ByteDance profit jumps 60% to US$40 billion, taking TikTok’s owner past arch-rival Tencent

ByteDance’s profit surged roughly 60 per cent in 2023, outpacing the growth of online peers Tencent Holdings and Alibaba Group Holding, in a sign of the TikTok owner’s resilience in the face of an economic downturn. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation jumped to more than US$40 billion from about US$25 billion in 2022, … Read more

China said to fall short of matching US advances in AI owing to ‘many challenges in theory and technologies’

China is falling short of matching the United States in artificial intelligence (AI) advances because the nation’s efforts are “littered with many essential challenges in theory and technologies”, according to a recent slide presentation made to Chinese Premier Li Qiang. Those difficulties were pointed out to Li during his recent inspection tour of the Beijing … Read more

Alibaba adds 11 apps to Huawei’s HarmonyOS, bringing Xianyu, Fliggy and more to China’s Android rival

Alibaba Group Holding is partnering with US-sanctioned Huawei Technologies to develop native versions of the e-commerce giant’s apps for the smartphone maker’s operating system HarmonyOS, which is meant to take on Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS in mainland China. Eleven applications under Alibaba Group – including second-hand trading platform Xianyu, online travel platform Fliggy, courier … Read more

Tencent chairman Pony Ma sets confident tone for internet giant in 2024 amid WeChat’s improved business prospects, sources say

The 52-year-old Ma, who kept a low profile during China’s 32-month crackdown on Big Tech firms, delivered that positive message in a speech before Tencent’s annual staff meeting on Monday at a stadium in Shenzhen, the company’s home city in southern Guangdong province. Founded in November 1998, Tencent must find new lifelines in its video … Read more

JD.com’s on-demand delivery unit, Dada Nexus, loses 46 per cent of US stock value overnight amid internal inquiry into potential fraud

An on-demand delivery firm affiliated with Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com lost 46 per cent of its stock value in New York on Monday, following an inquiry into “suspicious” data during an internal audit, dealing a fresh blow to confidence in China’s tech stocks. Dada Nexus, which operates JD Daojia and Dada Now, found 1 billion … Read more

ByteDance sales surpass Tencent’s to reach US$110 billion as TikTok owner pushes into e-commerce

ByteDance’s sales surged in 2023 to more than US$110 billion, according to people familiar with the matter, potentially overtaking arch-foe Tencent Holdings in a sign TikTok’s fledgling e-commerce business is driving growth at a time of economic malaise. The world’s most valuable start-up’s growth broadly matched the 30 per cent pace it managed in 2022, … Read more

China’s Big Tech market cap rankings see shake up as NetEase overtakes Meituan for No 4 spot

China’s Big Tech landscape continues to undergo seismic shifts, with video gaming and news portal NetEase overtaking food delivery giant Meituan as the country’s fourth most valuable listed technology company, after Tencent Holdings, PDD Holdings and Alibaba Group Holding. NetEase’s market cap stood at HK$563.2 billion (US$72.1 billion) in Hong Kong on Thursday, compared with … Read more

Chinese fintech giant Ant Group, Huawei to build HarmonyOS-based Alipay app amid growing adoption of home-grown operating system

The collaboration between Ant, the fintech affiliate of South China Morning Post owner Alibaba Group Holding, and Shenzhen-based Huawei is expected to benefit consumers who use Alipay and the Chinese tech firm’s devices across different scenarios, according to a statement by Ni Xingjun, president of Alipay China business group and chairman of Ant’s technology strategy … Read more

McDonald’s China pushes development of native apps based on HarmonyOS, as adoption of Huawei’s mobile operating system accelerates

The Chinese arm of McDonald’s – with a network of more than 5,500 restaurants and over 200,000 employees serving more than 1 billion customers each year – is part of the first batch of multinational food companies on the mainland that have committed to develop native apps on HarmonyOS, according to a statement by the … Read more