#StartupChina news
January, February & March 2019
- China: Shanghai set to gain world’s first 5G-enabled railway station, using Huawei tech
- An intro to China’s startups working with AI and facial recognition in agriculture
- China: XAG startup aiming for farming evolution using drones and AI
- China: Baidu internet giant partners Chery for electric car with AI, face-scanning payments and AR navigation
- China: 5G ‘smart highway’ for autonomous cars and AI traffic monitoring under construction in Wuhan, capital of Hubei
- China: Alibaba launches A100 program with sights set on cornering China’s enterprise transformation space
- Barclaycard UK partners China’s Alipay to allow retailers to accept Alipay in stores
- China: Ant Financial building out Alipay network, and set to launch a banking platform
- China: Ant Financial partners Hoperun for banking product intended to move financial institutions from transaction-oriented to customer-oriented models
- The Belt and Road Initiative – what’s in it for China?
- IBM completes blockchain trial, tracking shipment from China to Singapore
- China: Burning Rock Biotech secures $125M for cancer diagnostics
- China: Bitcoin mining operations head to Sichuan to take advantage of cheap hydro power through the rainy season
- Are China’s tech giants set to dominate blockchain development?
- China: Report finds “…only limited assurance that the long-term security risks can be managed in Huawei equipment currently deployed in the UK.”
- China’s Huawei offers to build cyber security centre in Poland despite spying charges
- China: Beijing Prison Administration unveils digital payment system allowing family members to send money to inmates via mobile phones
- China: WeChat total daily payment transactions exceeded 1BN in 2018; user base grew to 1.09BN
- China: Pinduoduo group-buying e-commerce platform now 2nd-largest by total active users – 272.6M in Q4 2018
- ‘Facebook’s revenue from Chinese-based advertisers reached an estimated $5 billion in 2018’
- China’s Alipay digital wallet to enter 7000 Walgreens stores in the US
- China: Huya game live streaming platform hit 117M monthly active users in December 2018
- eBay’s Vivian Tian interviewed on women in tech in China
- China: Guangzhou city now uses WeChat for digital ID for online and offline government services
- China: Online healthcare market estimated to reach US$3BN in value by year-end
- An overview of the scale of China’s secondhand e-commerce market
- China: An intro to Shanghai’s Kudosbay, 9-story startup incubator with a focus on connecting foreign entrepreneurs
- China: Facebook suing 4 companies and 3 individuals for creating and selling fake accounts, likes and followers
- China Banking Association self-regulatory body to launch blockchain-based platform for trade finance
- China: Enterprise Ethereum Alliance opens country office to advance adoption and participation
- China: THEKEY cryptocurrency project announces funding from People’s Bank and Nanjing Municipal Government
- China’s ZhongAn Insurance partners Grab for SE Asia digital insurance marketplace
- China: Waterdrop Company insurance-tech startup secures US$73M with AI tech and health sector in mind
- China: Fadada online electronic contracts platform secures $59M
- China: Bank of Beijing and ING partner for new digital bank via combined investment of $447M
- China: Shuhe Technology fintech firm raises $30M from Sina Corp internet giant
- China: Artificial intelligence system reportedly in use to catch unhygienic chefs in action
- China: VIPKid edtech firm tries to balance politics with $500M fundraise; teachers educating about Taiwan, Tiananmen Square have contracts terminated
- Five key trends in the Chinese Communist Party’s global propaganda campaign
- ‘Beijing does not talk about ‘Made in China 2025′ anymore, but things haven’t changed much on the ground’
- ‘It is telling how much US companies are willing to put at stake (in China) despite the risk of losing the crucial knowledge that has built their businesses.’
- China’s JD Com Inc e-commerce company launches store on Google Express, following Google investment of $550M
- China: Watrix AI startup says its gait-recognition can identify a person from 50 metres – even with their face covered or their back to a camera
- China: Zero Trust corruption-busting AI system being turned off for being too efficient – 8,721 officials snared across 30 counties and cities
- China: Blockchain platforms will have to censor content, give authorities access to data and allow them to check user identity
- China: Documents surface suggesting 3 government institutions, including national science ministry, may have knowingly funded ‘CRISPR babies’ research
- SingularityNET blockchain AI startup partnered by China’s Ping An insurance giant
- China’s Ping An insurance services firm launches OneConnect fintech subsidiary in Indonesia
- China: Koolearn online education company aims for Hong Kong IPO in the $100M range
- China: A podcast look at the basics and challenges of navigating the Chinese internet and social media
- China Post set to roll out 2000 robotic mail delivery trucks this year
- China: SenseTime and Sun Yat-Sen University researchers create a neural network that can train itself
- China: Meituan-Dianping claims more than 2M domestic hotel room nights booked on the last day of 2018
- China: A review of the Royole FlexPai, world’s first foldable smartphone
- China: A look at the recent Microsoft for Startups Shanghai Innovation Day
- China: Microsoft set to boost support for startups, particularly in Shanghai
- China: An intro to PicsArt, photo-editing app with 130M monthly active users
- China: Government regulations coming to short-video apps to cap the amount of time children spend on their screens
- China sets sights on rural villages being cashless and mobile-only by 2020
- China: The Flying Thai Food online food platform delivers ready-to-eat, vacuum-sealed Thai food, focusing on customers in tier-two cities
- China: Baidu internet giant’s mini-programs now have more than 150M monthly active users
- Report on China’s growing adoption of eSIM technology, from GSMA (pdf)
- China: Xiaomi electronics giant confirms it’s working on a flexible smartphone
- In brief: Huawei now turning all its smartphones to Point-of-Sale machines based on NFC tech
- China: Government intensifying crackdown on P2P lending industry could see up to 70% of firms shut down
- China: $1.5BN worth of assets seized in latest P2P lending crackdown, along with 62 suspects overseas
- Video surveillance in China is tipped to be a $20BN industry by 2022
- China: 10 schools in Guizhou Province now use microchipped ‘smart uniforms’ to track student locations
- China: 13M individuals on ludicrous “social credit” blacklist denied everyday activities
- Podcast: The Autocrat’s New Tool Kit – an interview with authors of the Wall Street Journal article
- Apps connected to ‘smart bulbs’ sold in Walmart and Best Buy send data to Chinese servers, report says
- China: Danke Apartments secures $500M with co-living focus, tho doubts circle around rent-vs-loan-repayments structure
- What Singles Day can tell us about how retail is changing in China
- China: Suning online retail giant buys 37 department stores to merge online and offline retail
- China: Pinduoduo social commerce startup aiming to raise $1BN-plus – 6 months after raising $1.6BN on Nasdaq
- China’s Yo-ren retail platform startup raises $11M to bring Japanese fashion to the international market
- China: Macao Government partners WeBank digital-only bank for smart city and blockchain solutions
- China: A look at Terminus, combining AI and IoT to power smarter cities and buildings
- China: Shenzhen Metro issues country’s first blockchain-based electronic invoice for a subway ride
- China: Shanghai launches IoT-based Smart City program with Germany’s MXC blockchain startup
- China: 17 million – the number of times people were banned from buying plane tickets for being ‘untrustworthy’, according to the social credit system
- China: Yunji social commerce startup running in WeChat files for $200M US IPO
- Concerns emerge that Reddit is becoming a battleground of Chinese propaganda trolls
- China: A brief video round-up of WeChat statistics from 2018
- China: Horizon Robotics AI startup lands $600M as Beijing pursues chip industry
- China: Chehaoduo used car startup lands $1.5BN from SoftBank Vision Fund
- China: Yuanfudao’s Xiaoyuan Kousuan free app checks math homework to help parents, teachers; claims 70M arithmetic checks per day
- China: A look at the massive live streaming space – 425 million live stream users by July 2018
- China: Shanghai’s new Nasdaq-style startup board – a game-changer?
- China: Hellobike bike-share startup reportedly raises $580M
- China: Soocas oral care startup lands $30M
- China: Luckin Coffee startup partners Tencent’s QQ instant messaging platform to open QQ-themed outlet in Shenzhen
- China: Mollybox secures $13M for cat food e-commerce platform
- China: Yuanfudao online tutoring platform raises $300M at $3BN valuation from Tencent internet giant and others
- KBANK China aiming to invest $250M into Chinese startups over 5 years to leverage technology around digital banking
- China: Government considering tighter controls for $43BN pawn-shop lending sector
- China: Moka SaaS startup secures $27M with recruitment tech services
- An intro to how China’s web giants are driving Latin America’s mobile tech boom
- Podcast: China Innovation Decoded powered by Microsoft for Startups Shanghai
- ‘I don’t know Facebook or Twitter’: China’s Great Firewall Generation Z cut off from the outside world
- China: Panda Selected secures $50M funding with shared kitchens business
- China: PETKIT pet product startup secures $20M
- China: Quest Ventures VC firm appoints 2 new partners for SEA-focused growth stage investments
- China: University in Hangzhou now uses AI to check class attendance, and find reasons behind absenteeism
- China is building a digital dictatorship to exert control over its 1.4BN citizens. For some, social credit will bring privileges — for others, punishment.
- China Youth Credit Management state-backed firm, partnering Communist Youth League Central Committee, launches credit app incentivising so-called “positive action”
- An insight into life on the wrong side of China’s social credit system
- Xinjiang Victim’s Database – a growing repository of testimony and statistics
- China: Cyberspace Administration has scrubbed the web of more than 7 million items since January 3 2019
- China: JD Com Inc revenues grew 22.4% year-on-year to US$219.6BN in Q4 2018
- On Bloomberg: Inside Xinjiang – A 10-Day Tour of China’s Most Repressed State
- On Huawei: “…between midnight and 0200, data from the AU’s servers was transferred…to servers in Shanghai….for 1825 days in a row”
- China: Horizon Robotics AI chip startup set to raise $600M
- China: Megvii AI and facial recognition startup reportedly planning IPO in either Hong Kong or New York to raise up to US$800M
- China: Shenzhen Metro to transform subway station by with 5G technology, artificial intelligence, facial recognition cameras and robotics
- The spread of internet use in China is leading to new sources of data on the country’s real economic condition
- China: Internet censorship agency to commence regulation of blockchain-driven firms from February
- China’s Binance Launchpad to support BitTorrent and blockchain projects in 2019
- China: Baidu search giant launches Baidu Blockchain Engine OS to facilitate decentralized application development
- China: Didi Chuxing ride-hail app to roll out financial services and insurance options for users
- China: Huawei confirms it has its own operating system in case US tensions disrupt use of Google Android
- China: Xiaomi IoT platform connected 150.9M devices – excluding smartphones and laptops – in 2018, a year-on-year increase of 193.2%
- China’s most popular mobile app? A propaganda tool teaching Xi Jinping Thought
- China: TikTok video-sharing app lands record $5.7M fine by US Federal Trade Commission for collecting personal info about pre-teens
- China: Retail market predicted to exceed US$5.6TN by year-end 2019
- China: An overview of the Greater Bay Area initiative, one of China’s moves to rival Silicon Valley
- China: Government propaganda adapts to the social media age as disaffection spreads among millennials
- China’s Mobike bike-share pioneer retreats back to home market, closing all international operations
- China: Data leak exposes private details from 364 million social media profiles tracked by government-linked surveillance program
- China: The dawn of the ‘little red phone’ – digital media as a means of strengthening the Party’s dominance of ideas and information
- US Senators introduce bipartisan bill to fight state-sponsored tech theft and defend critical supply chains
- China: “…by 2030 the number of internet users aged over 60 could almost triple to 245 million. By 2050, it could reach 350 million.”
- China: Enflame cloud-based deep learning chips for AI training platforms secures $50M pre-A, in part from Tencent
- China: VoiceAI voiceprint recognition technology startup gains pre-A funding via Hong Kong
- China: Mobvoi, Google-backed AI startup, sets for $1BN valuation pre-IPO
- China: JIMU Intelligent AI-powered driving startup raises $15M
- ‘If the driverless-car phenomenon takes off in China, the payoff could be in the trillions of dollars’
- China: EHang drone manufacturer aims for public offering in the US targeting up to $500M
- China: An intro to WiFi Master Key, 5th largest app by monthly user activity in 2018
- China: Maoyan movie ticketing app preps for US$350M fundraise in Hong Kong IPO
- China: A brief intro to the Chunhui Cup innovation and entrepreneurship competition for overseas Chinese students and graduates
- China’s VIPKid online education startup puts hundreds of teachers on notice over Taiwan and Tiananmen education
- Human Rights Watch recently reported that China’s assault on individual human rights is at its worst level since the Tiananmen Square massacre.
- China: Huawei once again caught using fake images to promote upcoming product
- US set to ban sale of tech to Chinese firms committing intellectual property theft and trade violations under proposed law
- China: Redpoint Ventures preps to raise $300M for 2nd seed, early and growth stage China fund
- China: SenseTime AI startup reportedly preps for US$2BN fundraise
- China: Baidu Ventures, VC arm of search giant, was the world’s most active corporate venture investor in AI last year
- Silicon Valley Bank’s China Report from the 2019 Startup Outlook
- China: Investment firm backed by Beijing city government in talks to raise $1.5BN tech fund
- China’s AI-driven virtual news anchors graduate to full-body presentation
- China: Nreal mixed reality glasses developer gains $16M backing
- Hong Kong: A look at the recent Jumpstarter event, an initiative of Alibaba Entrepreneurs Fund
- American universities start cutting ties to Huawei and Confucius Institute over perceived influence
- India: Xiaomi launches ShareSave, a platform for buying products from China
- India: Tamil Nadu government considers ban of China’s TikTok to stop the spread of ‘harmful content’
- Quietly and steadily, China’s app factory has been conquering India…
- Japan’s Mizuho Bank partners China’s state-run Zhongguancun tech fund to discover startups
- Singapore’s Chope restaurant booking platform lands partnership with China’s Meituan-Dianping, adding overseas options in-app for travellers
- Taiwan to block China’s Tencent and Baidu streaming sites due to propaganda and security risks ahead of 2020 election
- The internet, but not as we know it: life online in China, Cuba, India and Russia
- Japan: China’s SenseTime AI startup unveils self-driving center outside Tokyo
- Singapore: Bigo social media startup acquired by China’s social network YY
