China’s largest retailer, JD.com, has built a “massive smart logistics infrastructure” to serve its 300 million e-commerce customers, and is now opening that system up to brand partners and other retailers.
Calling itself the world’s third largest internet company by revenue, the firm has leveraged its enormous reach to develop a physical network of fulfillment and transportation that it is offering for commercial use through the “retail as a service” (RaaS) strategy it unveiled in 2018.
Chen Zhang, JD.com’s chief technology officer commented that as China’s largest retailer, JD is in the unique position of being able to research and develop, and commercially deploy, innovative new technology that is shaping the future of shopping worldwide. As JD opens its technology up to other companies and industries, the features that they have already rolled out in China from automated warehouses to virtual shopping can be enjoyed by consumers everywhere.