The 128th Canton Fair kicked off online on October 15th. It is the second time that the fair has moved online this year due to the COVID-19 outbreak. According to Dongguan Municipal Bureau of Commerce, a total of 188 companies from Dongguan participated in this session of the Canton Fair, occupying 572 booths.

The Fair will last for 10 days, with 50 exhibition areas in 16 categories of products and about 60,000 booths. The online platform provides constant live broadcasts, supply and sourcing docking, with several new functions such as online business card exchange and private chats function with purchasers.

Dongguan has organized a group of new enterprises of independent brands or new technology to participate this session of Canton Fair. Among them, there are 139 private enterprises, accounting for 73% of the total number of the city's exhibitors, while 49 are solely foreign-owned or Sino-foreign joint ventures, accounting for 27% of the total.

Many exhibitors have realized the importance of online channel through the Fair, and they have accelerated their layout of online sales channels to prepare for the Fair.

"Through the experience of the last Canton Fair, now every salesman knows how to promote products via live streaming," said Li Yunhuan, from Dongguan Yoyo Meiju Home Furnishing Manufacturing Co., Ltd., which is currently the largest manufacturer of PVC tablecloths in China. Li stated that the company's e-commerce sites have seen an increase in the number of visitors and sales rate during the epidemic, and some traditional offline customers have also moved online for inquiries and purchase.