Alibaba group’s business-to-business division Alibaba.com on Monday announced that it aims to more than double its user base in India over the next few years. It plans to do so by bringing over five million businesses on board its wholesale trading platform, reported PTI. The Chinese e-commerce giant has 40 million users globally and 4.5 million users in India.

Head of global business development of Alibaba.com, Timothy Leung, told reporters in New Delhi, "India is a very important market for us. It is the second-largest for us after China. In the next few years, we hope to have 10 million businesses from India on our platform."

As part of its strategy to support the trading business of SMEs in India to help them grow, Alibaba.com has partnered with Indian organisations to launch online platform SMILE (Small and Medium Industries Leveraging Export), Leung said. “By offering combined trading solutions to Indian SMEs, SMILE hopes to make cross-border trading easier,” he added.