taxes.

During the signing ceremony, Shen Ya, CEO of Vipshop, said that his company will treat Xinjiang as an important international trading hub. "We are seeking to transport foreign products to inland provinces via Xinjiang, whilst selling high quality Xinjinag goods to other countries around the world," he said.

Wei Yi, the district's Party chief said that the Vipshop project has created a "win-win" situation for both sides and provided great opportunities for Toutunhe.

"The project is a crucial starting point for the district to implement the One Belt and One Road Initiative. I believe it will drive the development of Xinjiang electric commerce industries,  boost related industries and facilitate the transformation and upgrading of industrial structure," said Wei.

Wei also said that the Toutunhe government will focus on improving the investment environment and formulating more sound policies for electronic commerce enterprises.

Vipshop sells its products with the use of online outlets, differing from Alibaba's C2C (customer directly to customers) method and Jingdong's B2C (business to customer) method.

Vipshop takes retailing as its main business and only deals with online businesses. The company has no physical store and features genuine brands and favorable discounts and sales items. At present, it has become one of the largest e-commerce companies in southern China and has entered into China's top five e-commerce enterprises.

By Li Xiaoxu and edited by Jacob Hooson