Chinese internet giant Alibaba’s mobile phone business wing, UCWeb, has setup a committee to explore business opportunities and increase investments in India. The Company has not set any limits to the amount of investments it will make in India. UCWeb is planning to collaborate with Paytm to enhance its content ecosystem. Read more on Investments
“The first one we may see collaboration between UCWeb India and Paytm and e-commerce platform in which Alibaba has invested”, Alibaba Mobile Business Group President, He Xiaoping said.
Besides Paytm, Alibaba has also invested in the Indian e – commerce firm, Snapdeal. He Xiaoping is also the co – founder of UCWeb. He announced today (09/03/2017) that UCWeb will pay minimum of Rs. 50,000 per month to its top 1,000 content writers on its We – Media platform. We – Media is UCWeb’s platform where users can register and post their own content like articles, photos, videos etc. UCWeb is looking for advertisement space in Google and Facebook and plans to invest Rs. 5 crores in the domain of content writing in India to encourage user generated content in India.
The Company in January, this year, said that it would invest Rs. 200 crores over a period of two years to increase content distribution in India. He Xiaoping said that during his team’s stay in India, they had discussions with VCs to co – invest in the domain of media content distribution and development of content ecosystem in India.
“We are forming our strategic group here specifically looking into the investment strategy for India. Overall, Alibaba would most probably do strategic investment and strategic acquisition. We would not like to disclose any fixed figure now but it will be very big. There is no cap for it because strategy is for long term”, He Xiaoping said.
Alibaba holds upto 40% stake in Paytm. UC News is UCWeb’s content distribution platform. The platform was launched in June 2016 and so far has over 80 million monthly active users in India according to Alibaba Mobile Business Group’s overseas GM, Kenny Ye. Xiaoping said that UC Web plans to partner with telecom companies in India to enhance their reach and have infrastructure like Google and Facebook.
“That is yes. Like Chrome (Google’s internet browser) has been doing for telecommunication partners, we are also exploring this kind of opportunity with telecom partners. In other ways, there has already been some kind of establishments. For example, Paytm, our partner, is already in infrastructural level of digital payment. It is going to have chemistry with us in the future”, He Xiaoping said.
He Xiaoping also said that UCWeb plans to enter into the realm of online ticketing soon but did not reveal any further details.
Content writing is an upcoming field in India. There are many talented content writers and bloggers in India. It is heartening to see a foreign company make investments in the domain of content writing in India. This will give a good opportunity for talented content writers in India to shine. The Government of India must create a business – friendly environment in India to promote foreign investments in India and create job opportunities for people in every segment in India. That’s the only way India can truly shine rather than having a jobless growth. Read more on Startup News
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