JD and Xiaomi post strong profits in Q3

China's two hottest firms JD and Xiaomi announced their third-quarter earnings on Monday, showing strong profits.

Smartphone maker Xiaomi reported its revenue surged 49.1 percent year-on-year to 50.8 billion yuan ($7.3 billion) in the third quarter of this year, and net profits rose 17.3 percent to 2.9 billion yuan.

E-commerce player JD said its third-quarter revenue jumped to 104.8 billion yuan compared with 87.3 billion yuan in the same period last year, and the profits increased to 3 billion yuan from 1 billion.

Xiaomi's founder and CEO Lei Jun said his firm carried out a series of strategies such as strengthening high-end market, speeding up the retail channel and investing more in AI, to start presenting good results.

In the third-quarter of this year, Xiaomi's smartphone business recorded 35 billion yuan in revenue, growing 36.1 percent year-on-year, and the smartphone shipment reached 33.3 million units, increasing 36 percent from a year earlier. By the end of the third-quarter, Xiaomi's high-end smartphone Mi8 shipments were nearly six million units, and the high-end smartphone contributed 31 percent to the revenue.

Xiaomi has built 499 direct-sale stores in first- and second-tier cites, and also authorized 1,100 stores as of September 30.

During this year's Nov 11 shopping festival, Xiaomi's sales from online and offline reached 5.25 billion yuan.

Xiaomi's new businesses in internet services, IoT and white household appliances also showed good momentum.

According to the firm's financial report, Xiaomi has gained 4.7 billion yuan from internet services in the third-quarter, skyrocketing 85.5 percent year-on-year, and its revenue from advertising shot up 109.8 percent year-on-year.

Other internet services businesses including overseas internet service and internet TV service contributed 4.4 percent and 5.4 percent in the revenue during the report period.

The firm's IoT and consumer goods business maintained high growth in the third-quarter with 10.8 billion yuan earning in revenue, an 89.8 percent surge year-on-year.

The sales volume on smartTV jumped 198.5 percent year-on-year in the third-quarter of this year, and in the first nine months, the smartTV sold 5.2 million units.

According to Xiaomi, the firm's IoT devices (excluding smartphone and laptop) in sold 132 million units during the first nine months.

Moreover, Xiaomi's revenue from overseas market also showed sharp rise. In the third-quarter, the overseas business contributed 22.3 billion yuan in revenue, surging 112.7 percent year-on-year.

The industry analysis firm Canalys said Xiaomi's revenue from overseas business occupied 43.9 percent of the total, and its smartphone shipments ranked top 5 among 30 countries including India, Indonesia and western European markets in the third-quarter.