Editor’s note:
Jack Ma’s e-commerce conglomerate Alibaba is mulling to relist in China as soon as this summer, a source told WSJ. Chinese authorities are exploring ways to allow overseas-listed companies to relist in the country.
Alibaba’s USD 25 billion float on New York Stock Exchange in 2014 remains the world’s largest IPO.
KrASIA Daily is a five-minute read to brief you everything you need to know to start your day. We only choose the latest tech & startup news that is worth your time, with a focus on Southeast Asia and China.
Southeast Asia:
Singapore: Chinese social media giant WeChat is continuing to expand its footprint in Singapore, bringing WeChat Pay to ComfortDelGro taxis from next month, said Ms Grace Yin, operation director of WeChat Pay International Business, on Thursday (Mar 15). (Channel News Asia)
Indonesia: Alibaba Group’s cloud computing arm Alibaba Cloud today announced the commencement of operations for its first data centre in Indonesia. (e27)
Singapore: Singapore-based insurtech startup PolicyPal raised 23,809 ETH (ether) last week via an Initial Coin Offering (ICO), giving the company about US$20 million in fresh funding. (e27)
Indonesia: Indonesian bike-sharing startup Banopolis on Wednesday announced a partnership with state-owned mobile operator Telkomsel, smartphone maker Huawei, and University of Indonesia (UI) to test bike-sharing service at UI campus in Depok, West Java. (e27)
Singapore: Virtuos, a video game content production company, on Wednesday announced raising a $15-million funding round led by 3D Capital Partners, and setting up of new headquarters and R&D center in Singapore. (Deal Street Asia)
Indonesia: A rescue plan for Indonesian life insurer Bumiputera has collapsed after it failed to agree with Evergreen Invesco – itsplanned white knight – over the size of a capital injection. Evergreen had been due to acquire a holding company for Bumiputera, which has more liabilities than assets and operates under the control of Indonesia‘s Financial Services Authority (OJK), by raising billions of dollars through a rights issue. (Deal Street Asia)
Vietnam: Vietnam government has decided to pare its 47.8 percent stake in one of the country’s largest pay-TV players, VTVcab, a unit of state-owned broadcasting agency Vietnam Television (VTV), in its initial public offering (IPO) slated for March 14. (Deal Street Asia)
China:
Technology giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is working on a plan to list on a stock exchange in its home market, China, according to people familiar with the matter, more than three years after its blockbuster initial public offering in New York. (WSJ)
Qu Toutiao, China’s news and video aggregator, has raised over USD 100 million in a Pre-IPO round led by Tencent, reports Chinese biztech media 36Kr citing multiple sources. The latest round values the startup at USD 1.3-1.5 billion, making it a unicorn. (KrASIA)
China’s social networking and gaming giant Tencent establishes Robotics X, an AI lab dedicated to robotics, announced the company’s VP YAO Xing on Thursday at Tencent AI Forum. Robotics X is part of Tencent’s push for the development of its AI Lab. (KrASIA)
Xiaomi churned out almost RMB 7.6 billion (USD 1.2 billion) in profit, a huge jump from previous year’s mere 900 million profit, according to a fundraising document obtained by local self-media Kaiqi. (KrASIA)
Head of Didi Research HE Xiaofei has reportedly left the ride-hailing company and started his own autonomous driving startup. (36Kr)
Samsung Electronics plans to begin building a new memory chip production line in China in late March, a spokesman said on Thursday, as the tech giant ramps up efforts to boost NAND flash technology to meet future demand. (Channel News Asia)
China’s Lenovo Group-backed Skyroam, a global WiFi provider, Wednesday announced that it had closed a Series C funding round of $20 million led by JAFCO Asia with participation from returning investors Vickers Venture, GSR Ventures, China Broadband Capital, as well as Delta Electronics Capital. (Deal Street Asia)
The enforcement chief of Hong Kong’s securities regulator said some sponsors of initial public offerings in the city have been “extremely reckless,” signaling more penalties to come after the regulator slapped a ban on UBS Group AG’s local unit this month. (Deal Street Asia)
The News Lens (TNL), an independent Taipei-based Chinese-language news site, has acquired Taiwanese sports news portal Sports Vision. The new deal comes more than two months after TNL acquired technology news portal INSIDE. (e27)
Online travel and ticketing platform Ctrip reports RMB 6.4 billion revenue in Q4 2017, up 26% compared to the same period of 2016, while its net revenue in 2017 stands at RMB 26.8 billion, up 39%. (36Kr)
GSR Capital, the Chinese private-equity firm that bought Nissan Motor Co.’s battery-making business, plans to invest $500 million in National Electric Vehicle Sweden AB. GSR said it will also build a battery factory next door to NEVS’s facility, which is based on the site of a former Saab auto plant in Trollhattan. (Bloomberg)
Soyoung, an app that helps users to find plastic surgery hospitals, has raised several hundreds of millions of yuan in a round led by Orchid Asia. (36Kr)
Debt-laden Chinese conglomerate HNA Group Co. is set to raise as much as 1.1 billion francs ($1.2 billion) from Gategroup Holding AG’s Zurich initial public offering. (Bloomberg)
China’s $930 billion sovereign wealth fund plans to expand investments in areas such as real estate, hedge funds, infrastructure and private equity for more stable returns, as it reduces exposure to volatile public markets. (Bloomberg)
Assets of Wanda Department Store will be sell to department store chain Yintai. (Linkshop)
Smartphone manufacturer Smartisan is recruiting senior blockchain talent to tap into blockchain technologies. (Chinaz)
World:
Amazon Japan said on Thursday it had been raided by the country’s fair trade regulator on suspicion of a possible anti-trust violation. (Reuters)
In its race to catch Amazon.com Inc. in online retailing, Walmart Inc. issued misleading e-commerce results and fired an executive who complained the company was breaking the law, according to a whistle-blower lawsuit. (Bloomberg)
Facebook wants you to pay for internet. This week TechCrunch was tipped off that Facebook had quietly launched an Express Wi-Fi Android app in the Google Play store that lets users buy data packs and find nearby hotspots as part of Facebook’s distributed Wi-Fi network. (TechCrunch)
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is examining the business practices of a cadre of funds set up to invest in cryptocurrencies and initial coin offerings — digital-token sales that give buyers stakes in companies, said three people with knowledge of the matter. (Bloomberg)
Microsoft is unveiling a new gaming cloud division that’s ready for a future where consoles and gaming itself are very different to today. (The Verge)
Microsoft is introducing a new bug bounty reward for the “speculative execution” CPU vulnerabilities that were disclosed recently. (The Verge)
Coinbase Inc., one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges, said it obtained an e-money license in the U.K. as it expands services in Europe. The firm also opened an account at Barclays Plc, easing deposits and withdrawal for clients. (Bloomberg)
Spotify Ltd. will begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange on April 3, just a week after the company plans to provide its most recent annual financial guidance. (Bloomberg)