Zara Partly Cedes China Web Control to Alibaba to Aid Growth
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Since opening its first website four years ago, Inditex SA has maintained full control of online sales for its flagship brand Zara. To gain a stronger foothold in China, the Spanish retailer plans to partially cede both oversight of the chain’s Web sales and a share of its profit.
This month, Zara will open an online store on Tmall, a Chinese website owned by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. where companies such as Nike Inc., Burberry Group Plc and The Gap Inc. sell their wares. Tmall, which outranks Amazon.com as China’s biggest e-store, with more than 100,000 brands represented, takes 0.5 percent to 5 percent of sales made on the site.