Thread by @JoshuaTai0427

$BABA, $JD and $PDD are the three biggest online E-commerce platform in China.

This thread will compare the three and address the difference between the quality, price, delivery speed, customer experience and shopping experience.

Let's get started 👇👇

1. $BABA
$BABA is the biggest Chinese online E-commerce platform with a market share around 50%, which is even larger than the combined market share of $JD and $PDD. The primary focus of $BABA is being a C2C platform. You can think of $BABA as a bigger and more successful $EBAY.

1.1 On top of C2C business, $BABA has also started their own Tmall B2C business to combat $JD. However, most shops on $BABA are still third-party shops now.

2. $JD
$JD is the second largest E commerce platform with a market share of around 16%. $JD is a baby $AMZN because $JD has their own logistics network, fulfillment center and delivery fleet. The primary focus of $JD is B2C business, where $JD have their own $JD first party

2.1 stores, which sell products to the customers. Although $JD also have third parties store on them, $JD are more well-known with $JD’s first party stores.

3. $PDD
$PDD is the third largest Chinese E-Commerce platform. $PDD is both a B2C and C2C platform. $PDD focuses on social e-commerce, that incentivizes social sharing and bulk purchases. $PDD is a platform that aggregates buyers and allow the buyers to enjoy cheaper wholesale

3.1 prices rather than more expensive retail prices. On $PDD, the seller will set the terms of a sale, for example, if 100 people buys a box of apple, the box of apple will only cost you $5 dollars. The buyers then initiate a ‘team purchase’, where the buyers try to get

3.2 100 people to buy the box of apple together. After 100 people signed up to buy the box of apple, the transaction will be confirmed, and apples shipped out.

4. Quality
The best product quality of the three is $JD's first party store and $BABA's Tmall . As $JD has more $JD’s first party stores then $BABA's Tmall, whenever Chinese want to ensure that they don’t get a fake/piracy product, their first choice is $JD followed by Tmall.

4.1 After $JD’s first party store and Tmall, $JD’s third-party stores and $BABA’s third-party store follows in terms of quality. All these third-party stores have varying degree of quality. Because $BABA have a lot more third-party stores, $BABA have the reputation of having more

4.2 fake products and products with low quality. Particularly for $BABA, the quality of a product really depends on the third-party seller, and a typical Chinese will recommend you to only buy from the stores that you/or your friends have already dealt with or have

4.3 many high reviews (Although sometimes reviews in China can be fake too). This means that buying things on $BABA depends on luck and skill (you need to have the skill to identify what comments/reviews are real and what products are real or fake 😂)

4.4 Although $BABA’s platform may not be the best in terms of quality, $BABA is still generally ahead of $PDD in the quality department. My Chinese friends have told me that it is ok to buy cheap or unimportant stuff on $PDD, but if you want to buy things that you can use for

4.5 a long period or want to be safe, avoid $PDD at all costs, because the quality of the product may make your jaw dropped.

4.6 Example of poor quality of $PDD – Chinese people have commented that they bought iPhone on $PDD, but soon realized it was already opened (and use a couple of times) $PDD’s response was that some iPhones were opened because $PDD was performing quality checks. Isn’t that ironic

5. Price
In terms of price, $PDD are the cheapest by a far measure. Many $PDD’s product is ultra-cheap (literally cheap to the point where you wouldn’t even believe the price is real, just look at my screenshot from the $PDD app below).

5.1 $BABA is the second cheapest because many third parties’ shops on $BABA usually have cheaper prices than official stores. $JD is the most expensive, $JD's first party stores, are similar to a traditional retailer selling products with suggested retail price online.

5.2 There is a famous saying in China: ‘if you want to buy more expensive stuff or bigger electronics go to $JD, whereas if you want to buy cheaper stuff, go to $BABA’ and I will add to that, if you want to buy REAL CHEAP stuff, go to $PDD.

6. Discount - 618 and Double 11
618 (June 18th) and double 11 (November 11th) are the two biggest sales period in China. All three have the most traffic during these period. 618 was first initiated by $JD, therefore $JD usually has the best deals, in particular for electronics.

6.1 On the other hand, during double 11, $BABA usually have better deals than $JD, and $BABA generally have a bigger sale because of the sheer amount of third parties stores on $BABA.

6.2 $PDD also have their mega sale during 618 and double 1111, but $PDD does not attract as much traction during these periods as $BABA and $JD, because $PDD was already very cheap, and $BABA and $JD more expensive.

7. Delivery
Thanks to $JD logistics, $JD has the fastest delivery speed out of the three. Whenever a customer order from $JD’s first party store before 11am, he can enjoy same day delivery, whereas if the customer order before 11pm, he can enjoy next day delivery.

7.1 (with very low delivery cost (below 10rmb), and free delivery if you spend more than 100rmb in most instances).

7.2 Some of my own experience: my girlfriend lives in a second/third tier city in China, and even she can enjoy next day delivery, indicating to me $JD's wide logistics coverage. $JD has also never been late on delivery.

7.3 I ranked $PDD and $BABA the same in terms of delivery, since $PDD is somewhat like a wholesale, it is usually well organised, and products can be delivered within a couple of days.

7.4 $BABA's delivery really depends on the seller. If you purchase with $BABA's Tmall it also offers same day or next day delivery. However, with third-party sellers (which is $BABA's majority), delivery time and service varies across a couple days to weeks.

7.5 $BABA has sensed their weakness in delivery and has started $BABA’s Cai Niao league in 2013, which is a logistics network that aggregates several Chinese logistics players. Nevertheless, it is still behind $JD logistics, but overtime $BABA's delivery should improve.

8. Customer service
Both $JD and $BABA offers 7 days free return (with no reasons needed). $JD and $BABA’s 7-day returns are substantially the same only with some minor differences. firstly, if you return a product bought from $JD’s first party seller, $JD delivery team will

8.1 collect the product at your home. Whereas $BABA, a customer may need to go to a distribution station to return the product. Since $BABA has more third-party sellers, sometimes it is harder to return the product as some sneaky sellers will find reasons to deny a return.

8.2 Nevertheless, this is the same if you buy things from $JD’s third-party seller. Lastly, $BABA usually return their customer money slightly faster than $JD.

8.3 The customer service on $JD and $BABA again depends on what seller you are dealing with, if you are dealing with $JD's first party seller or $BABA's Tmall, they are usually quite helpful. However, the quality of customer service will vary for all $JD and $BABA's third parties

8.4 stores. Since $JD have more first party stores than $BABA's Tmall, I will give a slight edge to $JD for customer service. But I just want to note that off all my purchases from $JD and $BABA, I have not had significant problems from either customer services.

8.5 $PDD ranks last in terms for customer service because many sellers on $PDD is operating a very low margin business (as they are ‘wholesalers’). Sometimes $PDD will not allow a customer to return their product. This should be understandable as most products on $PDD is very

8.6 cheap. With very cheap products, one will inherently experience drawbacks with its customer service.

9. The Shopping Experience
When it comes to shopping experience, it is a no brainer that $BABA ranks first. $BABA’s better logarithm and the numerous third-party stores allow $BABA to have much more products, making the shopping experience fuller. A lot of people, especially

9.1 female, have commented that they like $BABA the most as they can actually experience the feeling of ‘shopping’ with $BABA (browsing through many products over many products) but not with any other platforms.

9.2 Just one interesting side note about $BABA’s shopping algorithm, if you often browse more expensive products on $BABA, $BABA will adapt to your ‘expensive’ tense and suggest you with more expensive products whenever you search with $BABA and vice versa.

9.3 In terms of $JD and $PDD, it is hard to rank the two in terms of shopping experience as they are geared towards different customers. $JD has more customers that already knew what they are going to get before they shop. $JD's founder, Liu Qiang Dong has also admitted that

9.4 $JD’s shopping experience is lagging $BABA and is the one thing that $JD must improve on.

9.5 $PDD is geared towards lower income people, as ‘cheap price’ is the biggest selling point of $PDD and people usually have the attitude of trying to find something cheap in $PDD rather than trying to shop in $PDD.

10. Summary

Quality 👉 $JD > $BABA > $PDD

Price 👉 $PDD > $BABA > $JD

Delivery speed 👉 $JD > $PDD = $BABA

Customer experience 👉 $JD >= $BABA > $PDD

Shopping experience 👉 $BABA > $JD = $PDD

11. Thank you for reading this thread! I hope you have learned one or two things more about $BABA, $JD and $PDD. If you like this thread, please consider liking and retweeting this thread, it really does help me out a lot!

12. Please also consider following me @joshuatai0427 where I regularly post threads on exciting growth companies and Chinese stocks from a Chinese perspective. Thank you all for your support! I really appreciate you all!

Tagging some $JD, $BABA bulls and people that may be interested in these Chinese E commerce stocks! @mukund @MT_Capital1 @EugeneNg_VCap @jablamsky @daniel_toloko @BuyandHoldd @TanArrowz @HonestInvesting @skaushi @Pharmdca

@supercimomo @LiviamCapital @paul_essen @nsheth12 @Invesquotes @Innovestor_ Will appreciate all your comments, feedbacks and further insights on $BABA, $JD and $PDD! Thank you very much!