The joint venture features AliExpress, Mail.ru Group, MegaFon Russian Direct Investment Fund
The operation to establish a joint venture in Russia signed Alibaba Group – which will bring together e-commerce platforms, social media and popular games for the benefit of the country’s consumers and will offer Russian small and medium-sized enterprises greater access both locally and locally international markets – it’s a done deal.
First announced in September 2018, the joint venture features AliExpress, the leading Russian Internet company Mail.ru Group, the Russian mobile telecommunications operator MegaFon and the sovereign wealth fund Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF).
After the federal anti-monopoly service of Russia authorized the JV to move forward last June, now AliExpress Russia JV is owned by the majority of Russian shareholders, with a board of directors composed of RDIF executives, Alibaba Group, MegaFon and Mail.ru Group. Group CEO Mail.ru Boris Dobrodeev is the chairman of the board, while AliExpress Russia’s chief Liu Wei and the first deputy general manager of the group Mail.ru Dmitry Sergeev will serve as co-CEO of the JV.
Alibaba remains focused on fulfilling its basic mission
“Alibaba remains focused on fulfilling the mission ‘to make it easy to do business anywhere.’ “AliExpress Russia JV is an important part of Alibaba’s globalization strategy and a key step towards our long-term goal to help 10 million small businesses achieve profitability and serve 2 billion customers worldwide,” he said. Daniel Zhang, Executive Chairman and CEO of Alibaba Group.
“Together with Mail.ru Group, RDIF and MegaFon, we are committed to accelerating the development of the digital economy of consumers in Russia and the CIS countries, allowing regional brands and SMEs to reach and serve their target consumers through our unique and innovative shopping experience, “said Zhang.
The JV group and Mail.ru will conclude a strategic cooperation agreement related, among other things, to traffic and product initiatives. The JV will also promote its services on the Mail.ru Group platforms through exclusive solutions for product integration and marketing.
Mail.Ru Group has 100 million Internet users
Mail.Ru Group has 100 million Internet users through its social media properties, messaging, e-mail and online games, with 90% of all Internet users in Russia using at least one of its properties every month. The two largest Russian social media sites of Russia VKontakte and Odnoklassniki and its main email service are all owned by the Mail.ru Group.
In addition to combining social media and e-commerce, the joint venture will work to support the upgrade of consumption in Russia by offering a greater selection of high-quality products on the market. For Russian small and medium-sized enterprises it is an opportunity to tap into a new connected ecosystem in the domestic market, accessing over 600 million consumers using Alibaba platforms, including China, Southeast Asia, Turkey, Europe and India.
The joint venture also plans to participate in the acceleration of the Russian digital economy, exploiting the respective strengths of the parties in electronic commerce, social and digital media, logistics and the local market and helping to build the future commercial infrastructure in Russia and in the world.
Today it’s clear how Douyin is showcasing the future of social and e-commerce. Focus on Douyin if you want to win in China. Let’s see why
Chinese e-commerce sector is booming, having a higher e-commerce spend this year than the rest of the world combined. Last data show us, again, how China is such a big opportunity for brands. As we know, the Dragon, once known as less connected country in the world, has become the land of the e-commerce giants with Alibaba and JD amongst many others all dominating online spend right now. But other new players are growing behind the curtain. Pinduoduo, Meituan, Kuaishou, Little Red Book and Douyin some names.
That’s why is not wrong to say that the opportunity for brands isn’t in the Alibaba’s & JD’s. Whilst they account for over 50% of Chinese e-commerce, it’s more effective as a brand to go after the other portion that isn’t the lions share that is found through other e-commerce channels. Let’s see how Douyin is becoming month by month an important player in e-commerce sector. We’ve mentioned Douyin but also the “underbelly” of Chinese commerce, such as private communities, for example social sellers on WeChat.
Short-Form vertical video is going to be the dominant format over the next 5 years, and Douyin is the platform that will lead the way. We’ve always been confident on short-form video, and a large reason for that is the huge growth of Douyin, with over 500m monthly active users and rising, and over 50% of those using the app daily.
Today it’s clear that Douyin is showcasing the future of social and e-commerce, seamlessly integrating the two through content and future technologies.
Douyin’s latest feature is a true game-changer. You can now select a feature in a video, for example, a person or item of clothing, and search for other videos or images containing them or directly buy the products recommended. What’s the meaning? It’s what we’ve predicted will happen: Next generation of social media led by AI.
Could be a shock, but forget Tmall, Taobao and WeChat – focus on Douyin if you want to win. Let’s see why. Right now Douyin’s aims are to get as many users as possible and grow the platform, even outside China, and give exposure to great content, there is no ulterior motive like there is with other social platforms that are pay-to-win.
On Douyin, content wins, and that’s the best time for brands to build an audience. Digital experts always been bullish on short-form video and Douyin in particular, and this latest feature reinforces that and opens up a world of possibility for brands in connecting with their audience. Brands need to be working toward how they can leverage the direction that social is moving to, and they need to be doing that now – this is merely the tip of the iceberg. Are you going to start building an audience on Douyin?
China is a huge opportunity, but everyone should remember that it pays tenfold if you think outside the box, be bold and be creative. Think beyond the status quo platforms that everyone talks about and look at the opportunities everyone forgets. This is where the real arbitrage can be found, and Douyinis one the top player to interact with.
The two have formed a partnership to improve the user experience and to digitize the operations of the future Universal Beijing Resort, which will open in 2021
A cutting-edge theme park with the best technology that improves the user experience. This is the Alibaba and Universal Parks & Resorts project that intends to make the future Universal Beijing Resort, which will open in 2021, one of the most technological theme parks in the world.
The park will use facial recognition during park admission, app-based food ordering and more. To help is the ABOS project, which offers all the tools and services of Alibaba to companies so that they can better meet the pace and needs of the Chinese market.
Brian Roberts, president and CEO of US communications and entertainment company Comcast, owner of Universal Studios, said it was important to make sure that Universal makes it fun and easy for guests to enjoy their time with family and friends.
Visitors can use the local Koubei service app
“Our collaboration with Alibaba will help us do exactly that. Together, we can take the theme park experience to a new level, “Roberts said.
Visitors will be able to book tickets and hotels via Beijing’s Universal Fliggy flagship store and will also be able to watch the resort’s schedule and universal movies on Alibaba’s Youbu video streaming app.
Once at the resort, visitors have the opportunity to use Alipay’s facial recognition technology for anything. The use of Alipay mini-programs is also planned to improve the guest experience, such as travel planning or parking, as well as encouraging low-carbon lifestyle choices.
Alibaba’s cloud computing arm will support the technology infrastructure
The companies, which also collaborate with the Beijing Tourism Group, expect the collaboration to offer “the best experience for guests” and establish a new benchmark for the entertainment industry and theme parks globally.
Daniel Zhang, executive president and CEO of Alibaba Group, said: “This partnership will also bring to fruition a multidimensional, data-enabled operations-management solution for the industry and create a truly digitized theme park,” he said. “The future of commerce is driven by technology and big data, and digitization will be the source of brand-new growth opportunities for all businesses.”
The Alibaba Business Operating System (ABOS) program is a complete solution that helps brands use all the tools available in the corporate ecosystem, which includes marketing and branding, sales, product development, customer services, finance, logistics, supply chain and management channel and local services on request.
The delivery food platform is preceded only by Alibaba and Tencent
Meituan, the Chinese delivery food platform, closed at $ 89 per share on October 8th, up 5.08% from the previous day, reaching an all-time high of $ 89.25 per share with a market capitalization of $ 516.2 billion.
The evaluation currently makes Meituan the third largest Internet company listed in China after Alibaba ($ 428.3 billion) and Tencent ($ 394.3 billion).
On the other hand, Chinese Internet research and Baidu’s artificial intelligence engine closed at $ 99.53 on October 9 with a value of its US stock market at $ 34.69 billion, actually lagging behind Meituan as the fourth largest Chinese Internet giant.
Meituan and Tencent are currently the two kings of Hong Kong shares
As a Meituan pillar activity, the financial report shows that the transaction amount of food and beverage delivery activities in the second quarter of 2019 was 93.1 billion yuan, up 36.5% year-on-year; the number of food and beverage delivery orders was 2.1 billion yuan, an increase of 34.6% on an annual basis. Furthermore, the average value increased by 1.4% on an annual basis.
According to an analyst at Tiger Securities, Meituan and Tencent are currently the two kings of Hong Kong shares. The data also showed that Tencent Holdings, in recent days, recorded a turnover of 4.967 billion HK $, while the turnover of Meituan approached 3.238 billion HK $.
The new Indian rules for e-commerce companies could have to do with the fall in investments
E-commerce giant Amazon has invested $ 395 million dollars in its market unit in India this year, which is one-third of what it did in 2018 with $ 1.3 billion, according to local newspaper Economic Times. With only three months to go to the end of the year, it seems likely that this will be the first time since 2012 that Amazon’s annual investment in India has fallen.
Analysts tracing the history of Amazon India have mentioned that over the past seven years, its investments have steadily increased year by year with a phenomenal peak in 2018. This level could be attributed to Amazon’s entry into the food sector in India.
Amazon’s sharp decline in India has attracted the attention of Indian and US lawmakers
The news of Amazon‘s sharp decline in its investments in India has also attracted the attention of Indian and US legislators. During the Indian summit of the World Economic Forum held in New Delhi, Indian trade minister Piyush Goyal and US trade secretary Wilbur Ross had a long debate on this issue.
Ross asked Goyal for the new guidelines for e-commerce in India regarding its foreign direct investment (FDI) rules, which in the past had put a strain on foreign-funded e-tailers.
India, on the other hand, seems to have become a land of conquest for many Chinese investors. From Tencent to Alibaba, up to pass for Xiaomi.
The decision has also created controversy after local institutions and Amazon
“India is very clear on domestic and political compulsions. We welcome all e-commerce companies that want to work in India as agnostic platforms. We do not want to look at structures that fall within the scope of the law, but in a sense to break the spirit of the same. This is the clear position of the government and we have been clear for decades regarding the BJP” Goyal told Ross.
In his response to Goyal, Ross claimed that Amazon would have spent much more in India if it had not experienced a decline in growth due to e-commerce policies. “It is more important to obtain the most efficient form of retail trade. The demand for a country like India must balance those economic benefits for the population as a whole, even going against the special interests of the retail segment or competitors. nationals, “the US trade secretary said.
The company has revised its revenue target for 2019, in a range from 120 billion yuan ($ 16.8 billion) from a previous target set at the end of last year of 100 billion yuan
Douyin, a popular Chinese short video app known as TikTok outside of China, has introduced a reverse image search tool that allows some users to find in-video products such as clothing, which they can then purchase directly from within the app.
The move could help ByteDance, owner of Douyin, take advantage of the growing popularity of the video app, which has accumulated 320 million active users every day in July. The Beijing-based company has just revised its revenue target for 2019, in a range from 120 billion yuan ($ 16.8 billion) from a previous target set at the end of last year of 100 billion yuan, according to Reuters.
The function is only available for users selected on the Chinese version
The new function was identified by Chinese technology analyst Matthew Brennan, who showed the Twitter search tool for the first time last week. While watching a video clip of Chinese comedian Xiao Shenyang, other celebrity videos appeared after clicking on the circle icon on the right side of the screen. While Brennan moved the research area on Xiao’s trousers, similar apparel products appeared that could be purchased directly by users.
ByteDance has not commented on the news, but the description on the app page said that the reverse search function can be used to find other celebrity videos or videos of similar pets, based on still images, suggesting that the company is collecting identifiable data from its content that could potentially be used to generate advertising revenue.
The function is only available for users selected on the Chinese version of the app and it is not clear whether Douyin will make it available in the foreign market in the future. It is also not clear whether the platform is scanning videos that Douyin users have labelled as private.
Other companies have also used this technology, attracting however several criticisms on the privacy front
Supported by artificial intelligence algorithms, the technology behind the reverse image search is not new. The Google search engine offers the feature, but has raised privacy concerns, especially in the era of deepfakes.
In August, the Zao face exchange app, supported by Chinese social media developer Momo, became viral on social media but immediately sparked controversy over privacy issues. The growing concern for privacy related to facial recognition has led to Facebook’s decision to discontinue an automatic photo tagging option, according to Reuters.
With over 500 million monthly active users in 154 countries worldwide, TikTok is rethinking its future
TikTok, the ByteDace app that deals with short videos, has labeled the United States, Japan and India as strategic countries to favor its expansion abroad, according to Chinese media reports LatePost.
While the United States and Japan have already been popular markets for TikTok, the Beijing-based startup has increased its emphasis on the Indian market, where the company has increased the number of active daily users (DAUs) by 50 million units in 2019 .
The number of new users of TikTok and its Chinese version Douyin reached 188 million in the first quarter of 2019, with an increase on an annual basis of 70% and half of them came from India, as reported by the analysis organization Sensor Tower app. The Indians also installed the TikTok app 89 million times in the first quarter of the year, more than eight times last year’s number. By comparison, the United States has gained around 13 million installations over the same period of time.
To continue its growth in the Indian market, TikTok will join Vigo
Due to this rapid growth, India has been updated to the list of strategic countries, although it had previously been ranked lower in terms of average revenue per user (ARPU), an indicator applied internally by the company to differentiate the markets.
The move also comes after a backlash that the company faced in April, when the Indian government ordered TikTok to be removed from Google and the Apple App Store for two weeks. The sanction came due to alleged encouragement to obscenity and other illegal content. After the reversal of judicial prohibition, the app quickly returned to the country’s main downloads.
To continue its growth in the Indian market, some sources have reported that TikTok will be joining Vigo, another video-sharing app owned by ByteDance.
TikTok continues its rise in the world, with a special focus on South America
But between the new frontiers of the app there is not only India, Even the Brazilian market, in fact, has attracted the attention of TikTok’s plans. Everything comes from when its competitors, including the Kuaishou platform (marketed outside China as Kwai) and the live streaming app YY, are growing rapidly in many South American countries.
Tiktok, meanwhile, removed the UK from selected strategic countries. The Chinese company has been under investigation in the United Kingdom since February, due to the way in which it collects and uses the personal data of young users, with particular attention to the safety of minors present on the platform
The US PayPal will compete with two major payment companies like Alipay and WeChat Pay
PayPal, a company based in the United States, has just become the first foreign payment company to enter the Chinese market. This is confirmed by the People’s Bank of China, which approved the acquisition by the US company of a 70% shareholding in Guofubao Information Technology (GoPay).
PayPal made the acquisition through a subsidiary in Shanghai, Yinbaobao Information Technology. The financial details of the agreement, however, were not disclosed. GoPay is a joint venture between China International Electronic Commerce Center (CIECC) of the Ministry of Commerce and HNA Retailing Holding. According to preliminary information, it has mobile, online and cross-border yuan payment service licenses.
In 2019 the value of transactions for digital payments in China amounts to about $ 1.6 trillion
The deal is expected to end in the fourth quarter of this year, subject to customary closing conditions, said PayPal, which is entering the burgeoning payment market in China.
According to a recent report, the total value of transactions in the country’s digital payments segment amounts to about $ 1.6 trillion in 2019 and is expected to double to around $ 3.1 trillion in 2023. Growth will be driven by digital trade, which has accumulated a total transaction value of $ 988.8 billion in 2019. The main players in the segment are the Alipay and WeChat Pay e-wallet providers.
The real rival will be Alipay, which can count on 4 million users in the USA
Earlier this year, it was reported that Alipay could count on 4 million users in the United States. The company has also stated that the app can be used for in-store payments at 7,000 locations across the country. Payments abroad, on the other hand, are available in 40 countries and regions of the world.
The parent company Alipay Ant Financial has also invested in a series of online payment services abroad, particularly in rapidly growing markets throughout southern and south-east Asia.
A fleet of 7,000 logistics robots for a new generation of automated warehouses with almost zero labour. This is the strategy of Geek +, based in Beijing, to support e-commerce and production
The economy of the future will be increasingly smart and the logistics companies that will be the first to be able to speed up and reduce employees will also be among the first to lead the market.
As in the case of the four-year start-up Geek + Technology, which has become a rising star in the Chinese automation revolution, pushing the country towards logistics robots for the e-commerce and production sectors.
As confirmed by Zheng Yong, founder and CEO, Geek + has implemented over 7000 robots and completed over 200 intelligent logistics projects on four continents. To its customers, Geek + offers four different robots based on artificial intelligence: picking, moving, sorting and forklift systems
Geek +’s main customers include Alibaba Group Holding, SF Express courier and state-owned automobile manufacturer FAW Group
Zheng in an interview last week on the SCMP, said: “I think we did a good job combining technology with industry applications. How to sell it [smart logistics] to the consumer and gain even more confidence, besides facing our competitors – this is the challenge that awaits us. ”
The future of which Geek + speaks is possible to trace it in its smart factory in Nanjing, opened on September 25th. The new structure, designed with an annual production of over 10,000 robots, employs industrial robots, its own AI algorithms and its own production logistics management system, and other automated programs for assembling robots.
The procedure for checking and moving the products is impressive: the robots automatically complete the final tests and the inspection of the finished product, after which they proceed directly into the area of the finished product to be packaged and prepared for shipment. Without any employee.
Zheng on the factory said: “Over the past four years, we have already developed and implemented revolutionary technologies for storage operations. With smart factories, we continue to pave the way to a truly intelligent supply chain.”
That growth potential has made Geek+ a major focus of venture capital firms in the robotics industry
However, Geek + is not the only one aiming to become the vanguard for robots and logistics factories. For example, last year, the Uniqlo Japanese clothing retail chain has restructured its existing warehouse with an automated system created in collaboration with the Japanese logistics company Daifuku, helping to reduce personnel costs. Another example is JD.com, which transformed a 40,000 square meter warehouse in Shanghai with Mujin technology last year.
“It is still limited … and companies still need to hire a lot of workers to handle the big sale season,” Liu Yunhui, professor of mechanical and automation engineering at the faculty of engineering at the Chinese University of Hong Kong said. “It also requires warehouses to have a suitable layout [for logistics robots to work efficiently].”
To be sure, the largest logistics robots player in the industry remains Amazon Robotics, which has more than 200,000 such systems deployed. This company, formerly known as Kiva Systems, is a subsidiary of US e-commerce giant Amazon.com.
Pinduoduo is not the new kid on the block anymore. From lower-tier cities, it has made its way to the largest centers so much so that today, it is officially a viable competitor in China’s e-commerce arena
There is a Chinese app that embraces many of China’s contemporary trends and at the same time, faces the market’s modern challenges with extraordinary success. It is Pinduoduo, the e-commerce platform for group-buying deals, which is threatening Alibaba and JD.com’s duopoly in the Middle Kingdom.
Pinduoduo has been China’s third most popular shopping app since July 2017 but its daily active users have outnumbered JD.com’s for at least the past 12 months, turning it into China’s second-biggest e-commerce company by the number of users.
Its origins can be traced back to the US Silicon Valley where Pinduoduo’s founder, Colin Huang, started his career as a Google engineer. Mr. Huang, indeed, belongs to that group of Chinese entrepreneurs who, after a working experience abroad, have returned home to launch those hi-tech companies, which are making history today.
In particular, Colin Huang has managed to combine Chinese love for bargaining with the force of recommendation among friends while also targeting and unlocking the most neglected market, that of low-income households. The mission is clear: “The future of the Chinese digital economy is not to give a Shanghai resident the life of a Parisian. The future is to provide handkerchiefs and fresh fruits to those living in the province,” said Huang.
However, Pinduoduo’s history does not stop in the province. The company’s new challenge is to compete with the big ones on the same battlefield. Therefore, the next step is to develop an in-house logistics network and shipping information technology.
Currently, Pinduoduo is the second most used e-commerce platform and the fastest growing app in the history of the Chinese internet. Although it is mostly associated with lower-tier and lower-income buyers, last June, orders from Tier 1 and 2 cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, and Hangzhou accounted for almost half of the platform’s total order value.
The startup, whose name is roughly translated as “buy more together”, was launched in Shanghai in 2015. It turned into a Unicorn after just 21 months, reaching $1.5 billion gross market value much faster than its older peers like JD.com and Alibaba’s Taobao.
The explosive growth of Pinduoduo is essentially due to two main factors. The first factor is the significant number of funds received, such as that of Tencent and IDG, which allocated an investment of $110 million in 2016. The second factor is the app’s ability to take hold in smaller cities.
Today, 483.2 million buyers use Pinduoduo for their online purchases and 135 million of them use the app daily. Numerous international brands such as Huawei and Apple have their flagship stores on the platform and the overlap in users between Taobao and Huang’s app has now reached the figure of 109 million people.
In June, Pinduoduo’s average monthly active users were 366 million, an increase of 88% from 195 million in the same quarter of 2018. It represents almost half of monthly active users of the total Alibaba ecosystem.
However, compared to its peers, Pinduoduo works differently, allowing users to participate in group buying deals. More than a simple digital shopping platform, it is a social commerce app, which uses a “team purchase” model and leverages social sharing on Chinese social networks.
The consumer can buy an item at full price or get a discount if he invites other people to join the purchase. This is a model that applies perfectly to the Chinese cashless society as about 583 million people used mobile payment last year. But above all, it makes the most of the sharing-with-friends potential, creating a viral environment.
Therefore, Colin Huang’s experience in the digital landscape together with a forward-looking approach made him build a completely different kind of marketplace, whose appeal is the satisfaction of taking advantage of a great deal instead of the lower price of products. This explains its virality and addiction primarily in lower-tier cities where salaries are still lower compared to first-tier ones.
Nevertheless, although the competition with China’s e-commerce giants is strong in higher-tier cities, the app is moving away from the frame of a second-level platform for lower-income buyers to finally make its way in the Chinese high-end market. Here, China’s internet titans, Taobao and JD.com, dominate the market, keeping off potential rivals.
To reach its goals and be a viable competitor in the market, the Shanghai-based company thus plans to develop its own logistics network and, therefore, speed up its deliveries. According to Pinduoduo, with the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and big data technologies, new services will include route planning, parcel sorting, and the improvement of fresh produce deliveries.
Pinduoduo aims to answer the demand for fast and reliable delivery, especially since these two claims have overtaken the demand for competitive prices and a wide selection of products.
The plan is, therefore, to invest in advanced technologies like AI-powered routing in order to develop and then improve its logistics network.
The Vice President of Strategy at Pinduoduo, David Liu, said that the decision to implement the orders’ fulfillment has come after the company received customer complaints about the deliveries. He also explained that many merchants on the platform were using the competitor’s logistics network. Therefore, the app had no control over these shipments.
Since its launch, the app relied on Alibaba’s logistics arm Cainiao to track and handle about $70 billion of its annual shipments. Over these years, the rival Alibaba has, therefore, had access to Pinduoduo’s activity and its customers’ shopping habits. But this is all about to change, especially since the platform launched its own shipping information technology early this year.
Since the launch of Pinduoduo’s waybill system, an average of 40 million orders per day has already migrated to the new system, which are almost all orders generated on the platform.
David Liu revealed he is well aware that there are many established logistics services in China that Pinduoduo can leverage. He thus pointed out that the Shanghai app will not try to copy its larger rivals. Indeed, contrary to Cainiao and JD.com, Pinduoduo has no plans to operate warehouses or build its own delivery fleet.
Pinduoduo aims, instead, to help sellers participating in the supply chain. Being one of China’s largest online retail platforms for fresh products, farmers will thus leverage the platform’s big data analysis to syncronize the harvest and shipments and avoid food waste.
Once again, this young company focuses on its users to enhance the platform. It started as a group-buying app for lower-income households and then spread in higher-tier cities through its social nature and a check-out system that allows automatic payment.
Today, Pinduoduo targets the sellers. Although the company has already allocated an over $505-million-investment to help farmers selling their perishable agricultural goods on the platform, it now aims to help all the merchants improve their understanding and participation in the retail supply chain. And by entering the higher-tier market and the logistics sector, it has now officially entered into direct competition with China’s e-commerce giants.
But its strength is still the focus on both the customers and the sellers, which is increasingly developing around the fresh produce market. This is not about “provide handkerchiefs to those living in the province” anymore. Now, it is about building a direct line between farmers in rural areas and consumers in bigger cities.
The next battlefield for e-commerce dominance will probably be the fresh food e-commerce and Pinduoduo is already in the front line.
ECommerce Nest 
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