Alibaba Revs Up Its Automative Business

Alibaba’s automotive business garage just got a bit bigger as the eCommerce giant announced yesterday (April 22) that it had secured partnerships with two key automotive groups: BMW MINI and Jaguar Land Rover.

This news comes on the heels of the news that came last week that Alibaba had cut a deal with GM to finance its cars through its eCommerce sites, and using its data-crunching capabilities to target Chinese buyers for GM. Chevrolet, Buick and Cadillac automobiles were already sold on Alibaba’s Tmall online marketplace, along with dozens of other car brands offered by 10,000 car dealerships. But under the new deal with Shanghai GM, Alibaba will also offer loans to car buyers, offer after-market services, and use its big-data capabilities to target ads at potential GM car buyers.

Now, Tmall will also be the site that serves as the online platform for MINI online car sales in China. Through the partnership. MINI and Alibaba will be able to advertise cars, as well as be able to provide “customized online-to-offline services” between the two to help promote MINI. With Jaguar Land Rover, Alibaba has agreed to partner on big data research and help the auto company drive its eCommerce goals.

“Alibaba Automotive is committed to creating a platform and ecosystem for car brands and consumers to actively participate in, in order to improve operational efficiency in the industry and to provide users enriching online car-buying experience,” said Wang Licheng, general manager of Alibaba Automotive division. “By working with valuable partners like MINI and Jaguar Land Rover, Alibaba is able to strengthen our O2O presence thus helping raise the bar on customer service in the industry,”

Recently, Alibaba even announced a minor reorganization to bring all its automobile-related operations into a single automotive business unit.