alibaba
New regulation in China to hit food delivery giants’ profit model
Between 2016 and 2020, the number of people who ordered food online in China doubled to 400 million. The boom was in part thanks to the generous subsidies shelled out by the country’s food deliv
Voila raises $6M for its AI-powered storefronts for online creators
Voila, a startup building infrastructure for social commerce, is bringing concepts from China’s e-commerce market to the U.S. The company offers an alternative to the “link in bio” s
India bans Garena Free Fire, 53 more China-linked apps
India has banned Tencent’s Xriver, Garena’s Free Fire, NetEase’s Onmyoji Arena and Astracraft and 50 more apps with apparent links to China, the latest in a series of similar blockin
ByteDance reorganizes strategic investment team, causes panic
What a roller coaster day for China’s tech industry. TikTok’s parent company ByteDance has dissolved its strategic investment team, sending worrying messages to other internet giants that
Shopify and China’s JD.com team up to capture cross-border sellers
Two of the world’s largest e-commerce players are joining joined hands. Major Chinese online retailer JD.com has formed a strategic partnership with Ottawa-based Shopify to help global brands ta
China’s digital yuan wallet now has 260 million individual users
One of the fastest-growing apps in China right now, by installs, is the central bank’s digital yuan wallet: 261 million individual users (as opposed to enterprises), about one-fifth of the popul
China’s robotaxis charged ahead in 2021
Autonomous driving startups in China are in an arms race to put passengers in their machine-driven vehicles. Every few weeks, news arrives that another major player has got the greenlight to launch a
Ivorian e-commerce startup ANKA, formerly Afrikrea, raises $6.2M pre-Series A
A study by McKinsey & Company on general e-commerce activities in Africa says consumer spending will reach over $2 trillion in the next three years. Much of this spending falls under the importati
Tencent offloads stakes in allies as it continues investment spree
Chinese internet titan Tencent is divesting its vast portfolio. On Tuesday, the company announced plans to offload more than $3 billion worth of shares in Sea, a Singaporean internet conglomerate, tri
Kindle’s China future in doubt after disappearing from online shelves
Since Kindle began shipping in China nearly nine years ago, the e-book giant has garnered a loyal following in the country. The journey has never been easy, thanks to regulatory hurdles around digital
AI chip maker Kneron raises $25M for autonomous driving push
AI chips, which are semiconductors designed to accelerate machine learning, have many applications. One of the promising use cases, according to Albert Liu, is using AI chips in autonomous driving veh
India’s Cars24, a used-vehicle sales platform, raises $400M, now at a $3.3B valuation, to double down on growth
With supply chains in the automotive industry continuing to be disrupted due to COVID-19, demand has surged in the used-car market. Today, one of the startups that’s seeing a lot of growth as a
Alibaba’s Southeast Asia arm Lazada hits 130M annual consumers
Alibaba has always aspired to bring its e-commerce service to customers outside China. Its strategy is multi-thronged. The giant’s house-developed AliExpress has found success in Russia in recen
Apple iCloud, Twitter and Minecraft vulnerable to ‘ubiquitous’ zero-day flaw
A number of popular services, including Apple iCloud, Twitter, Cloudflare, Minecraft and Steam, are reportedly vulnerable to a zero-day vulnerability affecting a popular Java logging library. The vuln
Easol raises $25M for its experiences and event marketing, booking and payments platform
The gradual return of tourism and travel in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to see a wave of startups raising rounds of funding to meet new opportunities in the market. In the latest devel
Equity Monday: When does a selloff become a rout?
Hello and welcome back to Equity, a podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines. Despite the advanced week, news is still coming in hot and hea
Why Pinduoduo is putting all its profit into agriculture
For the past few years, Pinduoduo has been widely regarded as Alibaba’s strongest challenger. While Alibaba reported 863 million annual active consumers across its retail platforms in the 12 mon
Meru.com takes in new capital toward its goal of being LatAm’s ‘Alibaba’
Meru customers can select and purchase products in minutes with a guarantee from the company that they will receive those products and at the best market prices.
China banning foreign IPOs would be pretty unsurprising
China is considering removing the VIE loophole that allowed Chinese companies to list in the United States, closing a method by which local companies could access foreign capital.
Ant is changing how consumers borrow money from its app
In December 2020, Beijing laid out a guideline for Ant Group to “rectify” its business after calling off its IPO, which could have been the largest initial public offering in history. In t