Alibaba's AliExpress Prioritizes Spain For Overseas Growth, Also Eyes South Korea

Alibaba Group Holding Limited BABA aggressively chased overseas growth along with its peers to balance the impact of the domestic slowdown.
Alibaba's AliExpress retail service held a service launch event on Thursday in Spain, where it has been providing a nine-day delivery time for users since the beginning of March, SCMP reports.
AliExpress will run up to nine charter flights per week to Spain, the maximum among its EU markets aside from Belgium, the logistics hub for AliExpress in Europe.
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AliExpress plans to increase the number of its pick-up points in Spain from the current 5,000 to 7,500 by the end of March.
In February, orders in the country rose by 89% year-on-year in the kitchenware category and 44% Y/Y in the household goods and cleaning category, according to the company.
In an interview, Gary Topp, AliExpress's commercial director for Europe, shared plans to significantly invest in the user experience, including logistics, free returns, paying by installments, product selection and quality, and guaranteed prices. Topp said Spain is a priority for AliExpress in Europe.
AliExpress said it would invest 100 billion South Korean won ($76.2 million) in South Korea this year to improve logistics, the user experience, and the price-performance ratio of its products. Its daily active users in the country increased by more than 60% Y/Y last month, according to Ray Zhang, AliExpress South Korea general manager.
Mark Tanner, managing director of Shanghai-based consultancy China Skinny, said AliExpress targets markets like Spain as they are less contested than markets like the U.S., particularly for lower-cost Chinese cross-border goods. AliExpress has a logistics advantage over competitors through its increased investment in [logistics unit] Cainiao.
Price Action: BABA shares traded higher by 0.52% at $81.93 on the last check Thursday.

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