Editor’s note:
Didi Chuxing kicked off its service in Toluca, Mexico, igniting a potential price war with rival Uber.
This move comes as part of the company’s plan for global expansion. As China’s largest ride-hailing company, Didi Chuxing is facing increasingly fierce competition from local rival Meituan-Dianping.
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:
SE Asia: Gaming hardware maker Razer, which went public in a big IPO in Hong Kong last year, is doubling down on payments after it announced a deal to acquire MOL, a company that offers online and offline payments in Southeast Asia. (TechCrunch)
Indonesia: Hundreds of Indonesian motorcycle taxi drivers working for start-ups Grab and Go-Jek called on Monday for an end to low online fares and demanded tighter regulation of ride-hailing companies. (Reuters)
Singapore: Singapore’s state investor Temasek Holdings could give retail investors access to private equity (PE) investments through its subsidiary, Azalea Investment Management, according to a Business Times report. (Deal Street Asia)
The Philippines: Philippine-based unicorn startup Revolution Precrafted has sealed a $300-million exclusive deal in the Caribbean for the supply of its prefabricated units. (Deal Street Asia)
Malaysia: Fintech startup Soft Space Sdn. Bhd. on Monday announced it has closed a Series B investment by a subsidiary of Japan’s Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (SMFG). The quantum of investment was not disclosed. (Deal Street Asia)
Malaysia: Malaysian investment holding company PUC Berhad has announced that it will make a RM90 million ($23 million) investment in Celcom Planet Sdn Bhd (CPSB), which owns and operates local e-commerce platform 11Street Malaysia. (Deal Street Asia)
Myanmar: Food2U, Myanmar’s home-grown food delivery platform, has raised a six-digit investment from Premium Distribution, a distributor in retail, food services and non-food products, according to sources familiar with the development. (Deal Street Asia)
Vietnam: Shareholders of Vietnam’s largest brewer Sabeco voted to add three representatives of Thai Beverage PCL to its management board, Sabeco said in a statement. (Deal Street Asia)
Vietnam: Ho Chi Minh City Development Bank (HDBank), whose vice-chairman is Vietnam’s first female billionaire Nguyen Thi Phuong, has announced that its shareholders have approved a plan to merge with unlisted Petrolimex Group Commercial Joint Stock Bank (PGBank) in a share-swap deal. (Deal Street Asia)
China:
Chinese ride-hailing firm Didi Chuxing on Monday launched its service in Toluca, Mexico, the company said, setting up a likely costly battle with rival Uber Technologies in a key market. (Reuters)
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is getting its digital assistant into Mercedes-Benzes, Audis and Volvos in China, enlisting a clutch of global automakers in an effort to popularize the year-old technology for everything from shopping to home security. (Bloomberg)
In its first major statement since being acquired by Meituan, bike rental giant Mobike is to stop adding new bikes to cities considered to be already saturated with bikes, will share its big data with the government for improved city planning, and put RMB100 million into improving its user credit system, the company announced at a press conference held in Beijing on Earth Day, April 22. The company is changing its focus from rapid to responsible growth. (Technode)
Chinese funds have slashed valuations of ZTE Corp after the United States banned American companies from selling components to the telecoms equipment maker for seven years, a move ZTE said threatened its very survival. (Reuters)
Tencent CEO Ma Huateng said Tencent can answer the central government’s calls for industrial digitalization by serving as the country’s “digitalization assistant”. (Technode)
Chinese battery maker Tianjin Lishen plans to open a sales office in Germany, its first in Europe, and is in talks to supply local automakers with batteries used to power electric vehicles, a source at the company told Reuters. (Reuters)
Lenovo Group Ltd. is increasingly at risk of being dropped from Hong Kong’s benchmark equity index as its shares tumble more than any other technology company in the world. (Bloomberg)
The personal data of people who have ordered food delivery is readily available for sale via several channels, investigative reporting by The Beijing News has discovered (in Chinese). Data on offer includes information such as name, phone number, address of thousands of orderers per day, including for orders going to hospitals and even to specific seats in internet cafes. The data is being sold for as little as RMB 0.10 per person. (Technode)
World:
Walmart Inc. is close to finalizing a deal to buy a majority stake in India’s leading e-commerce company for at least $12 billion and may complete the agreement in the next two weeks, according to people familiar with the matter. (Bloomberg)
Netflix Inc said on Monday it planned to raise $1.5 billion in debt, the second time the company is tapping the debt market in less than a year to fuel a rapid expansion in original content. (Reuters)
Volvo Trucks plans to share battery technology across its brands to tame development and production costs for the crucial but expensive component, as the world’s second-largest truck maker ramps up electric offerings, the company told Reuters on Monday. (Reuters)
Amazon.com Inc expects groceries and household products to account for over half of its business in India in the next five years, as it moves to broaden offerings in the segment and foray into areas such as fresh produce. (Reuters)
Toshiba Corp said on Monday it is still aiming to complete the sale of its memory chip business soon, following media reports it had decided to cancel the $18.6 billion sale if it did not get approval from Chinese regulators by May. (Reuters)
The head of Australia’s competition regulator said on Monday it will scrutinize contracts between Uber Technologies Inc [UBER.UL] and restaurants that use its food delivery app Uber Eats. (Reuters)
BlackRock Inc., the world’s largest asset manager with $6.3 trillion in assets, is set to enter the distressed debt space in India, two people aware of the development said. BlackRock is in the process of a hiring a managing director for its global private credit platform, who will focus on distressed and non-performing asset (NPA) opportunities in India, the persons cited above said on the condition of anonymity. (Deal Street Asia)