A saleswoman conducts livestreaming at a sportswear shop in Jinjiang, Fujian province, on April 2, 2020. (DONG YANJUN / FOR CHINA DAILY)

SHANGHAI – China's platform economy, known mainly as online marketplaces, has grown to over US$2.39 trillion as of early April despite the COVID-19 epidemic's negative impact, according to the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT). 

The CAICT, under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said in its latest report on Friday that the platform economy has gained strong growth in China. 

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Digital marketplace firms each with over US$1-billion market value in China have increased to 193 by the end of 2019. By then, the total market value of online marketplaces has grown nearly 200 percent to US$2.35 trillion during the past five years. 

Even though travel, tourism and offline training industries were severely hit amid the epidemic, online economy including e-commerce, livestreaming, teleconference, online education and online medical care have seen headwind growth. 

Digital marketplace firms also contributed a lot in fighting against the epidemic globally and stabilizing economic growth and the employment, said the report. 

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According to CAICT, there were 74 digital marketplace firms each with over US$10 billion market value from home and abroad in 2019, forming a total of US$8.98 trillion global platform economy. Among them 30 were based in China.