Alibaba eyes European expansion from London
CHINESE e-commerce firm Alibaba has opened a new European headquarters in London in an attempt to accelerate its expansion outside of China.
The world’s largest business-to-business online marketplace, which has based its new home in the West End, has also announced the launch of a multi-million dollar global advertising campaign to aid its overseas growth.
Alibaba, which runs an eBay-style platform connecting small businesses with suppliers and partners, said that the current economic downturn provides an ideal backdrop for expansion.
“In the UK alone we have had a 55 per cent increase in user numbers in the last year, and in the Europe, Middle East and Africa region it is even higher, around 80 per cent,” Maggie Choo, general manager of Alibaba’s European operations, told the Financial Times.