Jack Ma’s Ant group plans to create a new consumer finance company

Ant is working with Nanyang Commercial Bank Ltd., China TransInfo Technology Corp. and Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. to build a consumer finance platform

Companies News: Jack Ma’s Ant Group is planning to create a new consumer finance company to bolster its market share in the country’s fast growing online lending industry. Ant is working with Nanyang Commercial Bank Ltd., China TransInfo Technology Corp. and Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. to build a consumer finance platform that will focus on doling out loans to individuals in China, people familiar said, requesting not to be named because the matter is private. The Chongqing incorporated company will have a registered capital of 8 billion yuan ($1.2 billion).

China TransInfo Technology jumped as much as 10%, the daily limit, while Contemporary Amperex Technology rose 4.3% in the afternoon trading session. The new entity would boost Ant’s lending capacity since consumer finance companies are allowed to lend out 10 times their capital. That would far surpass the two to three times leverage of Ant’s existing micro-loan companies in Chongqing, which operate its Huabei and Jiebei platforms.

Consumer finance is getting increasingly competitive in China. More than 20 such companies have emerged after the banking regulator started a pilot program in 2010 to promote purchases of durable goods such as home appliances. Such firms, while unable to take deposits, can fund their loans by borrowing from the interbank market, shareholders and issuing bonds and asset-backed securities…Read More

People may have to work just 12 hours a week thanks to AI, says Jack Ma

Just this year, Ma had endorsed the China tech sector’s infamous 12-hours-a-day, six-days-a-week routine, so common it earned the moniker 996

Billionaire Jack Ma, long an outspoken advocate for China’s extreme work culture, says that people should be able to work just 12 hours a week with the benefits of artificial intelligence.

People could work as little as three days a week, four hours a day with the help of technology advances, the Alibaba Group Holding Ltd co-founder said at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai Thursday. He spoke on-stage with Elon Musk, the chief executive officer of Tesla Inc who is building manufacturing facilities in the city.

Just this year, Ma endorsed the China tech sector’s infamous 12-hours-a-day, six-days-a-week routine, so common it earned the moniker 996. In one blog post, China’s richest man this year dismissed people who expect a typical eight-hour office lifestyle, defying a growing popular backlash.

“I don’t worry about jobs,” Ma said on Thursday, making an optimistic case that AI will help humans rather than just eliminate their work. “Computers only have chips, men have the heart. It’s the heart where the wisdom comes from.”

Jack Ma, China’s richest man, confirmed as member of ‘Communist’ Party

The lines between business and politics have become increasingly hazy in China

International News: Jack Ma, co-founder of China’s most valuable company, was officially confirmed as a member of the Communist Party in a state-backed newspaper recognizing business leaders for their contributions to the country’s development.

Ma, co-founder and chairman of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., is one of 100 people the Communist Party of China’s Central Committee will honor as part of a celebration marking 40 years since the country’s economic reform and opening up. The honorees also include Tencent Holdings Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Pony Ma, Baidu Inc. CEO Robin Li, basketball star Yao Ming and volleyball coach Lang Ping.

Jack Ma 

The lines between business and politics have become increasingly hazy in China as President Xi Jinping has led a campaign to ensure the Communist Party plays a leading role across all aspects of society. That has at time created tensions when the interests of private business people and the state have conflicted.

“We’re seeing an increasingly close relationship between China’s leading internet companies and government because government sees them as one of the most effective ways to realize its policy initiatives,” said Mark Natkin managing director of Beijing-based Marbridge Consulting. “Being a party member is essentially tipping your hat to the legitimacy of the party and it doesn’t necessarily denote any particularly high level of political activity.”

Daniel Zhang to be Alibaba boss when Jack Ma hangs up his boots next year

Jack Ma has remained the public face of Alibaba and is a charismatic advocate for China’s technology industry

BS| Jack Ma will step down as executive chairman of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. in exactly 12 months’ time with Chief Executive Officer Daniel Zhang to succeed him at Asia’s most valuable company.

Ma will remain on the board until Alibaba’s annual meeting of shareholders in 2020, the Hangzhou-based company said in a statement Monday. His retirement as executive chairman will coincide with his 55th birthday.

Ma has become synonymous with the company he helped found in his apartment nearly 20 years ago and has used the chairman’s post to develop managerial talent since ceding the CEO’s role in 2013. He is moving on with Alibaba in a dominant position in China and pushing into overseas markets from Southeast Asia to Russia. Leadership will now fall to Zhang and the 35 other partners who control the company.|Jack ma

“Starting the process of passing the Alibaba torch to Daniel and his team is the right decision at the right time because I know from working with them that they are ready,” Ma said in the statement. “Since he took over as CEO, he has demonstrated his superb talent, business acumen and determined leadership.”

A former English teacher, Ma started Alibaba.com in 1999 as a business-to-business marketplace with 17 co-founders. An investment from Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp. helped the company expand to allow consumers in China buy online and fueling its rise. Through the Taobao and Tmall platforms, it is responsible for billions of dollars in sales and last year saw daily package deliveries reach 55 million.

>>>Thank you<<<

ALSO READ: Smart people need a fool to lead them, it makes easy win: Alibaba’s Jack Ma

ALSO READ: Tencent, Alibaba take Chinese rivalry abroad; find new ways to defend turf

Flipkart will become Walmart today: Is that really good news for India?

The sale of Flipkart is not just the sale of one company. It is the beginning of a new tomorrow. It is just that one cannot be sure whether that tomorrow will be better for India than today

When Carl Douglas McMillon, president and chief executive officer of Walmart Inc, arrives at the Embassy Tech Village headquarters of Flipkart in Bengaluru later on Wednesday to acquire India’s first-to-a-billion-dollars-startup, he will be accompanied by Walmart International’s Judith McKenna and CEO (commerce) Marc Lore. It will be a triumphal return to India for the Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer which will be partnering Google’s parent Alphabet Inc in a deal estimated at $18-20 billion enterprise value – Walmart will own about 60 per cent stake, and Alphabet will get to own about 15 per cent of the online market place.

The passage of the past five years has obviously dulled memories. All recent media reports seem to have conveniently glossed over the history of Walmart’s previous foray into India, in partnership with Sunil Mittal’s Bharti group. Walmart in 2012 launched a global review of corruption after a New York Times report on bribery at the company’s Mexico operations. The review by its lawyers flagged India among the countries with the highest corruption risk. The US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act forbids American firms from paying bribes. Almost on cue, in November that year, Bharti Walmart suspended a number of employees, including the chief financial officer, as part of an internal investigation into bribery allegations in the Indian operation. By June 2013, Raj Jain, the CEO of the India operations, quit after six years at the helm of the company. It did not take much time thereafter for the Walmart-Bharti JV to fall apart.

One hopes that this time around Walmart has done enough due diligence before committing to the deal. One hopes that someone has told Carl Douglas McMillon (Doug to friends) that when Flipkart-owned Myntra acquired fashion e-tailer Jabong from the troubled Rocket Internet, Jabong was facing a huge number of corporate governance issues. Hope Doug has made sure that there are no troublesome skeletons from the past that might come in the way of US laws that Walmart likes to be governed and guided by, because of Jabong’s past.

Also, Doug must surely have been apprised that earlier this year Flipkart lost an appeal against the income-tax department over the reclassification of marketing expenditure and discounts as capital expenditure, which will surely involve substantial tax liabilities from the past. Just for Doug to know, this ruling was made in December last year, and the issue involves money spent by e-commerce companies on marketing through deep discounts. Flipkart (and Amazon, too) has been classifying these discounts as marketing expenses and deducting them from revenue, leading them to posting losses and, therefore, not being liable to tax. The tax department, however, contends that this is not a cost but a capital expenditure which means it should not be deducted from revenue. This issue of deep discounts might need further briefing to Doug as the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT), an umbrella association representing millions of India’s small traders, has also been demanding government scrutiny of Flipkart’s predatory pricing through deep discounts. So, Doug does need to know that while he is taking ownership of India’s largest e-tailer, there are issues from the past that might somewhat temper the euphoria.

Read More about Walmart flipkart deal

BookMyShow looks for Flipkart’s backing to combat Alibaba

A minority stake in BookMyShow to give Flipkart a play in the fast-growing online ticketing space and also an access to a high-spending loyal customer base

Amid competition from deep-pocketed global players like Alibaba, India’s leading online ticketing platform BookMyShow is looking for a backing in its space from Flipkart, the country’s largest internet company.

While Flipkart BookMyShow Deal has been one of the few profitable internet companies in India, with a profit of Rs 3.1 crore on a revenue of Rs 248 crore in the year that ended March 2016, competition from rivals like Paytm has caused sales growth to slow.

To shield itself from cash-burning rivals, BookMyShow will sell a minority stake to Flipkart, a behemoth with a cash reserve of $4 billion. For the e-commerce major, a stake in BookMyShow will give it a play in the fast-growing online ticketing space and also an access to a high-spending loyal customer base.

Also Read : economy  policy

According to Livemint, which reported the story first on Monday, Flipkart is interested in outright ownership of BookMyShow, but talks have largely steered towards purchase of a minority stake in the company. Both companies have a common investor in Accel Partners, one of the oldest and reputed early-stage VCs in the country.

Flipkart has been an active investor in other internet businesses and its acquisitions like Myntra, Jabong and PhonePe have borne fruit. Myntra says it will become profitable at an earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) level by March 2018, while PhonePe says it is the largest digital payments player on UPI.

While Flipkart is looking at categories like groceries to get customers to buy from it more often, the model will take time and significant investments over the next few years. On the other hand, online ticketing, already an established market in India, will give Flipkart the desired repeated purchases on its platform. Read More