Alibaba Duels With Tencent for Online Dominance in China
August 7, 2013 Leave a comment
Alibaba Duels With Tencent for Online Dominance in China
Two of China’s richest men are intensifying their rivalry over the world’s biggest Internet market. Jack Ma’s Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., the country’s largest e-commerce company, on Aug. 1 said it blocked Tencent Holdings Ltd. (700)’s WeChat to sellers. Four days later, billionaire Pony Ma’s Tencent introduced online payment features to mainland China users of its WhatsApp-like chat software. Alibaba is headed for what may be the biggest initial share sale since Facebook Inc., while Tencent is China’s biggest Internet company, with more than 300 million users for WeChat, which started in 2011. Both have made purchases and encroached on each other’s established markets in the battle for dominance of the country’s online spending. McKinsey & Co. estimates China’s Internet retail will triple to $395 billion from 2011 to 2015. Read more of this post
Bamboo Innovator 