Bottom line: Wanda’s new e-commerce initiative looks overvalued following a recent investment, but could have the resources and expertise it needs to pose a serious challenge to Alibaba and JD.com.
Wanda raises money for e-commerce JV
Fresh from the successful listing of its core real estate arm, Wanda Group is pushing full-steam ahead into another major new initiative in e-commerce, aiming to challenge industry leaders Alibaba (NYSE: BABA) and JD.com (Nasdaq: JD). Wanda’s colorful and very wealthy founder Wang Jianlin was busy talking up his e-commerce initiative this week, announcing a major new funding and important new partner for the project. Wang has forged ahead in several new areas over the past year, including hotels, theme parks and movie theaters, as he attempts to build up an entertainment empire to rival global names like Disney (NYSE: DIS). Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Apple’s new UnionPay tie-up is aimed at an eventual roll-out of its Apple Pay in China, while Baidu’s reported purchase of 99Pay marks a late but needed bid to boost its electronic payments capabilities.
Baidu eyes 99Bill
A couple of electronic payments stories reflect the rapid changes taking place in China’s banking market, where such payments are quickly making cash and even traditional credit cards obsolete. The higher-profile of the 2 deals has global gadget leader Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) in a deal to accept payments for its China app store in partnership with leading electronic payments firm UnionPay. The second deal has leading Internet search Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) reportedly looking to boost its presence in the space with plans to buy existing player 99Bill for 2 billion yuan ($325 million). Read Full Post…
New overseas investments by 2 of China’s top 3 Internet firms hint at where future priorities will lie for e-commerce leader Alibaba (NYSE: BABA) and Internet search giant Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU), which have made new purchases in the US and Brazil, respectively. More broadly speaking, the relatively modest size of these latest investments reflects the very real fact that major M&A targets have mostly disappeared by now, putting pressure on the cash-rich trio of Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent (HKEx: 700) to look overseas for places to invest. Based on the nature of these new investments and other similar recent ones, it’s becoming clear that overseas companies are most interested in the Chinese companies’ cash and would probably prefer to avoid being seen as a “made in China” company. Read Full Post…
Two of China’s most dynamic e-commerce firms are in the headlines today with new strategic moves, including JD.com’s purchase of a Russian rival and Vipshop’s (NYSE: VIPS) plans to open a small loan operation. Both of these moves look well conceived, taking their respective companies into new but related areas with big growth potential. The 2 moves come as JD prepares to launch a $1 billion-plus IPO in New York as soon as this week, and as Vipshop looks for acquisitions following a big fund raising exercise earlier this year. Read Full Post…
Fast rising search operators Qihoo 360 (NYSE: QIHU) and Sogou may be challenging sector heavyweight Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) in terms of market share, but they’re having far more difficulty finding an audience among advertisers that are the sector’s main revenue source. That’s my main conclusion after seeing the latest data for all 3 companies, which show Qihoo and Sogou making steady gains in terms of search traffic but failing to translate those gains into meaningful revenue. Read Full Post…
Many of China’s biggest tech leaders were chattering in cyberspace last week from Beijing, where they were gathered for this year’s National People’s Congress and the related Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), collectively known as the lianghui. Lei Jun, CEO of handset sensation Xioami, was uncharacteristically low-key in talking about his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, as was Li Dongsheng, the soft-spoken CEO of leading TV maker TCL (HKEx: 1070; Shenzhen: 000100). But the marketing savvy Xiaomi was still up to its usual publicity tricks, helping to spread a series of photos showing Robin Li, founder of search leader Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU), using a Xiaomi handset in one of the sessions. Read Full Post…
Tie-up talk swirls around Tencent-JD.com, Dangdang-Yihaodian
It’s a new day on the Chinese Internet, which is as good an excuse as any to talk about rumors of the latest tie-ups in the overheated e-commerce space. One of the latest pieces of gossip has a partnership taking shape between JD.com and Tencent (HKEx: 700), China’s second and third largest e-commerce operators. The other has an alliance forming between Dangdang (NYSE: DANG) and Yihaodian, 2 smaller players at the bottom of the list of the country’s top 10 e-commerce firms. I’ll offer my own guess that there’s a 50-50 chance the first rumor is true, while chances of Dangdang-Yihaodian tie-up look much smaller, perhaps around 20 percent. Read Full Post…
Two of China’s biggest Internet names are making interesting new moves into the tough US market, with word that Alibaba has launched an American e-commerce website and Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) founder Robin Li is helming a major new Hollywood animation studio. Both moves look cautious but relatively well conceived, even though each carries a degree of risk due to intense competition in the US e-commerce and animation sectors. Still, I have to admire both companies for at least trying, even if their chances of success could be around 50-50. Read Full Post…
It seems quite appropriate that we’re ending 2013 with word of yet another acquisition and New York IPO plan in China’s Internet space by leading search site Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU), capping a year that will go down as the most active for Chinese online M&A in the sector’s short but colorful history. It’s certainly appropriate that Baidu’s name is connected to both of these final news bits for the year, since the company and e-commerce leader Alibaba were the 2 most active drivers of this year’s M&A wave. Read Full Post…
Lenovo compliments Huawei on Italy smartphone push
China’s microblogging sphere is buzzing with a series of new posts that hint at a couple of budding friendships in the nation’s tech realm, one between smartphone aspirants Huawei and Lenovo (HKEx: 992) and the other between e-commerce titan Alibaba and online search leader Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU). Of course it’s quite possible that the tweeting is just casual conversation by company executives on their Weibo accounts. But both instances also hint at the potential for future tie-ups that could help these all 4 of these companies attain their different strategic aims. Read Full Post…
Just days after I said that NQ Mobile (NYSE: NQ) looked like a company to watch after its issue of $172.5 million worth of bonds, infamous short seller Muddy Waters has launched an assault on the software security maker, sparking a sell-off that has wiped out half of its market value. Internet search leader Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) is also coming under assault from different quarters, in this case taking heat from company watchers and regulators after promising returns that many believe are unrealistic on its newly launched investment product. Read Full Post…
