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Chinese Government Begins Blockchain Tech Development

17Mar By Sheldan RungasamyNo Comments

CHINA

Chinese Government Begins Blockchain Tech Development

The government of China is establishing an investment association to adopt blockchain technology development in the country. The project, entitled Global Blockchain Investment and Development Centre (GBIDC), is reportedly an initiative of the Investment Association of China (IAC) which is a social organization set up to simplify important domestic investment projects and contributed to the arrival of foreign capital, according to news outlet The Paper. The news first sparked speculations after a document leaked on the internet appears to be issued by the IAC regarding the new entity. After confirming the legitimacy of the document to The Paper, Liu Ren, Vice Chairman of the IAC, clarified that the initiative came after the association found out about the growing fame of blockchain...

Bike Rental Company Raises $866 Million From Alibaba

13Mar By Sheldan RungasamyNo Comments

CHINA, FUNDING

Bike Rental Company Raises $866 Million From Alibaba

China’s bike rental giant, Ofo announced it raised $866 million investment led by Alibaba Group, with additional partners in Haofeng Group, Tianhe Capital, Ant Financial and Junli Capital. The company is using a combination of debt and equity financing for this round of investment. A statement from the company claimed that this new funding represents a record in the bike-sharing industry. Earlier this month, rumors spread in China reporting Ofo held $280 million funding from Alibaba through chattel mortgage. However, we got no information concerning a relation between the two occurring news reports. "As the global leader in the bike-sharing sector, Ofo has been transitioning from a phase of rapid growth to a stage of high-quality development. Ofo will continue to put our customers fi...

Alibaba Makes Fourth Investment of $1.3 Billion To Boost Offline Retail Strategy

12Feb By RishabhNo Comments

CHINA

Alibaba Makes Fourth Investment of $1.3 Billion To Boost Offline Retail Strategy

Alibaba Group on Sunday revealed that it will be working towards expansion of its retail footprint and has announced that it invested RMB 5.45 billion (around $867 million) for 15% stake in Beijing Easyhome Furnishing, China’s second-largest home-improvement supplies and furniture chain and invested $486 million in Shiji Retail Information Technology, for 38% stakes. “The investment will combine the strengths of the world’s largest e-commerce platform and rich offline sources of Easyhome,” Alibaba said in a statement. Alibaba has been working on its strategy- "new retail" which is aimed at combining online and offline. As a part of this strategy, the Beijing Easyhome deal is Alibaba's fourth major investment in a brick and mortar chain after it bought majority of stakes in hypermark...

Non-Profit Organization RSF Urges Chinese Reporters To Quit Apple iCloud

9Feb By RishabhNo Comments

CHINA

Non-Profit Organization RSF Urges Chinese Reporters To Quit Apple iCloud

Reporters Without Borders or Reporters Sans Frontières(RSF), a non-profit NGO that promotes freedom of information and freedom of the press calls on Chinese reporters and journalists who are using Apple iCloud to close their accounts or relocate by February 28, 2018, when control of their data will pass to the Chinese state. This is because of the Apple's move of outsourcing the Chinese iCloud operations to a firm which has ties with the local government, by February 28. "RSF alerts journalists and bloggers using iCloud China to the danger that this migration poses to their security and the security of their sources, and urges them to migrate their account to another geographic region or to close it by 28 February," the report reads. Apple iCloud stores the majority of an iPhone or Ma...

7Feb By reutersNo Comments

CHINA

Apple Brings Alibaba-linked Payment System into China Stores Amid Market Push

Apple Inc will accept Chinese mobile payment app Alipay in its local stores, boosting its ties with giant e-commerce firm Alibaba Group Holding Ltd amid a push by the iPhone maker to revive growth in the world’s No.2 economy. The tie-up will make Alipay, run by Alibaba affiliate Ant Financial, the first third-party mobile payment system to be accepted at any physical Apple store worldwide, Ant Financial said in a statement on Wednesday. Apple’s own payment system has had a lukewarm reception in China. The Cupertino-based firm will accept Alipay payment across its 41 brick-and-mortar retail stores in China, said Ant Financial, which was valued at $60 billion in 2016. Apple, whose China website, iTunes store and App Store have been accepting Alipay for more than a year, did not imme...

Are The Days of Bitcoin Over? Becomes One-Third In Less Than 2 Months

6Feb By RishabhNo Comments

ANALYSIS

Are The Days of Bitcoin Over? Becomes One-Third In Less Than 2 Months

Bitcoin has been tumbling since the past few, and it's been over 1.5 months that it last it's all time high. Bitcoin hit an all time high $19,343 in December 16, 2017 after which it fell and topped at $17,135 on January 6, 2018. Ever since then its has been falling and hit $6,083 by IST 10:36 am February 6, 2018. Investor firms think that it is the time that Bitcoin will have to settle after being too dynamic with its price. The downfall is amidst the raising worries about regulation on the ungoverned cryptocurrency. Even on Friday, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America said that they will ban cryptocurrency purchase by their credit card customers. In India, at the time of Union Budget 2018 pre-poll the Finance Minister of India, Arun Jaitley said,"Cryptocurren...

Electric Vehicles and its Impacts on Future

5Feb By RishabhNo Comments

Automobile

Electric Vehicles and its Impacts on Future

"We will not stop until every car on the road is electric"- Elon Musk The above line by founder of Tesla (world's first electric automobile company) is somewhat going to be true in upcoming decades. Electric vehicles are taking over the traditional diesel and petrol engines, due to the growing concerns on fossil fuel consumption and pollution; electro-mobility is now bound to happen in the following decade. Going back into the history, a similar transition happened when horses were replaced by high-horsepower internal combustion engines that gave birth to the automobile sector, which is now a prominent figure in GDP of most countries in the world. “HUMAN inventiveness…has still not found a mechanical process to replace horses as the propulsion for vehicles,” lamented Le Petit Journal...

Apple Data Centre in China Will Open by 2020

4Feb By Press Trust of IndiaNo Comments

News

Apple Data Centre in China Will Open by 2020

The construction work of Chinese data centre for the US tech giant, Apple Inc, will begin later this year and it is expected to open by 2020, sources close to the project has said. The communications administration of southwest China's Guizhou Province, where the centre will be built, provided the timetable. With an investment of USD 1 billion, the data centre will cover 67 hectares in Guian New Area and it will offer iCloud services on the Chinese mainland. Starting February 28, iCloud services on the Chinese mainland will be operated by a local partner, Guizhou-Cloud Big Data Industry Co, Ltd. Before the data centre begins operations, the Chinese company will rent servers from China's three major telecom operators to provide iCloud services, the state-run Xinhua news agency repo...

27Jan By NitishNo Comments

CHINA

Tencent Launched China’s Cashierless Store in Shanghai

Chinese Internet giant Tencent has opened its first cashier-less pop-up store in Shanghai in a move to tap into the country's promising unmanned retail industry. At the 300-square meter shop named We Life, shoppers can use WeChat Pay, the proprietary e-wallet of messenger app WeChat, to buy items without paying cash, swiping a card, or interacting with a single human being, according to state-run China Daily. Customers can use a phone to scan a quick response code at the gate, which enables user identification and automatic payment. All products are equipped with radio-frequency identification tags that use magnetic chips to store information such as price and inventory. The store will be open until February 4 and showcases Tencent's payment capabilities in the realm of physica...

Now its Tencent Backed ‘Super-App’ Vs. Tencent’s own WeChat

25Jan By RishabhNo Comments

CHINA

Now its Tencent Backed ‘Super-App’ Vs. Tencent’s own WeChat

Another issue that is rising in China is tech apps taking over its rivals from the same backers. Recently, Meituan, a kind of Chinese technology that very few people out of the country understand is giving some serious competition to WeChat. Tencent Holdings Ltd, the messaging giant app is the developer of WeChat and a key investor in Meituan and watching its siblings take over each other, is something that nobody wants. Meituan has grown very popular in China. It has a restaurant review feature like that of Yelp (San Fransisco based review MNC), while its app also lets users order food off the menu from phone. Even to pay, users don't have to leave the Meituan app. This is the reason why its giving serious competition to Tencent's WeChat. the startup is already the world's fourth...

Chinese Handset Maker Coolpad Raises $300 Million Funding

18Jan By AnkitaNo Comments

CHINA, FUNDING

Chinese Handset Maker Coolpad Raises $300 Million Funding

Handset maker Coolpad today said it has received fresh investment of $300 million from Power Sun Ventures, which the Shenzhen-based firm will use to expand its capabilities in artificial intelligence. The funding comes after the company separated from Chinese Internet player, LeEco. "Chinese property mogul Chen Hua, Founder and Head, Kingkey Group, is leading the new investment through Power Sun Ventures, a family trust," Coolpad said in a statement. Power Sun is expected to invest USD 300 million in coming years in Coolpad, it added. Coolpad Group CEO Jiang Chao said, "With this new investment, Coolpad aims to shift its focus from being just into mobile business to an AI-focused technology company. We plan to expand this by creating AI focused applications across communication...

2Jan By reutersNo Comments

CHINA

China’s WeChat Denies Storing User Chats

Tencent Holdings’ WeChat, China’s most popular messenger app, on Tuesday denied storing users’ chat histories, after a top businessman was quoted in media reports as saying he believed Tencent was monitoring everyone’s account. “WeChat does not store any users’ chat history. That is only stored in users’ mobiles, computers and other terminals,” WeChat said in a post on the social media platform. “WeChat will not use any content from user chats for big data analysis. Because of WeChat’s technical model that does not store or analyse user chats, the rumour that ‘we are watching your WeChat everyday’ is pure misunderstanding.” Li Shufu, chairman of Geely Holdings, owner of the Volvo car brand, was quoted in Chinese media on Monday as saying Tencent Chairman Ma Huateng “must be watchi...