Alibaba and Dufry, a Swiss-based travel retailer which operates duty-free and duty-paid shops and convenience stores, agreed to form a 51-49 travel retail joint venture in China. In connection with this collaboration, Alibaba Group will invest in Dufry up to a maximum of 9.99% of the post-offering share capital and will participate in its ordinary capital increase, which is subject to the approval of Dufry’s shareholders at its upcoming EGM on October 6, 2020. In relation to the Alibaba's investment, Dufry may issue up to $760m in shares. "We expect this collaboration to drive growth in Asia and with Chinese customers worldwide with the support of new digital technologies. Alibaba Group is a leader in digital commerce with an ecosystem of more than 800m consumers in China. Dufry holds a leading position in travel retail globally and brings in its strong operational expertise in 65 countries and over 2,500 shops. By fostering existing and new business models in offline and online travel retail, we are convinced the Joint Venture will capitalize on growth opportunities and will support Dufry to become the leading digital travel retail company worldwide. We aim to better serve our customers and provide them anywhere with global products, services and personalized offers across all platforms and devices,” Julian Diaz, Dufry Group CEO.