Suning.com (002024.SZ), China's largest online-to-offline (O2O) smart retailer, announced operation revenue of RMB 244.96 billion (36.479 billion USD), up 30.35% year-on-year; sales volume of RMB 336 billion (50.16 billion USD), increased by 38.39%, and a net profit attributable to equity shareholders of the company was RMB 13.328 billion (1.984 billion USD).
Strong Growth in Online and Offline Business
In 2018, Suning announced its smart retail development strategy, aiming to accelerate its business expansion both online and offline. The financial figures represent the best performance for the Chinese company in last year and reveal the remarkable result of its smart retail strategy.
The company owns 11,064 offline brick-and-mortar stores in mainland China, Hong Kong and Japan, covering diversified consumption scenarios including Suning Retail Cloud Franchise Stores, SuFresh (fresh food supermarkets) and Suning Convenience Stores and Redbaby (maternal and child supplies stores).
The online business performance of Suning.com continue to improve. In 2018, sales revenue saw a strong growth of 64.45%, far beyond the industry average, with a sales volume of RMB 208.354 billion. The number of registered membership users reached 407 million.
In 2018, with the strategic partnerships with RT-Mart, Lotus Market, Auchan, Suning's specialized commodity management capabilities continued to strengthen and supply chain efficiency was improved. As of the end of 2018, Suning's home appliance sales ranked 1st in the national home appliance market (China), accounting for 22.1% of the market share.
Strengthened Logistics, Financial Services and Technology Capability
Suning has made a firm investment in the construction of retail infrastructure such as logistics, finance, and technology, to enhance the service, products and strengthen its market competitiveness.
Suning Logistics and Tian Tian Express have a total storage area of 9.5 million square meters, grew 38.48% year-on-year; the logistics network covers 351 prefecture-level cities and 2,858 districts and counties.
Suning Financial services saw 55% year-on-year growth in transaction volume, and the total assets of Suning Bank increased by 116% compared with the beginning of the year. In December 2018, Suning Financial Services launched C round of capital increase and share expansion, with a post-investment valuation of RMB 56 billion (approximately 8.34 billion USD).
In 2018, Suning.com R&D expenses increased by 80.81% year-on-year, and the number of technology engineers increased by 52.57%. At the beginning of 2019, the company established Suning Technology Group, to enhance the retail technology research and development to better serve smart retail strategy.
About Suning
Founded in 1990, Suning is one of the leading commercial enterprises in China with two public companies in China and Japan. In 2018, Suning Holdings ranked second among the top 500 non-state owned enterprises in China with annual revenues of 80.85 billion USD (557.9 billion RMB). With the mission of "Leading the Ecosystem across Industries by Creating Elite Quality of Life for All", Suning has strengthened and expanded its core business through eight vertical industries: Suning.com, Logistics, Financial Services, Technology, Real Estate, Sports, Media & Entertainment, and Investment. Suning.com is listed on the 2018 Fortune Global 500.
