Meituan set to invest 11bn yuan in merchant development drive

Leading Chinese ecommerce for services company Meituan has announced plans to invest 11bn yuan in support of merchants upgrading and optimising their operations

The investment aims to drive continued strong growth in China’s ‘Delivery Economy’, and will see Meituan assisting firms with supply chain services, digital transformation initiatives, marketing and incentives for innovation.

China’s Delivery Economy has seen Meituan’s daily on-demand delivery orders crossing 24mn in 2018 and this explosive growth is expected to continue.

"In the new 'Delivery Economy', consumers, merchants, our platform and delivery riders have formed a close ecosystem," said Wang Puzhong, Senior Vice President of Meituan, in the firm’s 24 January press release. 

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"Ecosystem development is more important than market competition. As a delivery service platform, Meituan is willing to invest more resources to support the ecosystem growth, especially the merchants."

Han Jian, General Manager of Meituan’s On-demand Delivery Service Group, added:

"Meituan is a valuable platform for merchants in terms of traffic acquisition, big data support and delivery services.”

"Meituan will focus on providing digitalized, intelligent and personalized services for merchants to help improve efficiency on the supply side."