HONG KONG — E-commerce companies like Alibaba have changed the way people shop in China and made things tough for brick-and-mortar retailers.

On Monday, Alibaba said it would pay a premium to buy into one of those struggling Chinese retail companies. Alibaba will pay 28.3 billion renminbi, or about $4.6 billion, to take a 20 percent stake in Suning, which sells consumer electronics and has been devastated in recent years by online competitors.

Alibaba will pay about 10 percent more than the price of Suning’s shares before trading was suspended on Aug. 3 in Shenzhen. Suning also said Monday that it would pay $2.28 billion for a 1.1 percent stake in Alibaba, paying a premium of 4 percent above the company’s share price at the close of Friday trading in New York.

Alibaba’s chief executive, Daniel Zhang, said during a conference call on Monday that the company would probably use Suning’s large number of retail outlets to sell groceries and other items outside Suning’s core consumer electronics business.

“We will also work with them to figure out integrated solutions to do in-store pickup and in-store return to serve our clients,” he said.

He did not specify how Suning would balance selling its own items while also acting as a storage center for goods ordered by Alibaba customers.

Mr. Zhang added that Alibaba’s approach to investment was very clear: The company first looks for partners that can bring it new customers, and then looks for ways to provide better services.

In a news release, Alibaba said the move was another step toward securing its distribution network across China. Suning has struggled to adapt as Chinese consumers have increasingly turned to the Internet to buy all manner of gadgets and devices. It posted a loss in the first quarter of 2015 of 332 million renminbi, narrower than the 433.5 million renminbi loss it posted in the first quarter of 2014. But it does have a sophisticated logistical operation that stretches across much of China.

In recent years, Alibaba’s frenetic growth has outpaced that of China’s delivery infrastructure, making delivery reliability and timing unpredictable in China’s smaller cities and its less-developed western region.

The companies emphasized in a news release that they would work to make use of Suning’s retail stores around the country to offer instant products and services to the hundreds of millions of Chinese who use Alibaba’s mobile applications.

“Consumers will be able to have a physical experience with the product in store, while at the same time being able to operate other areas — such as ordering and payment — through their own mobile device,” the companies said.

The move for Suning echoes one Alibaba made last year, when it said it would pay $692 million for the Chinese department store operator Intime Retail. The move highlights the company’s continued willingness to invest in a broad array of companies, including online mapping and video services, a smartphone maker, an Indian e-commerce start-up and even a soccer club.

Alibaba’s largest rivals, Tencent and Baidu, have also pledged investments in initiatives that connect users of their smartphone services to real-world services.