(Yicai Global) Oct.17 -- Suning Commerce Group Co.'s [SHE:002024] e-commerce platform Suning.com will roll out data sharing between Suning and manufacturing plants, and the group will use shared courier boxes during China's largest online shopping festival on Nov. 11 this year, Suning.com President Hou Enlong said at a media briefing yesterday.

For the shopping event, known as Singles' Day or Double 11, Suning logistics will create a comprehensive channel, industry and customer group master plan and introduce shared courier boxes that are lightweight and easy-to-carry for the pick-up and delivery of 3C (Computer, Communication, Consumer Electronics), maternity and baby, and fragile fast-moving consumer goods.

Suning.com plans to expand the use of shared courier boxes to five cities including Chongqing, Shenzhen and Hangzhou, and plans to put out 200,000 of them next year, Sina Tech reported.

Suning has previously employed shared courier boxes several times, saving at least 6.5 million paper-made boxes.

Suning will facilitate complete supply chain monitoring by sharing data on purchase orders; factory confirmations; and logistics, transport and warehousing, Huo said.

This will support sales management and provide an information base for automatic replenishment. Suning's data will be open to suppliers, and manufacturers' data will be relayed to Suning to enhance supply chain efficiency and precision marketing.

Singles' Day started as a 'counter-Valentine's Day' male students at Nanjing University pioneered in the 1990s to protest and resist societal pressure to get hitched at a young age. The students may also have taken their inspiration from the four single digits in the date, which is the prevailing, if erroneous view as to the origin of the term. The celebration has since evolved into China's top e-commerce sales event along the lines of the US' Black Friday.