The Iron Spine of Chinese Commerce: How Richard Liu Built JD.com into China's Largest Retailer
When global investors examine the rapid ascent of Chinese digital technology over the past quarter-century, attention frequently centers on the asset-light platforms: Alibaba's open merchant bazaars, Tencent's pervasive social messaging networks, and ByteDance's algorithmic video feeds. Yet beneath the digital cloud of Chinese consumerism lies a physical, industrial reality of very large proportions. At the absolute center of that physical reality is JD.com (Jingdong). Founded on June 18, 1998, by sociology graduate Richard Liu Qiangdong as a tiny four-square-meter electronics stall in Beijing, JD.com has grown into China's largest retailer, with 2025 net revenues of RMB1,309.1 billion (about US$187 billion).
Unlike competitors that built software platforms and outsourced the dirty work of parcel delivery to fragmented courier networks, JD.com executed the most audacious, capital-intensive infrastructure bet in the history of e-commerce: constructing its own nationwide, fully automated supply chain. Through JD Logistics, it runs its own warehouses and delivery staff, and the group employed 776,682 people at the end of 2025. Dual-listed on NASDAQ (JD) and the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (9618), with a market value of roughly $35 billion in September 2026, JD is led by CEO Sandy Xu Ran.
From Zhongguancun to SARS: The Origin Story of Richard Liu
The story of JD.com is one of the ultimate rags-to-riches epics in modern business. Richard Liu Qiangdong was born into rural destitution in Guangming Village, Jiangsu Province. His family was so poor that Liu tasted meat only once or twice a year, living on sweet potatoes and corn. Brilliant at academics, Liu scored top honors in the national gaokao entrance exam, earning admission to Beijing's top Renmin University. Because his family could not afford the train ticket to Beijing, the villagers of Guangming pooled their savings, presenting Liu with 500 RMB and 76 boiled eggs to sustain him on his journey.
At university, Liu studied sociology by day and taught himself computer programming by night. In June 1998, with 12,000 RMB ($1,500) in personal savings, Liu rented a tiny, four-square-meter counter stall in Beijing's Zhongguancun electronics bazaar, calling it 'Jingdong Century'. At the time, Zhongguancun was notorious for pirated software, counterfeit computer parts, and shady haggling. Liu chose a completely contrarian path: he insisted on selling only genuine, factory-sealed optical drives and burners, refused to haggle, and provided genuine government tax invoices with every sale. Customers realized that Liu was the only merchant in the bazaar who never cheated them, building an intensely loyal following.
In spring 2003, disaster struck. The deadly Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) epidemic hit Beijing. Shopping malls and bazaars were quarantined, foot traffic vanished, and Liu faced immediate bankruptcy. Desperate to sell his unsold inventory, Liu began posting messages on internet hardware bulletin boards and QQ chat rooms, offering to mail CD burners directly to buyers. Because customers recognized his business name and trusted his zero-counterfeit reputation, orders flooded in. Liu experienced an epiphany: e-commerce was not merely an emergency backup; it was the future of global retail. On January 1, 2004, Liu permanently shut down his physical stalls to launch jdlaser.com (the direct ancestor of JD.com), dedicating his life to building China's premier digital retailer.
The Multi-Billion-Dollar Logistics Gamble
By 2007, JD.com's online sales were growing quickly, but Richard Liu realized that the entire business sat on a fragile foundation: China's third-party courier services. Traditional courier companies were fragmented, unreliable, and notorious for stealing electronics, damaging parcels, and refusing to deliver to rural doorsteps. When a customer ordered an expensive laptop and received a crushed box three weeks late, they blamed JD.com.
In mid-2007, Liu met with early-stage venture capitalist Kathy Xu of Capital Today. Liu asked for $2 million to fund expansion; Xu was so impressed by his fanaticism that she wrote him a check for $10 million. Liu immediately announced an audacious, high-risk decision: JD.com would build its own nationwide logistics, warehousing, and last-mile delivery fleet. Many investors doubted the plan, since building warehouses across China would take years of heavy spending and weigh on margins.
Liu ignored the critics and built steadily. JD constructed its well-known 'Asia No. 1' mega-fulfillment centers: large automated facilities equipped with autonomous guided vehicles (AGVs), automated picking cranes, and robotic sortation belts. JD hired its own couriers, gave them red jackets and company-provided electric delivery tricycles, and guaranteed that if an order was placed before 11:00 AM, it would arrive at the customer's door before 9:00 PM that same day (the famous '211 Program'). When Chinese middle-class consumers realized that ordering from JD meant guaranteed authentic goods delivered in hours without damage, JD became an indispensable national utility. Alibaba later responded by building up its own logistics coordinator, Cainiao.
The Direct Retail Advantage (1P vs 3P) and Strategic Alliances
The fundamental structural difference between JD.com and Western platforms or domestic rivals lies in its direct retail (1P) dominance. Alibaba's Taobao and Tmall are mainly third-party marketplaces where merchants ship their own goods. On JD.com, the core revenue engine is direct: JD purchases smartphones, refrigerators, cosmetics, and wine directly from brands in wholesale volume, stores them in its own warehouses, and sells them to the end consumer.
This direct ownership gives JD large pricing power, bulletproof quality control, and zero counterfeit exposure. Recognizing JD's supply chain supremacy, global corporate giants formed historic strategic alliances with the company. In 2014, Chinese tech leader Tencent took an anchor equity stake in JD, transferring its own e-commerce assets to JD and providing preferential native traffic entry points inside WeChat, instantly exposing JD to over one billion smartphone users. In 2016, Walmart Inc. formed a comprehensive strategic alliance with JD, merging its Chinese e-commerce business (Yihaodian) into JD and taking an equity stake to integrate Sam's Club imported goods into JD's delivery network. Walmart later sold its entire JD stake in August 2024.
The Modern Era: Sandy Xu, Global Robotics, and High-Tech Healthcare
In May 2023, former Chief Financial Officer Sandy Xu Ran took the helm as Chief Executive Officer of JD.com. Under Xu's disciplined financial stewardship, JD expanded its lower-tier market penetration, streamlined operational expenses, and expanded its high-margin third-party merchant advertising ecosystem. JD's listed healthcare subsidiary, JD Health, grew into one of China's largest online pharmacy and consultation platforms.
2025-2026: Food Delivery, Thinner Profits and a Bet on Europe
In February 2025 JD entered on-demand food delivery, taking on Meituan and Alibaba. The push lifted orders and headcount (JD had 776,682 employees at the end of 2025, up about 36% in a year) but cut profit: 2025 net income attributable to shareholders fell to ~$2.72 billion (RMB19.6 billion) from ~$5.75 billion (RMB41.4 billion), even as revenue rose 13% to ~$182 billion (RMB1,309.1 billion) and JD Retail's operating margin improved to 4.6%.
2026 has been about discipline. Q1 revenue rose 4.9% to ~$43.9 billion (RMB315.7 billion). In Q2, revenue fell 2.9% to ~$48.1 billion (RMB346.4 billion) on a high base from 2025 appliance trade-in subsidies, the first quarterly decline since JD's 2014 listing, but non-GAAP net income rose 20.8% to ~$1.24 billion (RMB8.9 billion) as food-delivery losses narrowed by more than half. Abroad, JD made a tender offer in 2025 for Ceconomy, the German owner of MediaMarkt and Saturn. Germany approved the deal with conditions in 2026, and as of late September 2026 EU clearance was reported to be close, with an Austrian review still pending.
Who Owns JD.com and Who Are Its Competitors?
JD is a public company, but founder Richard Liu holds a majority of shareholder voting power through high-vote Class B shares, while institutional and public investors own most of the economic interest. Its main rivals are Alibaba (Taobao, Tmall), PDD Holdings (Pinduoduo), Douyin e-commerce and Kuaishou in online retail, and Meituan in food delivery and instant retail.
