BEIJING, March 7  (TMTPOST)— Chinese e-commerce giant PDD Holdings, just changing from the name Pinduoduo last month, confirmed the recent news about its expansion in the Australian continent.

Source: Visual China

Temu, a cross-border e-commerce website and application of Pinduoduo, plans to start opeartion, in Australia and New Zealand on March 13, and all the China-made manufacturing goods sold on the platform in North America will be also available in these two countries as the launch, the person in charge of Pinduoduo’s relevant business told Shanghai Securities Journal, the state-owned national newspaper.

During the preparation for entry into the two Oceanian countries, Pinduoduo will continue to fully open up to domestic brands, small and medium-sized enterprises and source factories in the manufacturing sector, and will provide a package of preferential policies such as exemption of  commission and deposit fees, traffic support, resource subsidies according to the official. Starting from this month, the special team under Pinduoduo’s initiative to support overseas expansion for Chinese companies will visit 100 quality domestic industrial belts covering several provinces such as Guangdong, Fujian, Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Shandong, Hebei, Anhui, Shaanxi, Sichuan, and Hubei, with the aim to comprehensively promote exploration abroad of manufacturing enterprises, and help them accelerate digital transformation and upgrade and better adapt to international competition, the person said.

Pinduoduo announced in September its plan to invest RMB10 billion (US$1.47 billion) to help China's manufacturing enterprises boost their global footprint. In the first phase of the initiative, Pinduoduo will promote 100 Chinese brands to go global and support 10,000 manufacturers to connect directly with overseas markets. It will still provide related infrastructure like warehousing, cross-border logistics and after-sales services through contract services, as well as offer tailor-made courses to domestic manufacturers on going global. The latter will enjoy long-term preferential policies of zero deposit and zero commission, according to the Shanghai-based company.

The expansion came as Temu has expanded rapidly since it launched in last September in the United States. The app has topped the U.S. chart since November. It became the youngest brand to air a commercial during the Super Bowl. As of February 23, less than two weeks following its Super Bowl ad, Temu app attracted more than 40 million new downloads and maintained the first place as the most downloaded app on Apple App and Google Play stores in the U.S. for 69 days and 114 days, respectively, according to Temu’s pitch document for investment and merchants.

Shein predicted global gross merchandise volume (GMV) to grow to US$80.6 billion in 2025, up 174% from last year, and revenue could increase to US$58.5 billion in 2025, up from US$22.7 billion last year the Financial Times reported last month, citing a management presentation shown to investors.

Temu has aimd a GMV between US$3 billion to 4 billion for the year 2023 and its long-term target is to achieve or exceed Shein’s US$30 billion GMV last year in the coming five years, Chinese tech news media outlet 36Kr reported in last October.

A lofty target Temu set in February, when the app rolled out in its second market Canada, suggests it will notch at a single day of gross merchandise value that tops Shein’s between now and Sept. 1, and ultimately rival global giants like Amazon.com and eBay Inc., Bloomberg cited people familiar with the matter on Monday.