China Tech News

A representative from Tsinghua Unigroup confirmed that Zeng Xuezhong, former executive vice president of ZTE, has joined Tsinghua Unigroup as global executive vice president.

On April 5, 2017, ZTE published a report stating that its executive vice president Zeng had resigned due to personal reasons, effective from the report publishing date. After the resignation, Zeng would no longer hold any position in ZTE. Zeng also confirmed that he had no disagreement with the board of directors of ZTE and there were no other matters that need to be brought to the attention of the shareholders of the company.

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Chinese mobile Internet security company Cheetah Mobile announced that its live show subsidiary Live.me Inc signed a USD60 million fund raising agreement.

Cheetah Mobile currently holds a 90% stake in Live.me.

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Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi announced a strategic cooperation agreement with Hubei province.
Under the strategic cooperation agreement, Xiaomi will join hands with the Yangtze River Industry Fund to initiate a CNY12 billion industrial fund, which will be used to support business expansion of Xiaomi and enterprises covered by Xiaomi's supply chain, or "ecological chain".

Xiaomi has already established two service sites in Hubei, one in Wuhan and one in Xiantao. There is no Xiaomi supply chain enterprise in Hubei yet. Xiaomi calls its supply chain ecosystem an "ecological chain", which is a smart hardware incubator.

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Chinese e-commerce platform Jumei.com is making a CNY300 million cash investment in Shenzhen Jiedian Technology.

Shenzhen Jiedian provides convenient shared mobile charging services to travelers and it eyes cooperation with department stores and vendors in popular urban commercial areas. By deploying its all-in-one charging machines and mobile power banks, Jiedian offers free-of-charge power bank renting services to consumers.

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What does Baidu's sale of its mobile business portend for its ability to integrate businesses?

At the end of March 2017, the Chinese search engine company told the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it sold its mobile gaming business. Two companies took over Baidu's gaming business for CNY1.2 billion. Baidu has also renamed its gaming business to "Duokoo Game" and separated it for independent operation.

In July 2013, Baidu announced the full acquisition of 91 Wireless for USD1.9 billion, which was reportedly the largest acquisition in Chinese Internet history at that time. 91 Wireless is mainly engaged in mobile Internet application distribution and its core assets include 91 Mobile Assistant, Android app store, 91 mobile open platform, PandaReader, and a mobile gaming portal.

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Chinese B2C e-commerce group JD has promoted Xu Lei to be JD Group's chief marketing officer.
Xu will be directly reporting to the group's CEO Liu Qiangdong.

JD Group's newly established CMO system will be responsible for the integrated marketing functions of the group's online store, finance, insurance, logistics, and cloud businesses. Meanwhile, it will take over the public relations strategy planning function in the Chinese domestic market.

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Cooperation between luxury British sports car manufacturer Aston Martin and Chinese Internet company LeEco has been ceased due to non-technology-related reasons.

Commenting on the news, LeEco's public relations department said that they were confirming the latest progress of the cooperation with executives from LeEco's automobile business.

LeEco and Aston Martin signed an agreement on February 17, 2016 and the two parties reached a memorandum of understanding to set up an electric car joint venture in Frankfurt, Germany.

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Tencent has invested additional USD90 million into the American gaming company Pocket Gems, and is increasing its stake in the latter to 38%.

Tencent first invested in Pocket Gems in 2015. At that time, that the Chinese Internet company invested USD60 million in acquiring a 20% share of Pocket Gems. After this new investment, Tencent's stake in Pocket Gems will increase to 38% and this deal values Pocket Gems at about USD600 million.

Pocket Gems only has two main games: Episode and War Dragons. Therefore, it is quite impressive for the company to gain such a high valuation. Pocket Gems was founded in 2009 and its games have reportedly been downloaded over 300 million times.

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U.S.-based information management company EMC announced the appointment of Danny Tam as its new president for Greater China.

In this new role, Tam will lead EMC's business operations in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan; and he will directly report to David Webster, EMC's president of Asia Pacific and Japan.

Tam said EMC Greater China gained huge achievements in the past and he is proud to be a part of the team. The appointment represents the company's trust in him and he is honored to lead the team to drive the businesses to help customers realize transformation.

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Chinese leading Internet tourism services provider Ctrip.com is reportedly considering buying Etraveli AB, an online tourism business of the German media giant ProSiebenSat.1 Media SE.

Apart from Ctrip, companies like Blackstone Group are reportedly also considering providing a proposal to Etraveli. Headquartered in Uppsala, Sweden, Etraveli's highest bidding may reach EUR500 million, which is about USD543 million.

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