Chinese e-commerce company Meituan Dianping, which no one in the West likely has ever heard of, is close to finalizing a $3 billion venture capital fundraising on a $28 billion valuation, making it the fifth largest tech startup in the world.

Previous investor Tencent Holdings Ltd., the operator of WeChat, is leading the round, with Los Angeles-based Capital Group and San Francisco venture capital firm IDG Capital also participating.

Founded in 2003, the Dianping part of the company provides independent consumer reviews on local services. Meituan, founded in 2010 before merging with Dianping in 2015, is a Chinese group buying website for locally found consumer products and retail services. The combined company today has gone wide in providing a various range of products including food delivery, movie tickets and travel services and claims to be the world’s largest on-demand delivery platform, reaching up to 10 million daily orders and deliveries.

According to Bloomberg, Meituan Dianping sits as a “marquee player” in a war between Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and Tencent, which are using startups covering food delivery and neighborhood services as a way to push their respective mobile payment platforms. Alibaba’s Alipay is the world’s largest mobile payment service, while Tencent, through WeChat, the No. 1 messaging service in China, is pushing its own app-related payment platform. Both companies are looking to expand globally as well, with Alipay expanding into Southeast Asia and the United States, while Tencent has started targeting European customers.

In an interesting twist, Meituan Dianping recently entered the ride-hailing market, putting it up against another Chinese unicorn in the form of Didi Chuxing. The former Uber Inc. competitor acquired Uber’s China business in August last year, with Uber being given a 20 percent stake in the company in return. Perhaps proving how complicated relationships can be in China, Tencent is also an investor in Didi Chuxing.

Should Meituan Dianping complete the round, it will take its funding to a staggeringly large $7.34 billion. It has a long list of previous investors: Baillie Gifford, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Capital Today, China Resources Venture, DST Global, FountainVest Partners, Google, Lightspeed Venture Partners, MSA, Qiming Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital, Source Code Capital, TBP Capital and Temasek Holdings.

Photo: yakobusan/Flickr