Alibaba third quarter revenue surges 54% to $7.67bn

Alibaba has reported that its third quarter revenue increased 54% to $7.76bn, compared to $5.3bn for the same period last year.

The Chinese e-commerce giant credited the revenue growth to its commerce retail business in China followed up by Alibaba Cloud and also the integration of its newly acquired businesses, especially Youku Tudou and Lazada.

Alibaba stated that the robust revenue growth in its Chinese commerce retail business was due to its persisting efforts to improve the social commerce platform by delivering better user experience driven by data technology.

Alibaba Group CEO Daniel Zhang said: “Our robust December quarter demonstrates the strength of the Chinese consumer and Alibaba’s ability to create value across our vast ecosystem.

“The 11.11 Shopping Festival featured Alibaba at its best, integrating commerce, entertainment and social engagement, all happening globally at record scale. We are driving the age of ‘New Retail,’ which leverages big data and innovation to provide a seamless online and offline experience for nearly half a billion mobile monthly active users.

“This retail transformation will make it even easier and more efficient for brands and retailers to engage with these consumers anywhere, anytime.”

The commerce retail business contributed revenue of RMB40.8bn ($5.9bn), an increase of 77% in comparison to what it earned in the same quarter in 2015.

From outside China, the retail business for Alibaba brought the group revenue of RMB2.4bn ($353m), surging at 288% in comparison to what was registered in Q4 2015.

The group’s cloud computing business brought revenue of RMB1.8bn ($254m), an increase by 115% compared to Q4 2015.

On the digital media and entertainment front, Alibaba made revenue of RMB4bn ($585m), surging by 273% to its corresponding revenue in the same quarter of 2015.

Following the results it has delivered for Q4 2016, Alibaba is expecting its revenue for fiscal year 2017 to increase 53% year-over-year.