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IF Insights: Shein finally lists, and Hong Kong marks it down

International Finance Business Desk — Wed, 09 Sep 2026 02:00:39 +0000

Shein rang the gong at the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on September 1, ending a listing attempt that had run through New York and London and taken the better part of six years.

The company sold roughly 280 million shares at HKUSD 48.56 apiece, raising about HKUSD 13.6 billion, or USD 1.74 billion, and valuing itself at around USD 26.5 billion at the offer price.

That was below the top of its marketed range of HKUSD 49.50, and it was still one of the city’s biggest new share sales this year.

The first session was not kind. The stock fell by as much as 10% to HKUSD 43.80 before recovering to close at HKUSD 48.50, a whisker below its issue price and a valuation of about USD 26.3 billion.

Analysts attributed the rebound to stabilisation measures of the sort large listings use to avoid a bruising debut, with Goldman Sachs acting as stabilising manager.

It closed at HKUSD 46 on the second day while the Hang Seng Index finished flat, and by the close on September 3 it was changing hands around HKUSD 42, some 13% below where it was priced.

Chief financial officer Leigh Gui told the listing ceremony that the debut marked “a new starting point”. Founder and chief executive Sky Xu stayed out of the spotlight and let his executives speak.

The price is the story
The headline comparison is unavoidable. At roughly USD 26.5 billion, Shein came to market more than 70% below the USD 98.2 billion it was worth in private funding rounds in 2022.

That gap has been reported as a humiliation, which is only half right. A private mark from 2022 records what one pool of capital paid in one liquidity environment. It is not a benchmark. The more revealing numbers come from the book itself.

The Hong Kong retail tranche was covered 5.63 times and the international tranche 2.59 times, modest by the standards of an exchange where hot deals are routinely subscribed hundreds of times over.

The offering represented about 6.6% of enlarged share capital, cornerstone investors took roughly a fifth of it and are locked up for six months, which leaves only about 5% genuinely trading.

Cornerstones committed about USD 383 million and included existing backers Boyu Capital, Tiger Global and General Atlantic, alongside Tencent, Greenwoods, Taikang Life and UBS Asset Management. Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan sponsored the listing.

A thin float held up largely by insiders is not a vote of confidence from the wider market. It is a deal engineered to get done.

The loophole was the moat
Shein’s cost advantage was never purely operational. A large part of it was regulatory. Packages worth up to USD 800 once entered the United States free of duty under the de minimis rule, and that relief has gone.

The European Union followed, agreeing a fixed 3 euro customs duty on parcels valued under 150 euro from July 1 2026, with an additional Union Handling Fee due from November 1 2026.

France, which pushed hardest for the change, will also bar influencers from promoting ultra-fast fashion brands from January 2027.

The scale involved explains the political urgency. The number of low-value e-commerce packages arriving in the bloc doubled in a single year to 4.6 billion, more than nine in ten of them from China, and France alone took in roughly 800 million small parcels.

Brussels had planned to close the exemption in 2028 and brought it forward under pressure from domestic retailers.

The effect on the accounts was immediate. Shein reported first-quarter revenue of USD 9.05 billion and swung to a net loss of USD 99 million from a profit a year earlier, reversing USD 395 million of net income in the same quarter of 2025.

The company has guided first-half revenue growth broadly in line with the 1.1% it managed in the first quarter, with the operating margin slightly lower, blaming new European import charges, pricing pressure and softer demand in the Middle East linked to the Iran war.

The arithmetic underneath
Strip out the noise and the deceleration is stark. Revenue grew 41.1% in 2023, then 20.7% in 2024, then 8% in 2025, reaching USD 41.85 billion, while earnings fell almost 39% to USD 2.06 billion.

What makes this more than a cyclical wobble is where the money goes. Between 2023 and 2025 net revenue grew by USD 9.744 billion. Fulfilment absorbed USD 5.6 billion of that increase and marketing took USD 2.7 billion, leaving USD 335 million of additional operating profit, or roughly 3.4 cents on every extra dollar of sales.

That is the number investors are actually pricing. Growth at those incremental economics is close to worthless.

Crucially, this is not a collapse in pricing power at the product level. Gross margin held at roughly 68% in 2025 and around 70% in the first quarter.

The products still carry a healthy mark-up.

It is the cost of getting each parcel to each doorstep, plus the cost of persuading the customer to open the app in the first place, that has swallowed the profit. Duties simply added a third claim on the same dollar.

Who owns it, and who can sell
The share structure deserves attention from anyone tempted by the discount. The shares sold carry one-tenth of the voting rights of founder-held stock, and co-founders Sky Yangtian Xu, Maggie Gu, Molly Miao and Tony Ren control 90% of votes.

They retain close to 60% of the company, locked for 24 months. Shein has also agreed to pay up to about USD 3.5 billion in cash to investors who bought special shares in earlier private rounds, which is money leaving the business to settle the consequences of those older, richer valuations.

Jianggan Li of the consultancy Momentum Works called the deal a capital-structure event as much as a fundraising.

Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Catherine Lim has noted that with pre-IPO and cornerstone holders all accepting six-month lock-ups, the expiry in March 2027 will be a far more meaningful test of the company’s worth than the debut session. That is the date to diary.

Hong Kong was the only door left
The venue is itself part of the analysis.

Shein filed in the United States in 2023, then turned to London, where the Financial Conduct Authority approved a draft prospectus before China’s securities regulator objected, largely over how the company described risks tied to its Chinese operations and Xinjiang.

Beijing signed off on the Hong Kong route in July, and there is no US listing and no depositary receipt. The company moved its headquarters to Singapore in 2022, but the listing has anchored its identity back where its supply chain always was.

The regulatory file is not closed either.

Shein has disclosed an ongoing US Federal Trade Commission consumer protection investigation that could carry significant penalties, and the European Commission is examining its handling of illegal products, the potentially addictive design of its platform and the transparency of its recommendation systems.

For Western institutions with mandates that limit Hong Kong exposure or that screen on labour and environmental grounds, the practical result is a narrower pool of natural buyers. That is a structural discount, not a sentiment one.

What has to be proved next
The bull case is not empty. Shein counted 281 million active users at the end of March and turned its inventory in just 36 days in 2025 under its small-batch testing model, a speed advantage that no customs rule can legislate away.

The prospectus points to marketplace and supply chain services for other brands, building on its 2023 purchase of the Missguided name from Frasers Group and its partnership with the French label Pimkie, and 40% of proceeds are earmarked for technology with another 40% for brand building.

The bear case is simpler. If a meaningful slice of the cost advantage was regulatory arbitrage, and that arbitrage has been withdrawn in the two largest markets within a year of each other, then the model must now win on merchandising and logistics alone, against Temu, Amazon Haul and every incumbent that spent five years learning from Shein.

There is also a question of shape. Holding stock closer to the customer, in European and American warehouses, would blunt the tariff hit but weaken the very thing that made the model work, namely tiny test batches, fast reorders and almost no inventory risk.

The competitive question is no longer who is cheapest but who can absorb a fixed cost per item and still look cheap.

The first real evidence arrives with second-quarter results. Watch three things. Whether US price increases stick without volume falling away.

Whether the loss narrows or deepens. And whether fulfilment and marketing costs finally grow slower than revenue.

Until then, a share price sitting below its offer is not the market being harsh. It is the market waiting.

The post IF Insights: Shein finally lists, and Hong Kong marks it down appeared first on International Finance.

Unitree IPO puts a price on China’s humanoid robot bet

International Finance Business Desk — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 00:00:08 +0000

Chinese robot maker Unitree has priced its Shanghai initial public offering (IPO) at 150.80 yuan a share, seeking about 6.1 billion yuan, or USD 904 million, in a deal that will make it the first humanoid robot manufacturer listed on the mainland.

The Hangzhou-based company is offering roughly 40.45 million shares, or 10% of its enlarged share capital, on the Shanghai Stock Exchange’s STAR Market. At that price the company is worth around 60.99 billion yuan, close to USD 9 billion.

The reception has been extraordinary even by the standards of China’s technology listings. The offering was more than 8,000 times oversubscribed by retail investors, with the company disclosing odds of roughly 0.018% of receiving shares after a partial reallocation away from the institutional tranche.

A single lot of 500 shares requires a payment of 75,400 yuan, which has not deterred buyers hoping for a first-day pop.

The regulatory path was just as quick. The application was accepted on March 20 and cleared the listing committee on June 1, a span of 73 days and a record for the board.

What investors are actually paying for

The valuation is the story. The offer price implies a diluted price to earnings ratio of 219.23 for 2025 and a price to sales ratio of 35.89, both far above comparable general equipment manufacturers, against a reference industry multiple of 38.56 times.

The company itself warned investors about the risk of a share price decline given the premium. The final price came in about 45% above a market consensus of around 104 yuan after bookbuilding with institutions.

Underneath that multiple is a business growing at a rate few hardware firms manage. Revenue rose to 1.70 billion yuan in 2025 from 392.77 million yuan in 2024 and 159.13 million yuan in 2023, a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) above 220%.

Reported net profit was 278.21 million yuan, while net profit attributable to the parent after excluding one-off items, chiefly share-based payment charges, stood at 590.75 million yuan.

The headline 219 times multiple is calculated on the lower of those two figures. Between 2023 and 2025 the company sold 33,294 quadruped robots and 5,632 humanoids, and gross margin on the core business climbed to 60.13%.

The strategic investor list explains part of the enthusiasm. Institutions taking 20% of the issuance include DeepSeek, Tencent’s Qishan Investment, PetroChina’s Kunlun Capital, China Southern Power Grid’s industrial finance arm and Tianyi Capital, alongside three National Social Security Fund portfolios.

DeepSeek alone was allocated 933,390 shares with a 36-month lock-up, a pairing meant to bridge large language models and robot hardware. This is state-adjacent capital and platform capital arriving together, which is how Beijing tends to signal that a sector matters.

Why everyone is rushing the exit door at once

Unitree is not an outlier. It is the first mover in a queue. AgiBot, valued above 20 billion yuan after backing from Tencent, JD.com and SAIC Motor, began its Hong Kong listing process in July, the first among a wave of 30 to 50 Chinese embodied intelligence startups to disclose listing plans.

It has also acquired a controlling stake in Shanghai-listed Swancor Advanced Materials, securing a mainland platform. IPO applications from Leju Robotics and DEEP Robotics have been accepted in Shenzhen and Shanghai respectively.

UBTech, which listed in Hong Kong in December 2023 as the first humanoid robot stock anywhere, saw its shares surge 150% in 2025 against a 32% rise in the Hang Seng Index.

Three forces are pushing companies towards public markets simultaneously. The first is capital intensity. Building humanoids requires actuators, reducers, sensors and factories, the training data problem is unsolved, and the burn rate is high while revenue is thin.

The second is the policy window. The 15th Five-Year Plan covering 2026 to 2030 elevates robotics and embodied intelligence from a niche subsidy target into the connective tissue of China’s economic modernisation strategy, with component localisation targets written into the top-level document rather than into subordinate ministry plans.

A 1 trillion yuan state venture fund for artificial intelligence (AI), robotics and emerging technologies sits behind it. Listing while that support is explicit is simply cheaper than listing later.

The third force is the valuation cycle itself. Sector financing in China reached 73.5 billion yuan in 2025, and the first two months of 2026 alone exceeded 20 billion yuan. Private rounds at those levels create pressure for public exits before enthusiasm cools.

The industrial base beneath the hype

The humanoid narrative sits on top of an automation build-out that is already the largest in history. China accounted for 54% of all industrial robots installed worldwide in 2024, or 295,000 of 542,000 units, and its installed base of about two million machines is roughly 4.5 times that of Japan in second place. Global operational stock stood at 4.66 million.

More telling is who supplies them. The share of local suppliers in Chinese domestic installations rose from 30% in 2020 to 57% in 2024, and Chinese firms now hold 85% of the domestic metal and machinery segment. For the first time, Chinese robot makers sold more units at home than foreign competitors.

China also became a net exporter of industrial robots for the first time in 2025, and first-half 2026 exports reached 6.29 billion yuan, up 18.6% year on year, shipped to 141 countries and regions.

That is the import substitution story Made in China 2025 promised, delivered a decade later in a sector Western suppliers once dominated.

One caveat is worth stating plainly. On robot density, China is not yet the leader. Using updated labour market data from its own statistics bureau, the International Federation of Robotics puts China at 166 robots per 10,000 manufacturing employees, sixth in Asia and 22nd worldwide, against 307 in the United States.

Western Europe reached a record 267 and North America 204. China’s advantage is absolute scale, not saturation, which is precisely why the runway is long.

China against the West

On volume, the humanoid contest is already lopsided. Roughly 16,000 humanoid robots were installed worldwide in 2025, with China accounting for more than 80%, according to Counterpoint Research, which put AgiBot on 30.4% of global installations and Unitree on 26.4%.

Omdia ranks AgiBot first on 5,168 units and a 39% share, a reading Unitree disputes with its own claim of more than 5,500 humanoids shipped. American rivals including Tesla and Figure each shipped a few hundred units at most.

On money, the West leads by a distance. Figure is valued at about USD 39 billion after a Series C exceeding USD 1 billion in September 2025, roughly four times Unitree’s listed value, with 1X at around USD 10 billion and Apptronik at about USD 5.5 billion.

Tesla remains the wild card, with Optimus V3 expected to enter mass production in the second half of 2026 on a converted Fremont line. Unitree’s own prospectus names Optimus and new entrants from Chinese carmakers as material competitive risks.

The historical pattern from solar panels, drones and electric vehicles is that scale wins once the underlying technology commoditises, which is the bet embedded in Unitree’s multiple.

Automation as industrial policy

For an economy facing a shrinking working-age population and rising wages, robots are a labour supply story as much as a technology story.

Automation is how China intends to keep its manufacturing base competitive while the demographic base erodes, and how it plans to cut dependence on imported precision components.

The Robot Plus initiative and the AI Plus Manufacturing roadmap aim to double manufacturing robot density by 2030, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has set up a standardisation committee for humanoid robots, and China is now leading formulation of international standards for elder-care robots, echoing its earlier standards campaigns in 5G and high-speed rail.

The risks arrived before the shares did. Overseas sales generated 731.66 million yuan in 2025, or 43.65% of main business revenue, and on July 28 the United States Federal Communications Commission added foreign-made humanoid and quadruped robots to its Covered List, blocking equipment authorisation for models not already cleared.

Unitree certified its current lineup weeks earlier, so those grants stand, but the North American path for new models is closed for now. The Pentagon has separately listed the company as having alleged military links, which Beijing rejects.

Growth is also cooling. First-half 2026 revenue guidance of 1.05 billion to 1.13 billion yuan implies growth of 36% to 45%, against 333% a year earlier, and adjusted net profit is guided to fall by between 6% and 22%.

A 219 times earnings multiple leaves no room for that trend to continue. Investors chasing lottery odds of 0.018% may find that out.

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IF Insights: Baidu’s Ernie chatbot & China’s AI test

IFM Correspondent — Mon, 24 Apr 2023 07:39:29 +0000

Sam Alatmen-led OpenAI’s ChatGPT has ushered in a new era of technological marvels, as it has changed the artificial intelligence playbook in 2023. Some are even comparing the chatbot’s impact on the global economy with the invention of the printing press. The artificial intelligence product is a large language model based on the GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) architecture.

It generates human-like responses to natural language inputs, making it a powerful tool for conversational artificial intelligence applications, including language translation, text summarisation, question answering, and even creative writing by analysing vast amounts of text data and learning patterns in language use, which it can then use to generate coherent and contextually appropriate responses, as per the user inputs.

OpenAI’s success has invited rivalry from other tech giants like Google, Amazon, Meta, Baidu and Tencent. However, Google’s Bard’s launch was unsuccessful, and ever since Microsoft bought OpenAI and integrated ChatGPT technology into Bing, Chrome has been suffering, and tech analysts and investors are wary about the popular search engine’s future.

Despite the red tape, Chinese companies continue to innovate and have released their AI much before American tech giants like Amazon and Meta.

Leading Chinese search engine Baidu has unveiled Ernie, a chatbot that uses artificial intelligence to compete with ChatGPT.

What Are Ernie’s Capabilities?

At a live-streamed news conference organised to demonstrate the capabilities of the technology on April 13, Baidu Chief Executive Robin Li stated that Ernie (Enhanced Representation through Knowledge Integration), known as Weixin in Chinese, was the outcome of “decades of Baidu’s hard work and efforts.”

Li demonstrated Ernie creating a conference poster and video based on a prompt at the Beijing event and recommending the finest Chinese city for the event’s location and reading material in the Sichuan dialect.

The CEO also demonstrated the chatbot answering queries and outlining the plot of a well-known Chinese science fiction novel.

The functionalities, which will be incorporated into Baidu’s Xiaodu intelligent device ecosystem, would initially only be accessible to a select group of individuals with an Ernie invitation code, according to Li.

Li claimed that although the bot can recognise something incorrect, it struggles with inquiries involving logical mistakes and performs better in Chinese than in English.

In contrast to OpenAI’s live demonstrations of ChatGPT, Ernie’s capabilities were shown by Baidu through a series of slides. Additionally, the chatbot lacks features like the capacity to produce text in response to a picture revealed in the follow-up to Chat GPT, GPT-4.

Investors did not react favourably to Ernie’s launch, and Baidu’s Hong Kong-listed shares dropped more than 10% during the pre-recorded demonstration.

“There is still a lot of uncertainty around Ernie’s capacity, especially given the lack of a live demo – a stark contrast to OpenAI’s GPT-4’s developer livestream a few days ago,” said Chim Lee, a China technology expert for the Economist Intelligence Unit.

Obstacles To Growth

China is becoming increasingly Orwellian with surveillance cameras everywhere, state internet control, and a social credit system. Analysts wonder how artificial intelligence can develop in such a controlled environment and whether it will have relevant access to information.

However, it is believed that the restrictions placed on foreign AI will not cripple the advancements of state-compliant domestic players. As a result, the artificial intelligence sector from the world’s second-largest economy might still need to compete with global giants, but it can undoubtedly dominate and even monopolise billion-dollar domestic markets.

Baidu investors were disappointed that Ernie’s capabilities were presented on a slideshow instead of a live stream launch. It has even made people question the fundamentals and authenticity of the project.

But despite the backlash, the Chinese are determined to create AI that serves the Chinese ecosystem. Li said more than 650 Chinese institutions, including the National Museum of China, the Global Times newspaper, and China CITIC Bank, plan to employ Ernie.

The Chinese government has promised to assist regional AI creators and implement the technology throughout Chinese business. As a result, the local tech behemoths JD.com, Alibaba, and Huawei have planned to release their chatbots. Alibaba has even invited businesses to test its Tongyi Qianwen AI chatbot, as per media reports.

AI & Communist China

Given its authoritarian political system and strict control over information and technology, the Chinese government could use AI to crack down on its own citizens. Here are a few possibilities:

Social Credit System: China is already implementing a social credit system, which uses artificial intelligence and other technologies to monitor citizens’ behaviour and assign them scores based on their compliance with laws, regulations, and social norms. Those with low scores can face various penalties, including restrictions on travel, access to education, and employment opportunities.

Surveillance & Monitoring: China already has one of the most extensive surveillance systems in the world, with millions of cameras and other monitoring devices deployed in public spaces. Artificial intelligence could automate the monitoring and analysis of this data, allowing the government to identify and track individuals based on their behaviour and activities.

Predictive Policing: Artificial intelligence could be used to analyse data on crime and other activities to identify individuals who have been deemed a potential threat to the state, allowing the government to take preemptive action against them.

Propaganda & Censorship: Artificial intelligence could be used to generate and disseminate propaganda and disinformation and censor and control access to information on the internet.

The CCP welcomes the new technology and has even discussed AI’s potential in asymmetric cyber warfare. Whether to control or administrate the civilian population, cyber warfare, or give the domestic economy an edge, China knows that Artificial intelligence holds the key to its envisioned future.

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Paysend and Tencent partner up to create Weixin transfers

IFM Correspondent — Mon, 03 Jan 2022 08:26:51 +0000

UK-based payment ecosystem Paysend recently announced its partnership with Tencent where they are unveiling a feature named Weixin which will enable people to receive money through it, which is said to be China’s version of WeChat, according to media reports.

Alex Bessonov, group head of network development and strategic partnerships at Paysend, told the media, “The meteoric rise of mobile and app-based payments in China has brought convenience to the lives of over one billion people. This partnership with Tencent Financial Technology expands acceptance of Paysend transfers to Weixin users and underlines our ambition to use advanced technology to make payments faster and easier for millions around the world.”

People using this feature can make these transfers across borders, via licensed banks in China – with funds reaching the bank account linked to the Weixin application. Currently, Paysend has over five million customers on its platform and they are also working to increase their financial inclusion.

Wenhui Yang, general manager, Tencent Financial Technology Asia Pacific told the media, “As customer preferences change, companies like Paysend provide an easier, more convenient, and lower cost alternative for people to send money to friends and family. Ultimately, our partnership is another step in promoting openness and interoperability among the digital payment industry, thereby increasing convenience for customers who can send and receive money in the way that makes most sense to them.”

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Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi suspends UK expansion plans

International Finance Business Desk — Thu, 26 Aug 2021 06:59:28 +0000

China-based ride-hailing giant Didi has suspended its plan to launch in the UK as well as Europe as faces political and regulatory challenges in its home country, media reports said. The plan to launch in the UK and Europe has been postponed by at least 12 months.

The company was set to launch in the UK as it secured licences to operate in Manchester, Salford and Sheffield.

A Didi spokesperson told the media, “We continue to explore additional new markets, liaising with relevant stakeholders in each and being thoughtful about when to introduce our services. As soon as we have news on additional new markets, we look forward to sharing it.”

In July, China’s cyberspace regulator recently ordered the app stores to ban ride-hailing firm Didi Global after the application has severely violated relevant laws and regulations while collecting and abusing user data.

The regulator also told the ride-hailing company to take strict measures to fix the loopholes which are in accordance with the law and national standards which will ensure the data safety of users.

Earlier this year, the company revealed a loss of $1.6 billion for 2020 in its latest IPO filing. While filing a prospectus for its upcoming blockbuster US IPO, the company revealed that they have incurred heavy losses in recent years but now there is a solid chance of getting closer to profitability.

Last year, the company raised a funding of $62 billion, according to media reports. Didi’s largest shareholders include SoftBank’s Vision Fund, Uber Technologies, and Tencent Holdings.

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Voyager Innovation raises $167 mn to fast-track financial inclusion in the Philippines

International Finance Business Desk — Mon, 28 Jun 2021 07:01:28 +0000

Philippines-based technology company Voyager Innovation have announced that it has raised around $167 million in a fresh funding round to fast-track financial inclusion in the country, media reports said. Voyager Innovation is the parent company of PayMaya, the Philippines’ most popular payment app.

Investors that participated in the funding round for Voyager Innovation include existing shareholders such as telecom giant PLDT, global investment firm KKR; and China-based tech giant Tencent among others. New investors such as IFC Financial Institutions Growth Fund also participated.

With regard to the funding, Orlando B. Vea, Voyager and PayMaya chief executive officer and founder told the media, “We have seen a quantum leap for digital payments adoption in the Philippines over the past year, and PayMaya has served as the nexus connecting consumers and enterprises with enriching digital finance experiences. This investment supports the unique value we bring and gives us a natural head start with the target market for the digital banking service.”

In April 2020, Voyager announced that it raised $120 million from PLDT, KKR, Tencent, the International Finance Group (IFC) and the IFC Emerging Asia Fund. So far, the company has raised around $452 million.

Earlier this month, UNObank and Tonik had their application approved by the Central Bank of Philippines to operate as a digital bank in the country and they aim to bridge the gap of financial inclusion in Southeast Asia and eventually South Asia.

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Gojek raises $300 mn in a fresh funding round amid merger talks

Pritam Bordoloi — Mon, 10 May 2021 06:59:13 +0000

Indonesian super app Gojek has raised around $300 million in a fresh funding round despite being in the middle of merger talks, media reports said. The funds have been raised from Telkomsel, a unit of Indonesia’s largest telecom operator Telkom. Last year in November, Telkomsel injected $150 million in Gojek.

Telkomsel chief executive Setyanto Hantoro in a statement, “Telkomsel is optimistic that this latest investment will open more opportunities for society to access advanced digital technology-based innovations developed by homegrown companies.”

Reportedly, Gojek is in talks with ecommerce firm Tokopedia to merge their business. If talks are successful, the new entity would be called GoTo and the deal could be worth $18 billion.

So far, Gojek has raised around $3.45 billion in separate funding rounds from high-profile investors including Google, Facebook, PayPal, Visa, and Tencent. With the latest funding, Telkomsel is also expected to be one of the largest investors in GoTo.

In December, it was reported that Southeast Asia’s ride-hailing giant Grab and Gojek are on the brink of a potential merger and investors of both parties are urging the startups to merge. Grab’s founder and chief executive, Anthony Tan reportedly emailed his employees to say that Grab was in a position to acquire.

Speculations about a potential merger began even earlier. In March 2020, it was reported that Gojek wanted a 50 percent stake in the merged entity; however, Grab wanted to hold a controlling stake.

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Chinese crackdown on fintech firms continue

Pritam Bordoloi — Fri, 30 Apr 2021 06:35:08 +0000

China continues to crackdown on its fintech heavily and is preparing substantial fines for some of the big names in the industry, media reports said. Chinese authorities have recently summoned 13 fintech firms and ordered them to strengthen compliance with regulations.

Some of the big names include multinational technology conglomerate holding company Tencent and Beijing-based tech company ByteDance. Fintech arm of ecommerce giant JD.com, handset maker Xiaomi, ride-hailing app Didi Chuxing and food delivery firm Meituan were among those to face the regulators.

The recent developments are part of the ongoing antitrust clampdown backed by President Xi Jinping.
The People’s Bank of China said in a statement, “Internet platforms have played an important role in improving the efficiency of financial services and broadening the access of financial services to more people.”

“At the same time, some financial services were running without licenses, and there are serious rule violations in areas such as regulatory arbitrage, unfair competition and damaging consumers’ interests.”

Recently, it was also reported that Tencent could be fined as much as $1.5 billion for not reporting details of investments and anti-competitive practices.

The demands made by the Chinese regulators are similar to a list of demands they made of Alibaba’s affiliate financial company Ant Group earlier this month. Ant Group’s much anticipated initial public offering (IPO) was halted by authorities earlier this year over concerns about its finance model.

The crackdown initially began after Alibaba founder Jack Ma criticised the government last October. Earlier this month, Alibaba was slapped with a hefty fine of $2.8 billion over monopoly concerns.

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Tencent deploys its cloud infrastructure in Bahrain

International Finance Business Desk — Wed, 03 Mar 2021 09:16:25 +0000

China-based technological giant Tencent has opened its data centre in the Kingdom of Bahrain, media reports said. According to a research report by MarketsandMarkets, the Middle East’s cloud market is expected to reach $4.5 billion by 2024. To launch the data centre, Tencent is partnering with the Economic Development Board (EDB), and the brand-new Internet data centre (IDC) is expected to go live in the kingdom by the end of the year.

Tencent has joined the likes of leading global cloud giants like Amazon Web Services (AWS) in choosing Bahrain. The Kingdom is expected to drive massive growth in data traffic towards the region, according to media reports.

In this regard, EDB chief executive Khalid Humaidan told the media, “We are confident that Tencent will be able to leverage the kingdom’s regional connectivity, local talent, and business-friendly environment to expand their services and reach clients across the region.”

“Moreover, the launch of the new data centre stands to create a clustering effect as other global providers turn their attention to the increasingly attractive region, with Bahrain positioned as the destination of choice with proactive initiatives such as the government’s Cloud-First’ policy and nationwide 5G.”

Last year, it was revealed that Tencent will invest around $70 billion over the next five years in AI, cloud computing and cybersecurity. Dowson Tong, senior executive vice president of Tencent, told state media in an interview that the investment will also span over other key sectors which include blockchain, servers, big data centres, supercomputer centres, internet of things operating systems, 5G networks and quantum computing.

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Tencent invests in Chinese healthtech firm DXY

Pritam Bordoloi — Mon, 04 Jan 2021 07:29:22 +0000

Chinese tech giant and gaming company Tencent has participated in a funding round for Chinese healthtech firm DXY, media reports said. The startup raised around $500 million in the fresh funding round which was led by Trustbridge Partners.

Along with Tencent, a existing investor in DXY, Hillhouse Capital’s early-stage focused GL Ventures also participated in the funding round. So far, the healthtech startup has raised around $680 million in separate funding rounds.

DXY started out as a knowledge-sharing platform for doctors and has over time added a consumer-facing aspect by bringing wellness advice and medical consultation services to the public.

Last year, Tencent bought shares of Congenica, which is one the fastest growing UK-based genomics startups. The stake sale is part of a funding process by Congenica, where other UK pension providers also participated. According to reports, Congenica raised around £39 million by selling its stakes to Tencent and other investors. Some of the investors besides Tencent that also participated in the funding round include Legal & General, Cambridge Innovation Capital and Downing.

David Atkins, Congenica chief executive told the media, “Genomic medicine is revolutionising healthcare, transforming outcomes for patients by providing clinicians with fast, accurate and early diagnoses and the information needed to provide life-changing answers for their patients, improving wellbeing and disease management.”

Similarly, in September, China-based Shanghai Kyee Technology secured around $64 million in its Series D funding round led by Tencent. Besides Tencent, existing investors that also participated in the funding round for Shanghai Kyee Technology include DYEE Capital, Royal Sea Capital, Beijing Meihe Zhongbang Technology and Jiaxing Guangrun.

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