As of 23 April, Covestro offers its high-tech polymer materials in a flagship store on 1688.com (link: covestrochina.1688.com), an online platform of Alibaba. The platform is the biggest online business-to-business marketplace in China.

The company’s main goal is to offer customers a reliable, official channel with a simple and efficient purchasing experience. With a maximum quantity order, the store is tailored to the needs of small and medium-sized customers. Therefore, transactions will be of relatively small volume. Covestro hopes to learn and continuously improve its offering by this.

As a start, Covestro will offer around 50 products on 1688.com. A second wave of products to launch is in planning. The company announced that new forms of online commerce will contribute up to EUR 1 billion Euro in accumulated sales until the end of 2019.

• Covestro AG, Leverkusen, Germany