JD.com Enters Travel and Hospitality With Supply Chain-Focused Strategy

AsianFin -- JD.com has officially thrown its hat into China’s fiercely competitive travel and hospitality ring, signaling a bold new chapter for the e-commerce giant as it doubles down on supply chain integration across industries.

In a post on June 18, JD.com confirmed its foray into the sector with an open letter to hotel operators via its official WeChat account, JD Blackboard News. The letter pitched the platform’s massive base of over 800 million high-spending users and strong ties to more than 30,000 large enterprises and 8 million SMEs. JD also unveiled a key incentive: hotels joining its new Hotel PLUS Membership Program will be exempt from commissions for up to three years.

The announcement followed comments from JD.com founder Richard Liu Qiangdong, who said on June 17 that all of the company’s initiatives—from food delivery to hotel bookings—are designed to deepen its supply chain footprint. “On the front end, consumers stay in hotels and order food. But behind the scenes, the supply chain is chaotic and costly,” Liu said. “We’re streamlining that.”

JD.com’s expansion comes as the hospitality industry gears up for China’s summer travel surge—and as online travel agency (OTA) incumbents like Ctrip and Meituan fiercely guard their turf. The move revives JD’s earlier travel ambitions, including a 2015 investment in Tuniu and the 2018 launch of its “Boundaryless Retail + Accommodation Experience” campaign, but this time with sharper execution and a deeper focus on logistics and supplier-side integration.

Drawing parallels to its February entry into food delivery, JD is positioning itself as a consumer-first platform. Just as it undercut rivals with rock-bottom latte prices and tea deals, the company is now touting transparent pricing on flight tickets—excluding the opaque insurance add-ons that have long frustrated OTA users.