Alibaba invests $364 million in electronic appliance maker Haier to improve China’s e-commerce logistics

E-commerce titan Alibaba and electronic appliance maker Haier (SHA:600690; HKG:1169) announced today that the two companies will jointly create a nationwide logistics, distribution, and installation system. As part of the partnership, Alibaba invested HKD 2.8 billion ($364 million) for a two percent stake in Haier and a 9.9 percent stake in Haier’s logistics and delivery subsidiary.

Haier’s logistics and delivery service, Goodaymart, has nine bases and 90 distribution centers across China. Haier has tens of thousands more stores and service outlets littered throughout the country.

Alibaba founder and former CEO Jack Ma in the past has pointed to logistics as a critical weakness and bottleneck in China’s e-commerce market. This investment will likely help Alibaba combat and capitalize on the problem.

This isn’t the first time Alibaba and Haier have teamed up. In June last year, they launched a cheap smartphone that runs on Alibaba’s Aliyun operating system.

(Editing by Josh Horwitz)