360buy completes new round of funding

360buy.com, China’s second-biggest business-to-consumer website by revenue, has confirmed it has completed a new round of funding from investors, but declined to give specific figures.

In a statement to China Daily, 360buy said it had recently raised money from the Ontario Teacher Pension Fund and Tiger Global Management LLC.

According to a report from caijing.com.cn, 360buy’s new funding was $400 million in total, of which the Ontario Teacher Pension Fund invested $250 million,.

In April 2011, 360buy.com received $1.5 billion during its third round of funding. Investors included Digital Sky Technologies and the family of the late Sam Walton, founder of the Arkansas-based Wal-Mart Stores Inc retail chain. DST has gained fame by successfully investing in companies like Facebook Inc, Groupon Inc and Zynga Inc.

Richard Liu, chairman of 360buy.com, has said that DST paid more than $500 million to gain a stake.

Established in 2004, the Beijing-based company has seen an annual growth rate of more than 200 percent during the past five years.

Competing with Alibaba Group’s Tmall.com in the business-to-customer market, 360buy.com had nearly 30 billion yuan ($4.7 billion) in sales last year.

The company launched an English-version e-commerce website in mid-October to enter overseas markets. In an interview with China Daily, Shi Tao, vice-president of 360buy.com, said the company wants to extend its reach to the global market and establish an online empire on the same lines as Seattle-based Amazon.com Inc.