Shanghai, Nov 12 (IANS): Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba on Monday announced generation of whopping $30.8 billion in terms of Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) during Singles' Day sale -- the 24-hour annual shopping event -- held on November 11, beating the last year's record of $25 billion.

Around 180,000 brands had participated in the sale on all retails platforms of the company. Apple, Xiaomi, Pampers were among the top brands that were sold to customers spread across 197 countries.

The 10th edition of the Global Shopping Festival 11.11, which is also called 'Double 11' event as it falls on November 11, kicked off on Saturday midnight providing huge discounts on goods ranging from diapers to mobile phones. It started with a bang as products worth $3 billion were sold in the first five minutes and the $10 billion figure was achieved in little over one hour.

Alibaba Group Executive Chairman Jack Ma was present at the countdown gala here. Los Angeles, Tokyo, Frankfurt, were among the global cities that saw orders being placed for goods ranging from diapers to mobiles. Alibaba has invested in Indian digital payment platform Paytm. According to Joseph Tsai, Executive Vice Chairman of Alibaba Group, the investment in the payment platform helps them understand the Indian market.

"It is a difficult market for everyone. We do not want to rush... we have time," he told reporters while talking about the company's plans for India. Alibaba group CEO Daniel Zhang said the Indian market was big and it was seen by many big companies as strategic location. Alibaba will help local companies grow rather than putting business itself there, he said.