Chinese fans of fried chicken will soon have a new way of paying for their food fix after Alibaba’s Alipay payments unit hooked up with KFC.
阿里巴巴(Alibaba)旗下的支付宝(Alipay)与肯德基(KFC)建立了合作关系，中国的炸鸡粉丝很快将可以使用一种新的付款方式。
It was the biggest move by a Chinese ecommerce group to diversify through an online-to-offline (O2O) deal.
这是中国电子商务集团在进军“线上到线下”(O2O)道路上做出的最大动作。

Alipay’s agreement with KFC China — the country’s biggest food delivery business with 5,000 restaurants across 900 cities — was followed by search engine Baidu saying it would invest Rmb20bn ($3.2bn) over the next three years in Baidu Nuomi, its Groupon-like marketplace.
支付宝与肯德基中国（中国最大的食品递送业务，在900个城市拥有5000家餐厅）宣布达成协议后，搜索引擎百度(Baidu)表示，将在未来三年期间向“百度糯米”（类似于高朋Groupon的团购网站）投资200亿元人民币（合32亿美元）。
Analysts said the focus on O2O — where customers use smartphones to find, order and pay for goods from food to ride-hailing apps — marked a shift in the industry as growth slowed in pure online sales.
分析师们表示，随着纯粹的在线销售增长放缓，聚集O2O标志着行业发生转变。从食品到叫车应用，O2O让客户可以使用智能手机查找、下单购买和支付各类商品。
Ecommerce groups such as Alibaba have chased growth by buying into “combined channel” merchants, which have an online and offline presence.
阿里巴巴等电商集团近期纷纷通过投资于“组合渠道”（既有在线业务、也有离线业务）商家，来追逐增长。
Alibaba’s deal with KFC will be the biggest partnership with retailers to allow customers to pay by scanning bar codes using Alipay’s smartphone app.
阿里巴巴与肯德基达成的协议，将是电商企业与零售商结成的最大合作伙伴关系。客户将可在智能手机上用支付宝应用扫描条码，即可完成买单。
KFC will be the third big retailer to accept Alipay after Walmart and Carrefour began doing so this year.
肯德基将是第三家接受支付宝的大型零售商，此前沃尔玛(Walmart)和家乐福(Carrefour)已在今年开始接受支付宝。