Search results for: “Alibaba Group”

Alibaba Eyes Micromax For Investment And Entry Into India

Asia’s largest e-commerce name Alibaba is keen on entering the Indian market. With all the buzz around the online space, a new pro-investment Prime Minister and the booming Mobile phone market in India, Alibaba has found a secret route to enter.

Sources claim that Chinese search and e-comm giant Alibaba will invest heavily in Micromax, acquiring upto 20 % stake in the Indian bred company. A deal that would cost the company over $ 1.2 Billion, would allow the chinese giant easy access into the market which is tough to get into for new companies.

Alibaba has also been in the news recently for investing in brands like Ouya, Meizu and Snapchat. Micromax is one of the largest mobile phone manufacturer in the domestic market. With its constant damage to Samsung’s position in India, and the new brand “YU” taking on the likes of Xiaomi and OnePlus in the local markets, Micromax makes for a good investment option.

Micromax’s new brand YU is apparently set to launch a new product in India on the 12th of May to provide a more premium outlook, taking on flagship killers. The company was also recently in the news for the sad breakup of OnePlus and Cyanogen .

The investment, however, focuses on Micromax devices and their wide spread reach. Alibaba plans to deploy services like Alipay, the company’s new payment platform. Ant Financial Services Group, which owns Alipay, is China’s largest payment service provider and is controlled by Alibaba’s executive chairman and founder Jack Ma.

May 8, 2015
Alibaba Invests Heavily in Chinese Smartphone Maker Meizu

Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant, has been trying for a while to put its foot in the profitable smartphone business. The company created a record last year with the biggest IPO ever worth $25 Billion. Alibaba is now betting big on Chinese smartphone maker Meizu and has invested a sum of $590 Million in the company.

Through this merger, Alibaba would try to take its operating system Yun OS further in the market. The os is based on the Android platform and provides cloud-based features like e-mail, Web search, weather updates, and GPS navigation tools. It is also called Aliyun OS. Google had previously dissuaded Acer to ship devices based on Aliyun as it was incompatible with other Android devices, and Acer is a signatory of the Open Handset Alliance (OHA).

Meizu like Xiaomi, gets its design “inspirations” from Apple

Meizu has tried to emulate Xiaomi, which in turn “borrows” from Apple. This deal might also help Meizu to take on Xiaomi, which has replaced Samsung in China as the biggest smartphone brand. Meizu isn’t even in the top-5 of that points tally, and a push by Alibaba might work in its favor.

[quote text_size=”small” author=”Alibaba “]

Alibaba Group will provide Meizu with resources and support in the fields of e-commerce, mobile Internet, mobile operating system and data analysis with the aim of developing Meizu’s smartphone ecosystem.

[/quote]

Alibaba has, in the past, invested $280 million in a messaging app called Tango and $120 million in US game maker Kabam. But these investments are yet to bear fruit for the company. It makes sense for it to invest in an established brand rather than starting a brand from scratch.

February 9, 2015
UC Browser Under Government Scanner For Reportedly Sending Information To China

One of the most popular mobile web browsers in India, UC Browser is under the scanner for reportedly sending data from Indian users out of the country. According to a report by Business Standard, “a government lab in Hyderabad is probing how UC Browser can send user details and location data to a remote server.”

This aforementioned lab is the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC), an R&D organisation for the Department of Electronics and Information Technology, under the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology. If found guilty, the Alibaba-owned app could be banned. Further, the report said that the government plans on sending notices to Reliance Jio’s smartphone brand, LYF, and others including Meizu and Videocon.

The same report adds that the UC Browser sends data including device’s IMEI number and location data to a server in China on connecting to a Wi-Fi network.

This report comes a week after the government had asked over 21 smartphone companies, the majority of them being Chinese manufacturers, to outline the procedures and processes adopted by them to ensure security and privacy of users’ data. To submit the detailed responses on security practices, August 28 has been set as the deadline on the basis of which the government would verify and audit the devices.

In May 2015, a Canadian technology research group reported that Alibaba Group Holding Ltd paid more than $1 billion for leaking sensitive user data and said that it is a privacy risk. Another report states that the UC Browser is the most popular mobile browser in India, accounting for nearly a 50 percent share of the market, ahead of Chrome, which is a little over 33 percent, and Opera, which is nearly at 10 percent. UC Browser once accounted for over 60 per cent of the market share in India, but, has lost out a little of its share to Google Chrome since then.

Reacting to the reports of leaking mobile data of its Indian users to China, the Alibaba-owned browser UCWeb made statement on Wednesday saying that the company would never breach the trust of its users. and it takes security and privacy issues very seriously.

August 23, 2017
Facebook Includes Nokia HERE Maps on Messenger, Instagram Ahead of Official Buyout

HERE maps, previously known as Ovi Maps or Nokia Maps, is an alternative of Google Maps and Apple Maps service. Nokia was in talks with buyers to sell out its maps unit, but seems like Facebook has inked a deal to power maps on its various platforms.

The social networking site is presently using Here maps on the mobile version of its website, and on other applications like Facebook Messenger and Instagram. The Facebook spokesperson confirmed the same through statement –

We are testing Nokia HERE maps across Facebook to give us more control and flexibility in delivering a consistent maps experience.

Nokia confirmed that it is seeking buyers to sell out its $2 billion Here map. The Finnish tech brand spent $8.1 billion to buy Chicago-based digital map maker, Navteq, in an effort to capitalize its market for mobile search, but the buy-out deemed unprofitable. Hence, in April, Nokia roped in the heavyweights of technology including Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Alibaba Group, etc. to sell its maps business. According to Techcrunch, one of those potential buyers has already sealed a deal with Nokia.

For now, Facebook has not given any details about its availability on iOS.

May 5, 2015
Yahoo is Closing Shop in China, Hundreds of Employees to Lose Jobs

Once the top portal on the internet, Yahoo has not seen good days in the recent past. But recently, since the arrival of new age apps and features, Yahoo has somewhat faded into the background. The company is now pulling out from China where it had to shut down its web portal in 2013. This move will result in a loss of jobs of 200 employees.

The consumer side businesses of Yahoo such as the Web portal, Yahoo Music and email service has already been shut down. Yahoo’s only office in Beijing was then transformed into a research facility. Now the company is pulling the curtain down on its entire show in China by shutting down the Beijing facility.

Yahoo’s Chinese business was overseen by Alibaba group. The Beijing facility though was directly controlled by Yahoo and the company employed over 350 employees there. The shutdown will lead to massive layoffs in terms of hundreds. Yahoo has intimated the employees about the shutdown. Yahoo had laid off about 2000 employees in 2012 citing financial woes.

Yahoo’s present CEO Marissa Mayer has been instrumental in turning the company around by taking some unpopular decisions. Her first task in the office as CEO was to shut shop in South Korea. As the services were being ignored for newer services outside US, she decided to bring focus back to America. There were also several layoff’s in India, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and the Middle East. In total, the company has cut between 700-900 jobs since October last year.

The wages were also cited as reasons for the shutdown. Yahoo China employees get twice the salary of their Indian counterparts. Considering there are no consumer side application in the country, it made sense for the company to cut the costs there.

March 19, 2015
Narendra Modi Flags Digital India Campaign with Digital India Week
‘Make in India’ is an initiative that was started back in September 2014 by the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi. The principal objective of this initiative is to build manufacturing firms within India to generate more job opportunities and improve the skills of the people of India across different sectors like automobile, aviation, biotechnology, defence manufacturing, mining, oil and gas, ports, railways, textile and much more. As a part of the ‘Make in India’ campaign, Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has launched the ‘Digital India Week’ today. He says the campaign is a part of a grander plan in the future and hopes to give better services with the use of IT.

Narendra Modi has been named as the chairman of the Digital India Week, where he also unveiled the official logo of the campaign that seeks to transform India into a digital powerhouse. For this campaign, Digital India will provide broadband connectivity to all panchayats, Wi-fi in all the schools and universities and public wi-fi hotspots in all important cities by 2019. It will be extended for giving services in areas like health, education, agriculture and banking. The vision is focused on three important areas:
- Digital infrastructure as a utility to every citizen
- Governance and service on Demand
- Digital empowerment of Citizens
The event saw tech powerhouses like Reliance Industries, Tata Group, Wipro, Bharti Group, etc. investing crores on the Digital India Programme.

Officials say a plan will also be announced for “billions of dollars” of investment, most likely in manufacturing—critical for a government that needs to create more jobs, at a faster rate.

India’s first cyber prime minister, Modi has used social media and particularly Twitter, where he has 13 million followers, to fashion himself as a leader in handling technology.

With a growing economy and declining handset prices, India is one of the fastest developing smartphone markets in the world, and Modi is looking to harness India’s potential for social development in fields like education and health.

For now, many companies are in support of the Make in India campaign. Companies from China like Alibaba and Xiaomi showed their full backing for the project. Alibaba Chairman said, “We are excited about India. We are excited about Make in India and Digital India.” Xiaomi President Lin Bin too showed his support and stated, “We have some big plans for India. We fully support Make in India.”

Many companies have started putting up production houses in India like Celkon, Foxconn, Mercedes-Benz, etc.

This initiative looks very promising. This can improve the economic well-being of Indian masses.

Let us see how the campaign shapes up in the future.

You can also follow Make in India YouTube campaign here.
July 1, 2015
China Offers 100% Ownership to Foreign Investors of E-Commerce Companies

China is doing everything in its power to excite foreign investors to come invest their resources in their country. The government of China has now allowed foreign investors to hold 100% stake in e-commerce companies in Shanghai’s Free Trade Zone.

This new policy comes from China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Previously the investors needed to partner with a Chinese company to conduct business. They were also only allowed to own 55 percent stake in the company. China aims to gather more access to retailers and consumers outside the country.

The Shanghai Free Trade Zone (SFTZ) was established in 2013. It is the first free trade zone in mainland China and spans across 29 square kilometers. The intention is for the SFTZ to expand gradually to cover the entire 1,210 square kilometres.

Chinese E-Commerce company Alibaba made history by offering a $25 Billion IPO.

At present, there are more than 12,000 companies operating in the SFTZ. This number also includes 1,677 foreign-funded firms. This decision today will help the foreign companies such as Amazon to infiltrate into the Chinese e-commerce space.

The Chinese e-commerce market is profitable and growing at a rapid rate. At present, there are about 330 million online shoppers in the country, which, for perspective, is more than the entire population of the United States. Chinese e-commerce company, Alibaba.com had also shown its might on the NYSE when if offered the biggest IPO in history worth US$ 25 Billion. Alibaba is planning to enter India and was in talks with Snapdeal in September 2014.

January 19, 2015

More posts