Hangzhou, China, 2016-Jun-22 — /EPR Retail News/ — Kaola, the e-commerce and cross-border platform of Chinese Internet services leader NetEase, Inc., and Rakuten, Inc., operator of Japan’s largest Internet shopping mall Rakuten Ichiba, today announced the signing of an agreement to partner on a strategic collaboration to bring the best of branded Japanese goods to Chinese consumers.
Rakuten will launch an online flagship store on Kaola.com today, with the aim of providing Chinese consumers with high quality and popular merchandise, adding top Japanese brands to the Kaola cross-border e-commerce platform and marketing the brands across NetEase’s significant online media assets. Kaola already offers hundreds of popular branded products from Japan, South Korea, America, Australia and European countries and is enjoying rapid growth, with a platform that is highly accessible to more than 800 million NetEase users across China.
Since its launch in January 2015, Kaola has grown rapidly in China as a first-party e-commerce platform recognized for providing “Good Quality, Reasonable Price and Considerate Service” to its customers. Rakuten Ichiba was established in Japan in 1997 as an online marketplace and currently hosts over 44,000 merchants, with an offering of over 200 million different items.
Masato Takahashi, Managing Executive Officer of Rakuten, commented “Rakuten has high expectations of the partnership with Kaola, already a trusted leader and innovator in cross-border e-commerce. We look forward to connecting Kaola’s customers with popular and unique Japanese products from a top selection of Rakuten Ichiba merchants.”
“Demand from Chinese consumers for high quality international goods continues to grow and, by partnering with Rakuten, we are looking forward to offering our customers an expanded lineup of popular Japanese merchandise,” said Kaola CEO Zhang Lei. “As Chinese consumers become more familiar with a deeper range of Japanese merchandise through the collaboration between Kaola and Rakuten, they will also be able to enjoy a higher quality and easy shopping experience.”
Rakuten will introduce products to Kaola’s customers from categories such as health food and cosmetics. Rakuten will also provide product rankings from their Japanese marketplace, which, together with NetEase’s online media assets, will be very powerful in recommending the best of Japanese products to Chinese consumers. Expansion of the product lineup will continue over the coming months.
NetEase, Inc.
NetEase, Inc. (NASDAQ: NTES) is a leading Internet technology company in China. Dedicated to providing online services centered around content, community, communication and commerce, NetEase develops and operates some of China’s most popular online PC and mobile games, advertising services, email services and e-commerce platforms. In partnership with Blizzard Entertainment, NetEase operates some of the most popular international online games in China.
For more information, visit:
http://ir.netease.com
About Kaola
NetEase launched Kaola in January 2015. The online shopping site has since grown rapidly to become a leading brand in cross border trading business in China, with a reputation of “Good Quality, Reasonable Price, and Considerate Service”. Kaola has formed strategic collaboration with hundreds of brands from Japan, Korea, U.S, Australia and European countries, and has successfully sold hundreds of millions of high quality products to its Chinese consumers.
Source:Rakuten