mobile e commerce battle heats up
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Mobile e-commerce battle heats up in China Rivalry between Tencent and Alibaba intensifies after they roll out new products on the same day to tap the mainland's US$395 billion market
8. August From South China Morning Post: In the past week, the two internet giants Tencent and Alibaba launched new products on the same day. Some see this as a sign for the battles to come for the lucrative e-‐commerce market. The e-‐commerce market in China is, according to consultancy McKinsey, set triple to US$395 billion from 2011 to 2015. Tencent launched on Monday WeChat 5.0, a new version of the world's fifth-‐most popular smartphone app, according to research firm GlobalWebIndex, with new monetisable features including a game centre, sticker shop, mobile payments and barcode scanning for e-‐commerce transactions. On the same day, Alibaba unveiled a service that lets users trade on Sina's weibo microblog platform directly, a step into the social realm. Tencent's QQ messenger had close to 800 million active accounts at the end of 2012, while WeChat has nearly 400 million users, of
whom 195 million are monthly active users. WeChat had more than 70 million overseas users by last month. Alibaba, meanwhile, has been working to slow WeChat's success. It has splashed out on an 18 per cent stake in Sina's Weibo and 28 per cent of AutoNavi, the mainland's top mapping system. During the launch, Tencent put a mobile puzzle game, Tian Tian Ai Xiao Chu, on The new update also carries functions including a mobile payment system that lets users buy, for instance, movie tickets or coupons directly on the app through Tencent's third-‐party payment system Tenpay. It also allows users to scan the barcodes of different products with their smartphones, and if the products are available online, users will be directed to
For more information feel free to write to Christian Brüel [email protected] at Shanghai Jungle. Read more http://www.scmp.com/business/china-‐business/article/1295141/mobile-‐e-‐commerce-‐battle-‐heats Loushanguan 83 +86 15811153574 www.schultz-‐co.com