(Yicai) Sept. 15 -- To compete in the market for instant shopping deliveries, Meituan, JD.Com, Freshippo, and other Chinese online service providers are coming out with new initiatives for consumer and vendors.

Meituan's flash sales segment will offer seven bonuses for merchants on the platform, including a 10 percent traffic support for some sellers, the Beijing-based food delivery giant said yesterday. It will also launch FAST, an instant-delivery retail brand management model.

JD Daojia, the on-demand delivery platform of Dada Nexus, one of JD.Com's four businesses, plans to help more than 10 vendors achieve sales of more than CNY1 billion (USD137.5 million) each next year, according to a plan it released last week. 

Alibaba's grocery arm Freshippo, also known as Hema Fresh, will team up with Disney China to launch a series of themed products this year, it announced last month.

E-commerce platforms are also battling for customers, with the iPhone 15 smartphone series, due to go on sale on Sept. 22, as the main draw. At the same time, Freshippo will debut the Apple handset online and offline, shipping it to users in as little as 18 minutes, while Meituan and JD Daojia's couriers will pick up the phones from nearby stores and get them to buyers within half an hour.

“Open the app to place an order on Sept. 22, and the iPhone 15 will be available,” Alibaba Group Holding's takeout platform Ele.me said.

With the Double 11 Shopping Festival also rapidly approaching, instant-delivery retail combined with offline stores can encompass more consumers, reduce costs, and improve the efficiency of e-commerce platforms, said Zhuang Shuai, an expert in the retail sector and founder of Beijing Bailian Consulting.

China's quick-delivery retail sector is rapidly developing, and Meituan, JD.Com, and other major e-commerce platforms need fast-growing businesses to boost the confidence of the capital market and internal teams, Zhuang noted.

The quick commerce market has grown by more than 50 percent a year on average over recent years, reaching CNY504.3 billion (USD70.4 million) last year, an industry report by the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation showed. It will be CNY1 trillion (USD137.5 billion) within three years, according to Wu Chuanliang, deputy director of the Circulation Industry Promotion Center of the Ministry of Commerce.

According to Meituan's latest earnings report, daily orders of the company's flash sales surpassed a record 11 million last quarter, with the segment’s number of merchants rising 30 percent from a year ago.

JD Daojia’s revenue soared 25 percent to CNY1.8 billion last quarter from a year earlier, while its gross merchandise volume surged 30 percent to CNY70.8 billion (USD9.9 billion) in the 12 months ending June 30, according to Dada Nexus’ second-quarter financial report.

Editor: Martin Kadiev