Wal-Mart to open Sam's Club on JD.com

(Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc said it was launching its warehouse retail business Sam's Club and a store for imported products on JD.com Inc's platform, three months after the world's largest retailer took a stake in the no. 2 Chinese e-commerce company.

Walmart Stores will also start a two-hour delivery service from its stores in select Chinese cities on Thursday for orders placed on JD Daojia, JD.com's grocery business.

The delivery service will be available from more than 20 Walmart stores in China, and are expected to double by the end of the year.

Walmart's global import store, set to be launched on Friday on JD Worldwide, will give Chinese customers access to products imported by Walmart from its stores around the world.

The efforts, part of the agreement announced between the two companies in June, are being launched in time to woo Chinese customers ahead of the Singles' Day shopping festival on Nov. 11.

The U.S. grocery giant said in June it would sell its Chinese online grocery store Yihaodian in return for a 5 percent stake in JD.com, to cure ailing sales in one of the world's toughest retail markets.

For the Sam's Club store, Walmart said it would stock merchandise in JD's warehouses and use JD's same- and next- day delivery service.

Wal-Mart reported a 10.8 percent passive stake in JD.com as of Oct. 5.(http://bit.ly/2eo9sJS)

(Reporting by Gayathree Ganesan in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta)