Russia’s Ozon opens Shenzhen HQ

▶ Bilateral trade relations benefit from complementarity, diversity: expert

Ozon, one of Russia’s largest online retailers, has opened an office in Shenzhen, South China’s Guangdong Province, as the demand for Chinese products keeps soaring, a move that industry insiders envision would spell more business opportunities for Chinese entrepreneurs amid rapidly growing economic ties between the two countries.

From home appliances, laptops and smartphones to clothing and daily necessities, the wide range of Chinese products sold on Ozon fills gaps due to the pull-out of Western companies after the breakout of the Russia-Ukraine crisis. The development will add to their already booming trade in bulk commodities such as energy and agricultural products, observers said.

Bilateral trade will become more complementary and diversified, analysts said.

The trade, which surpassed 1 trillion yuan ($150 billion) during the first 10 months of this year for the first time, is on track to hit the goal of surpassing $200 billion by 2024.

Ozon Global, a division of Ozon, opened an office in Shenzhen as its Chinese headquarters to boost cross-border sales to Russian shoppers on its platform, Simon, managing director of Ozon China, told the Global Times on Tuesday.

Simon said Ozon plans to attract at least 100,000 Chinese sellers to the platform by 2024, and to elevate the gross merchandise volume (GMV) of Chinese vendors 10 times two years later.

The company already has more than 10,000 active Chinese sellers.

Chinese products now account for 90 percent of Ozon’s cross-border trade. According to Simon, the sales of Chinese products soared in the second and third quarters, rocketing about 25 times compared with the same period last year, and the number of active Chinese sellers rose 18 times, which reaffirms Ozon’s decision to expand to Chinese market.

“Ozon opened access for international sellers two years ago, but Chinese sellers only started entering last year. This year, the growth is brisk,” Simon said.

Simon predicted that bilateral trade will hit a record high this year.