China e-commerce back office support platform raises $120m

The business was launched in 2015 as an ancillary services provider. The trigger was a recognition that a growing proportion of online retail was not search-based but driven by social media, with personal recommendations stimulating demand for certain products. Yunji offers back office services in this context, providing support to small or individual retailers across sourcing, logistics and supply chain management, IT systems, and customer services.

The company claims to have helped more than three million people start e-commerce operations to date, achieving single day sales across the platform of up to RMB278 million. Yunji has nearly 30 self-operated warehouses across seven major cities and a customer service based in Hefei province. It has a string of cooperative agreements with international brands ranging from L’Oreal to Philips.

Much of the new financing will go towards upstream supply chain integration, artificial intelligence (AI) and big data infrastructure, improving regional warehousing capabilities, and attracting more customers, according to a statement.

Wei Ying, a partner at CDH, noted that if the top two e-commerce companies – Alibaba Group and JD.com – have a stranglehold of the traditional market, they are likely unwieldy. This creates opportunities for other players taking a different approach.

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• Topics
• Greater China
• Technology
• Consumer
• China
• China Renaissance
• CDH Investments Management
• TMT