CEO, chairman quit Walmart’s China e-commerce firm Yihaodian

The CEO and Chairman of Walmart’s Chinese e-commerce company Yihaodian have quit “to pursue their next venture”, the US retailer said on Wednesday, as it aims to grow a company still far smaller than local rivals.

“Yihaodian co-founders, Chairman Gang Yu and CEO Junling Liu have announced they are leaving Yihaodian,” Walmart said in a statement, adding that it is recruiting other leaders.

The US company “will work to accelerate [Yihaodian’s] growth ... and Walmart continues to be committed to investing in China and in e-commerce.”

The world’s biggest retailer, Walmart plans to close some under-performing stores in China and seek to tap into the faster-growing online grocery market through its digital Yihaodian.com platform.

Walmart’s Asia head Scott Price told Reuters earlier this year that online retail was important to help tap China’s younger generations. “What we’re finding is that the Chinese customer is going online and they’re going online outside of China pretty aggressively,” he said.

Wal-Mart, along with France’s Carrefour and Britain’s Tesco have all seen sales growth slip over the last five years, losing market share to local rivals, according to a report from consumer analytics firm Kantar Worldpanel.