The e-commerce operator, headed toward an initial public offering in the United States, accounts for just less than half of Chinese business-to-business marketplace sales.

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., the leading e-commerce company in China, accounted for nearly 45% of Chinese business-to-business marketplace sales in the second quarter, according to EnfoDesk, a unit of Analysys International, a market research firm.

Alibaba’s share dwarfs the second-place B2B e-commerce operator, HC360.com, with 4.53%. The report gave no specific spending figures but an estimate earlier this year put the Chinese B2B e-commerce market at 42.4 billion Chinese yuan (US$6.9 billion) in the third quarter of 2013, EnfoDesk says. Q3 2013 sales were up 23.2% from 34.4 billion yuan (US$5.6 billion) in the year-earlier period.

The report from EnfoDesk details the market share held by various e-commerce operators:

• Alibaba, 44.82%

• HC360.com, 4.53%

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• Made-in-China.com, 3.21%

• GlobalSources.com, 2.98%

• Pharmnet.com, 1.13%

• Dhgate.com, 1.08%

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• Emedchina.net, 0.98%

• Ibicn.com, 0.95%

• Mainone.com, 0.94%

• Other, 39.38%

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Alibaba is moving toward an initial public offering of stock in the United States, with the IPO expected in the next month or so. In China, Alibaba.com accounts for nearly half of all B2B e-commerce sales transacted by small and mid-size companies. But new competitors are emerging, EnfoDesk says in a report from earlier this year.

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