The announcement comes a week after Alibaba said it would invest US$732 million over the next five years in its popular e-commerce site Taobao.com, which was recently merged with Alibaba’s digital ad service platform Alimama.
The move further differentiates the site with Baidu, which recently launched its rival e-commerce platform Youa.com.
Taobao claims more than 80 million registered users and one million sellers as of September.
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