Chinese ecommerce group Alibaba has long dominated China’s Rmb2.8tn ($451bn) online retail market. However, there are signs that its smaller competitor, JD.com, is closing the gap.
在规模达2.8万亿人民币（合4510亿美元）的中国在线零售市场上，阿里巴巴(Alibaba)长期占据着主导地位。然而，目前有迹象表明，规模比它小的竞争对手——京东(JD.com)正在逐渐缩小与它的差距。
According to data from FT Confidential Research, a Financial Times research service, the popularity of JD.com has soared in recent months to a record high. Nearly 45 per cent of respondents in China Confidential’s first quarter 2015 survey of almost 2,000 online shoppers said they regularly shopped on JD.com. As recently as the first quarter of 2013, just 30 per cent of shoppers surveyed said they regularly shopped there.
英国《金融时报》旗下研究服务“投资参考”(FT Confidential Research)的数据显示，京东的人气在近几个月升至历史新高。《中国投资参考》2015年第一季度对近2000名网购者的调查显示，接近45%的受访者表示，他们经常在京东购物。在2013年第一季度的调查中，表示经常在京东购物的受访者还只有30%。

Although Alibaba remains the clear market leader, both of its consumer ecommerce sites — Taobao and Tmall — declined in popularity in the latest quarter, while JD.com was up sharply.
尽管阿里巴巴仍是当仁不让的市场领先者，其旗下两家消费电商网站——淘宝网(Taobao)和天猫(Tmall)——的人气在今年第一季度都有所下降，京东的人气则大幅上升。
JD.com’s fast-growing popularity is largely due to its rapid expansion of logistics in smaller cities and its strategic alliance with Chinese internet group Tencent, in place since mid-2014.
京东人气蹿升，主要是因为其在中小城市迅速扩建物流体系，并且自2014年年中以来跟中国互联网集团腾讯(Tencent)结成了战略联盟。
While consumers living in first-tier and wealthy eastern coastal cities were early adopters of ecommerce, their counterparts in smaller cities and inland provinces arguably have a greater demand for internet shopping because they have a less-advanced bricks and mortar alternative. How far and how fast ecommerce companies can deliver goods to consumers in smaller cities correlates directly to their popularity.
尽管一线城市和东部沿海富裕城市的消费者很早就接受了电子商务，但中小城市和内地省份的消费者对网上购物有着更大的需求，因为他们所在的地方实体店不够发达。电商企业在中小城市的发货速度有多快、覆盖范围有多远，直接关系到自身在网购者中间的受欢迎程度。
JD.com has invested heavily in expanding into smaller cities in recent years, greatly increasing its popularity. By the end of the first quarter of 2015, JD.com had 3,539 delivery and pick-up stations in 1,961 cities and counties nationwide, up from 3,210 in 1,862 cities and counties at the end of 2014 and 2,523 stations in 1,780 cities and counties in the second quarter of 2014.
近年来，京东已投下巨资向中小城市扩张，使其人气大为提升。到2015年第一季度末，京东在全国1961个县市拥有3539个配送站和自提点；2014年底在1862个县市有3210个配送站和自提点；2014年第二季度在1780个县市有2523个配送站和自提点。
Meanwhile, JD.com’s partnership with Tencent has given the retailer access to the latter’s massive userbase — Tencent’s WeChat and QQ mobile apps alone have about 1bn users.
另一方面，京东与腾讯建立合作之后，可以接触后者的庞大的用户基础——仅微信(Wechat)和QQ这两款移动应用便拥有约10亿用户。
JD.com’s promotional activities on WeChat and QQ, such as distributing virtual hongbao — red envelope gifts — during lunar new year, have increased its popularity among price-sensitive, mass-market consumers who previously looked for bargains on Alibaba’s consumer-to-consumer site Taobao.
春节期间京东在微信和QQ上的促销活动（比如发电子红包），深受对价格敏感的大众市场消费者的喜爱，这些消费者以前通常在阿里巴巴的C2C网站淘宝网上物色便宜货。
The quality of delivery services also matters. JD.com has invested heavily in its own logistics network, which, although costly, has enabled it to maintain strict oversight and achieve quick, accurate delivery. The delivery quality has supported JD.com’s popularity among China’s increasingly demanding consumers.
送货服务的质量也很重要。京东也投巨资建设自己的物流网络，尽管代价不菲，但这让京东得以保持严格管理，实现快速精准的送货。送货质量提高了京东在越来越挑剔的消费者当中的受欢迎程度。
By contrast, merchants on Alibaba overwhelmingly rely on third-party logistics companies to serve a vast number of geographically dispersed buyers. This has left these merchants unable to match JD.com’s delivery speed or service quality, denting the popularity of Alibaba’s two websites.
对比之下，阿里巴巴平台的商户主要依赖第三方物流公司，为天南地北的买家送货。因此，这些商户的发货速度和服务质量比不上京东，降低了阿里巴巴旗下两个网站的人气。
In China Confidential’s survey, 36.3 per cent of respondents said Alibaba’s business-to-consumer site Tmall was one of the two ecommerce sites they most regularly used, down 0.7 percentage points quarter on quarter. Furthermore, although Alibaba’s Taobao remained the most popular ecommerce site, its popularity fell for the second successive quarter: 50.6 per cent of respondents said they most regularly used Taobao — down 4.2 percentage points year on year and 1.5 percentage points quarter on quarter.
在《中国投资参考》的调查中，36%的受访者表示，阿里巴巴的B2C平台天猫是他们使用最多的两个电商网站之一，比前一季度低了0.7%。另外，尽管阿里巴巴旗下的淘宝网仍是最受欢迎的电商网站，但其人气连续第2个季度出现下降：50.6%的受访者表示，他们最经常使用的是淘宝网，比去年同期下降4.2个百分点，比前一季度下降1.5个百分点。
The declining popularity of Taobao lowered the combined percentage of survey respondents that regularly used Alibaba’s two consumer ecommerce sites to 87 per cent, down from an all-time high of 90 per cent in mid-2014.
淘宝人气下降，使得经常使用阿里巴巴旗下两家消费电商网站的受访者的百分比之和降至87%，低于2014年年中创下的最高值90%。
Almost all other online retail sites, including Dangdang and Amazon China, have seen declines in popularity over the past year as the two market leaders, both buoyed by bumper US initial public offerings last year, invest heavily to extend their dominance.
包括当当网(Dangdang)和亚马逊中国(Amazon China)，几乎所有其他在线零售网站的人气在过去一年里都有所下降。这是因为，得益于去年在美首次公开发行(IPO)融得的巨资，阿里巴巴和京东这两家市场领军公司都利用大笔投资巩固主导地位。
Although Alibaba remains the clear market leader and continues to invest heavily, China Confidential expects JD.com to gain further ground, helped by the company’s ongoing investment in logistics and its growing consumer base.
尽管阿里巴巴仍是显而易见的市场领先者，并在加大投资力度，但《中国投资参考》预计，在持续加大物流投资和用户基础扩大的帮助下，京东有望夺取更多地盘。
However, continued heavy investment and the high cost of its self-operated model mean the company remains unlikely to post a profit in the near term.
然而，持续的巨额投资和高成本的自营模式，意味着京东在近期仍不大可能实现盈利。
JD.com’s net loss widened to Rmb710.2m in the first quarter, up from Rmb454.3m in the fourth quarter of 2014.
今年第一季度，京东的净亏损额从2014年第4季度的4.543亿元人民币扩大到了7.102亿元人民币。
Its investment-led approach is enabling JD.com to slowly close the gap on Alibaba, reflected in rising popularity and relative share price outperformance over the past year. But it remains to be seen how long investors will be prepared to wait for the asset-heavy online retailer to post a profit.
在投资驱动模式下，京东得以慢慢缩小与阿里巴巴的差距，这一点从过去一年里其人气不断上升和股价的相对表现可以看出来。但是，投资者准备花多长时间等待这家“重资产型”在线零售商实现盈利，则需拭目以待。