“I bested every rival but got beaten by the times. And when the times discard you, they don't even bother saying goodbye,” mused Huang Ming-Tuan, former chairman of Sun Art Retail Group Ltd. (6808.HK), years ago. Those words were quite prescient, foreshadowing today’s grim reality for traditional hypermarkets where Sun Art’s RT-Mart chain was once a leader of the pack.

The rise of e-commerce has made the operational model championed by these large-format retailers largely obsolete. Testifying to that shift, former category leader Carrefour (CA.PA) had only four stores remaining in China by the end of last year, leaving the chain far from where it sat in days when it was king of the Chinese grocery cart. Walmart (WMT.US) has also shuttered over 20 big-box outlets domestically in the same timeframe, as it focuses instead on its Sam's Club warehouse-style outlets.

Victim of shifting times