World is shallow, so you be shallow? At least not here 1 Corporate Headlines

  1. Beyond Meat, backed by Gates, products hit supermarket shelves This week, Beyond Meat, which has received investments from Bill Gates, General Mills, and Tyson Foods, announced that starting May 29, consumers will be able to find their patties in the meat section of traditional fresh supermarket Safeway.
  2. Chinese favor imported seafood; a Thai company is coming to grab market share Seeing the potential of the Chinese market, Thai seafood manufacturer Union Thai, which previously only had B2B business in China, is officially bringing its consumer seafood brand Oscar King into China. Union Thai is currently the world's largest tuna can manufacturer, with 2016 sales of 125 billion Thai baht (approximately $3.7 billion). It acquired the Norwegian brand Oscar King in 2014. Oscar King primarily sells frozen seafood products, such as Thai direct shrimp, crown party shrimp, salmon sashimi slices, and raw frozen Boston lobster. Currently, most Oscar King products are processed and prepared—they are "ready-to-eat" or require only "one-step cooking" like thawing or heating. Their products are priced between 78 and 188 RMB and will enter premium supermarkets (including Greenland Global Direct Sales Center and Ole) as well as e-commerce channels like JD.com and Tmall.
  3. Alibaba acquires 18% stake in Lianhua Supermarket. In the early morning of May 27, Bailian Group announced that Alibaba Group acquired an 18% stake in Lianhua Supermarket from Yiguo Fresh, becoming the second-largest shareholder of Lianhua Supermarket. Yiguo Fresh holds 1.17% of Lianhua Supermarket. In February this year, Alibaba announced a strategic cooperation with Bailian. 2 FMCG News
  4. Skittles to launch sweet and spicy flavor, reportedly because Americans now love spicy food Skittles and Starburst will launch new flavors in December this year, a sweet and spicy series (Sweet Heat). The candy packaging will also change to a black base. Skittles' new series has five fruit flavors to choose from: spicy watermelon, mango, orange, strawberry, and lemon. Starburst's spicy fruits are similar to Skittles, with the addition of pineapple flavor.
  5. "8×8", pre-sale for China's largest co-brewing event begins! This craft brewing collaboration event is unprecedented in its level and scale, not only bringing foreign brewery culture and experience to China but also promoting excellent Chinese craft beer to the world and connecting with international standards. From now on, each pair of partners will co-brew a beer, and the collaborative works will be released at the "Eight by Eight" beer festival on November 3-4.
  6. China's new first-tier city ranking released, with changes in seats Based on the latest year's commercial data from 160 brands, user behavior data from 17 internet companies, and city big data from data institutions, the 2017 latest city commercial charm ranking has been released. The list shows that the status of the four first-tier cities—Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen—remains unshakable, but the seats of the 15 "new first-tier" cities have changed somewhat, in order: Chengdu, Hangzhou, Wuhan, Chongqing, Nanjing, Tianjin, Suzhou, Xi'an, Changsha, Shenyang, Qingdao, Zhengzhou, Dalian, Dongguan, and Ningbo. 3 B2B Column SF Express and UPS to create a joint brand, preparing to expand international business together In the express delivery industry, a popular saying goes: "Express delivery is divided into two types: SF Express and others." SF Express, which focuses on business parcels rather than e-commerce parcels, is actually closer in model to traditional European and American express giants like UPS and DHL, with stable business and high profit margins. This is also why SF Express attracted great attention when it went public earlier, and after listing, it saw multiple limit-up boards and a surge in value. Recently, SF Express announced that it will reach closer business cooperation with UPS. The two parties will each invest $5 million to establish a joint venture in Hong Kong to jointly develop and provide international logistics products and expand global markets. This business will use a new joint brand, covering both commercial and personal parcel services. Before announcing this cooperation, SF Express had already made some arrangements for the international market. Over the past three years, SF Express's international business has grown by more than 70% year-on-year. Although this part of revenue accounts for no more than 2% of total revenue, in 2016 it grew by more than 300% year-on-year, making it SF Express's fastest-growing business. Previously, SF Express's vice chairman Lin Zheying, in an interview with Sina Finance, had proposed that in regions geographically close like Southeast Asia, or countries with a good Chinese foundation, SF Express would continue to adopt a direct operation model; while in distant regions like Europe and America, it would adopt a cooperative approach, seeking cooperation with local express companies or international giants. "I'll help him conquer the Chinese market, and he'll help me conquer the local market; we call it market-for-market." Being able to penetrate the complex Chinese market through SF Express's network is obviously more significant for UPS. As the world's largest express company, UPS has business outlets in more than 220 countries and regions. Currently, although North America and Europe are still UPS's largest markets, demand from Asia has grown rapidly in recent years. In China, UPS is also the first international express brand to have the right to operate international express business. However, constrained by fierce competition in the domestic express terminal market, UPS has always positioned itself in China as a comprehensive logistics service provider, focusing on import and export logistics for large corporate clients. In the past few years, its layout in second- and third-tier cities has also been to serve this group. As for other domestic express companies, their layout is more targeted at the growing but unstable consumer demand of cross-border online shoppers. STO, ZTO, and Best Express have all made initial overseas layouts by acquiring U.S. transit companies. A relatively large transaction is YTO's recent acquisition of Hong Kong-listed company Xian Da International for 1 billion yuan. 4 Thinking Space What if watching videos also requires a handstand? I have a feeling that next time I watch a Mercedes-Benz ad, I'll need to rotate my head 270 degrees. 5 Interactive Survey Q&A Today's topic: Regarding the disadvantages of FMCG distributors building their own B2B platforms, what do you think they are?