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News feed
Bite-sized news updates on China’s tech world
Thursday, May 12
- Chinese gaming giant Tencent has abandoned the acquisition of Xiaomi-invested gaming phone maker Black Shark, Chinese media outlet 21st Century Business Herald reported on Thursday. Tencent was first reported to be talking with Black Shark in January and hoping the latter would make virtual reality headsets for metaverse-related content. The report said Tencent gave up the acquisition after failing to get approval from authorities. Luo Yuzhou, CEO of Black Shark, who was quoted in the report as saying that the purchase between Tencent and the firm “doesn’t exist, and the firm still has plans for raising money and acquisition.” Founded in 2017, Black Shark is a major gaming phone maker, accounting for 13% of global gaming smartphone markets from the second quarter of 2018 to the first quarter of 2021, according to Canalys. [21st Century Business Herald, in Chinese]
- IDC released a report on Wednesday showing that tablet shipments have grown 8% yearly to 6.8 million units in China in the first quarter. The growth is unaligned with a declining global trend as tablet shipments have decreased 5% in global markets during the same period. Guo Tianxiang, a senior analyst with IDC, said that the new coronavirus outbreaks and accompanying lockdown measures have boosted consumers’ demand for tablets. Guo also noted that lockdowns in Shanghai and surrounding areas hadn’t impacted tablets’ supply chain as these aren’t the main production regions for the device. [IDC, in Chinese]
- AliExpress Russia, the main plank in Alibaba’s strategy for expanding its e-commerce reach into the Russian market, has laid off 40% of its employees as the Russia-Ukraine war and accompanying sanctions continue to weigh on their operations, Russian media outlet Vedomosti reported. The story said the company started to reduce headcount in non-core business lines in April. In 2018, Alibaba established AliExpress Russia with Russian partners including Mail.ru Group and MegaFon, aiming at Russia and neighboring countries’ consumer internet and e-commerce markets. AliExpress Russia’s business represents 95% of online sales from China to the Russian market, data from research agency Infoline Analytics shows. [Vedomosti, in Russian]
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Baidu announced on Thursday that its smart voice business has reached a partnership deal with Nio. The Chinese tech giant will enable the electric vehicle maker to improve the in-car voice assistant experience based on its DuerOS voice-enabled technology. Baidu, which reportedly led a $600 million funding round in Nio back in early 2017, will collaborate with the EV upstart as a “media and content ecosystem provider,” the company told Chinese media without revealing further details. Last October, Chinese artificial intelligence firm iFlytek told investors that it offers its voice assistant solutions to Nio’s three crossover vehicles. [36Kr, in Chinese]
Friday, May 13
- Lei Jun, CEO of Xiaomi, stated on Wednesday that the company’s second smart factory will begin production in late 2023. A Xiaomi representative told TechNode that the firm began building the new automated factory in Beijing’s suburban Changping district last July. Covering 58,300 square meters, the new factory is expected to have an annual output of 10 million smartphones, with an estimated production value of RMB 60 billion ($8.8 billion). Xiaomi’s first smart factory is also located on the outskirts of Beijing, in Yizhuang, and began operating in 2019. [Xiaomi statement, in Chinese]
- Didi has let go of half of its 40 employees in the UK and shelved its expansion plans for overseas markets until at least 2025, The Guardian reported Wednesday, citing people familiar with the matter. The news marks the latest setback for the Chinese ride-hailing platform, which was put under investigation by Chinese regulators last July after its $4.4 billion US IPO, reportedly due to data security concerns. In April, the company revealed plans to halt its ride-hailing services in South Africa and shut down its food delivery business in Japan. [The Guardian]
- On Monday, the US Securities and Exchange Commission added a further 11 Chinese companies to its provisional list of delisting, including ride-hailing giant Didi and online grocery delivery platform Dingdong Maicai. Other Chinese tech firms added to the list included cross-border e-commerce site LightInTheBox Holding, cosmetic surgery app SoYoung, fintech platform Lufax, cloud service provider KingSoft Cloud, news aggregator Qutoutiao, and edtech firm China Online Education Group. The regulator has been expanding its list of foreign companies who face being removed from US exchanges for failing to provide evidence of their financial audits and to disclose whether or not they are owned or controlled by a government entity. A total of 144 firms, or more than half of the roughly 240 US-listed Chinese companies, have now been added to the delisting list, identified under the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act in the US. [SEC]
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