CHICAGO, United States –Wal-Mart Stores Inc on Monday said it has completed the acquisition of internet retailer Jet.com after agreeing to pay about $3 billion for the e-commerce startup last month.

Wal-Mart chief executive Doug McMillon announced the closing of the deal, which was pending regulatory approval, in a blog post on the retailer's website.

The deal value, which was the largest for an online startup, will give Wal-Mart access to Jet.com's innovative pricing software and will help the Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer to better compete with online rival Amazon.com Inc .

"A lot of folks ask me why Jet.com?", McMillon said in a blog post. The answer he said was in the savings both Wal-Mart and Jet can together offer shoppers.

Jet, with its ability to lower prices as customers add more items to their shopping carts, will help the world's largest retailer reach more customers such as millennial shoppers. The deal would also strengthen Wal-Mart's existing e-commerce infrastructure, McMillon said.

Wal-Mart has built its website into the second largest online retailer by traffic in the US in the past six months, the blog post said. It has also expanded the assortment of products on its website from 7 million to 15 million items and is adding a million more each month.

The Jet deal follows a five-year e-commerce acquisition spree in which Wal-Mart has bought 15 startups, seeking the talent and technology to make it a dominant player online and narrow the massive gap with Amazon.

By Nandita Bose; Editors: Sandra Maler and Grant McCool.