Alibaba’s AliExpress recruits Beckham to ‘get more’ global sales

By Casey Hall

SHANGHAI (Reuters) – AliExpress, the e-commerce site owned by Chinese giant Alibaba, has signed former England soccer captain David Beckham as a brand ambassador as it catches up with Temu rival PDD Holdings in the battle to sell cheaply made – goods from China to the world.

Alibaba, which until recently was a small cross-border player, is now investing aggressively to boost global sales amid flagging domestic e-commerce growth. Its international division, which includes AliExpress, is its fastest-growing unit, with revenue growing 45% year-on-year from January to March.

Earlier this year, AliExpress also became a sponsor of the UEFA Euro 2024 tournament, which starts in June, where it will invest millions of dollars in discounts, offers and engagement to attract online consumers.

The advertising campaign featuring Beckham will run in conjunction with the UEFA tournament and will encourage consumers to “do better with AliExpress,” the e-commerce platform said in a statement on Monday.

This follows Temu’s success with PDD Holdings in airing multiple ads during the Super Bowl this year encouraging American consumers to “shop like a billionaire.”

According to mobile analytics company Apptopia, downloads of the Temu app were up 34% on Super Bowl Sunday compared to the previous day.

“Soccer fans (in Europe and) Latin America are a similar demographic to American soccer fans in North America. “There will generally be a lot of price-sensitive and inflation-affected consumers among them,” said Humphrey Ho, U.S. managing director partner at digital advertising agency Hylink Digital, of the decision by Temu, and now AliExpress, to focus on soccer fans.

COMPETITIVE ENVIRONMENT

While Alibaba has long viewed the overseas market as a potential money maker, with founder Jack Ma saying in 2017 that Alibaba aimed to serve 2 billion consumers worldwide by 2036, it needs to catch up in many markets ceded to rival Temu.

“Historically, execution has been an issue for Alibaba’s international ambitions,” said Jianggan Li, founder and CEO of Momentum Works, a venture and analytics firm.

“Alibaba spent years wondering whether it would be too difficult or too hard to compete with Amazon (in the U.S.), and Temu just did it.”

Temu, which sells $5 earbuds and $10 dresses among other items in more than 60 global markets, has grown in popularity since its launch in 2022, and Chinese investment management firm CICC estimates Temu will earn $18 billion in 2023 year.

PDD does not separately break out Temu’s revenues and does not comment on the accuracy of third-party sales estimates.

To better compete with rivals, Alibaba is currently leveraging its competitive advantage by offering select products with five-day delivery windows in 11 markets, supported by investments in global logistics.

The buyout of logistics company Cainiao in March is likely to strengthen AliExpress’s logistics advantage over rivals.

AliExpress is present in over 100 markets.

Alibaba has the will and money to pump growth into AliExpress, but most importantly, the competitive landscape is forcing the issue, changing the dynamics of cross-border e-commerce from China, Li said.

“AliExpress needs to find a way to compete with and differentiate itself from Temu” to gain market share, Li said.

– I mean, there’s no other way.

($1 = 0.9218 euros)

(Reporting by Casey Hall; Editing by Himani Sarkar)