Too much competition: Amazon cuts off online retail services in China

As Chinese online retail giants such as Alibaba and JD.com bloom, Amazon Inc has decided to shut off access to online retail services in Chinese site.

From July 18, Amazon China will close access to local online retail services. Chinese products will only be shipped in from overseas after that.

Amazon has told sellers not to use Amazon.cn after the deadline as it focuses cross-border sales into China. It will provide Chinese consumers products directly from its overseas sites, Amazon said.

"Amazon’s commitment to China remains strong ... (we will) continue to invest and grow in China," the company told Shanghai Daily. 

Amazon will maintain key businesses in China — from Kindle, its cloud service Amazon Web Services to cross-border e-commerce operations Amazon Global Store and Global Selling.

In the short-term, Amazon China faces almost certain defeat by Alibaba and JD. com in the domestic market, analysts say.

In the first half of 2018, the Chinese online retail market was dominated by Alibaba’s Tmall, with 52.5 percent of the market, and JD.com's 31.3 percent, compared with Amazon China’s 1.2 percent, according to iiMedia Researcher.

AWS is now the world’s top public cloud service provider, followed by Microsoft’s Azure and Alibaba.

Amazon is expanding its cloud-providing facilities in Shanghai and Nanjing to tap into the growing market. But Bloomberg News says Amazon will shift to India from China.