China’s JD.com will close its e-commerce services in Indonesia and Thailand, retreating from Southeast Asia after a bruising year for China’s retail and technology sectors.
Local websites showed JD.com will end its services in Thailand from March 3 and in Indonesia from the end of the same month. Both units will stop taking orders on February 15.
A spokesperson for JD.com said in a statement on Monday that the company will continue to serve global markets, including Southeast Asia, through its supply chain infrastructure.
The company, which did not give a reason for the closures, started its e-commerce operation in Indonesia under the name JD.ID in 2015 as a joint venture with Provident Capital, while the Thai platform was launched two years later with the kingdom’s largest retailer Central Group.
However, JD.com failed to gain traction against larger players such as Alibaba Group’s Lazada, Sea Ltd’s Shopee and GoTo Group’s Tokopedia.
The company, which also runs the omni-channel retail brand Ochama in Europe, said in November that “new businesses” – including units abroad as well as other ventures such as JD property – accounted for just 2% of total revenue in the third quarter.
In China, the company, like many of its tech peers such as Alibaba, has been battling a slowing economy and the impact of strict curbs, which have prompted cost cutting and worker layoffs.
While JD.com has performed better than its peers, posting an 11.4% rise in third-quarter revenue, its chief executive has described the second quarter as the most difficult one since listing in 2014. (NNT)
