China e-commerce giant JD.com has received a US$550 million investment from Google as part of a strategic partnership.
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Tag: China
OnePlus 6 crosses 1m mark in 22 days
Twenty-two days. It took relatively unknown smartphone maker OnePlus just that amount of time to sell one million units of OnePlus 6, its latest smartphone.
Huawei and Xiaomi lead smartphone growth in Q1
China smartphone makers Huawei and Xiaomi grew strongest as the market recovered in Q1, according to Gartner.
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Google moves to top of smart speaker market in Q1
Google has ousted Amazon from the perch of the global smart speaker market. According to Canalys, Google shipped 3.2 million units with its Google Home and Google Home mini series , surpassing the 2.5 million units of the Amazon Echo series for the first time in Q1.
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Foxconn Industrial Internet targets US$4.3b China IPO
China’s biggest initial public offering (IPO) since 2015 will come to pass if Foxconn Industrial Internet hits its target of 27.1 billion yuan on May 24.
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Microsoft acquires Semantic Machines
Microsoft has acquired Semantic Machines, which has developed a new approach to building conversational artificial intelligence (AI).
ZTE gets reprieve from US President
ZTE looks like it’s getting a chance to resurrect its business, thanks to help from the highest office in the United States. Last week, the China telecom giant announced that it had to cease business activities because of US sanctions on critical components.
ZTE ceases activities
ZTE has hit a massive roadblock that has resulted in the cessation of its business operations. China’s number 2 telecom equipment maker was hit by the US’s seven-year blockade to vital components needed for its devices.
Xiaomi to list in HK
Xiaomi, one of China’s biggest smartphone makers, has picked Hong Kong for its public listing.
Xiaomi bucks trend as China smartphone market dips in Q1
In a quarter when the China smartphone market experienced it biggest ever decline, Xiaomi bucked the trend and grew 37 percent to 12 million units, according to Canalys.
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APAC PC shipment down 3.9% from Q1
The downward trend continues for worldwide PC shipment with a 1.4 percent drop in Q1, making it the 14th consecutive quarter of decline, according to Gartner.
Apple fully powered by clean energy
Singapore’s land scarcity is not a constraint for Apple, which is drawing 32 megawatts of power from solar panels on more than 800 rooftops.
Bangladesh smartphone market continues growth trajectory
Bangladesh mobile operators began offering 4G services last month, albeit in limited areas, after gaining the necessary licences.
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India is fastest growing smartphone market in 2017
India has become the fastest growing smartphone market in the world with total shipment growing 14 percent to 124 million units in 2017, according to IDC.
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Apple iPhone X is holiday bestseller despite axe rumours
Amid rumours that Apple was going to axe the iPhone X came encouraging sales numbers by Canalys.
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Global IT spending to rise to US$3.7t in 2018
Global IT spending is expected to grow to US$3.7 trillion in 2018, an increase of 4.5 percent from 2017, according to Gartner.
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Qualcomm invests in China AI startup SenseTime
China artificial intelligence (AI) startup SenseTime has signed a strategic investment agreement with Qualcomm.
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APAC PC market down 5.1% in Q2
PC shipment in the Asia-Pacific region surpassed 21,5 million units, down 5.1 percent in Q2 compared to the same period last year, according to Gartner.
The dip was due to primarily due to market dynamics in India and China. In India, the pent up demand after the demonetisation cooled down after Q1, coupled with the absence of a large tender deal compared to a year ago and higher PC prices, brought about weak market growth. China was hugely impacted by the rise in PC prices due to the component shortage.
Overall, global PC shipment totaled 61.1 million units in Q2, a 4.3 percent decline from the same quarter last year.
China vendors corner India smartphone market
China-based vendors strengthened their grip in the India smartphone market, snaring 51.4 percent share of the smartphone shipment in Q1, according to IDC. They grew 16.9 percent sequentially and an impressive 142.6 percent over the same period last year.
In contrast, share of homegrown vendors dropped to 13.5 percent in the Q1 from 40.5 percent in the same quarter last year.
Overall, 27 million smartphones were shipped in Q1, a 14.8 percent growth over the same period last year. Unlike last year, shipment grew sequentially in the first quarter of 2017 by 4.7 percent recovering from demonetisation impact in Q4.
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Huawei smartphone strides ahead in China
Huawei has taken top spot again in China’s smartphone market, edging past Oppo after two quarters of trailing in second place. According to Canalys, the Chinese smartphone giant, which launched the P10 and P10 Plus during MWC, shipped close to 21 million units to secure an 18 percent market share in Q1.
Despite strong annual growth of 55 percent, Oppo fell to second place with shipments of just under 20 million units. Third-placed Vivo had the lowest annual growth of the top three, capturing a 15 percent share with its shipment of 17 million units.
“China’s smartphone market continues to grow, with shipments increasing by over nine percent year on year this quarter. But there is a clear indication that the market is consolidating. The top three vendors are pulling away at the head of the market, accounting for more than 50 percent of shipments for the first time this quarter,” said Lucio Chen, Research Analyst of Canalys.
No more IDF
After nearly two decades, Intel has decided to bring the curtains down on its annual Intel Developer Forum(IDF). Even the China edition has been canned.
A highly anticipated and popular event, IDF was the platform for new product announcements.
“Intel has evolved its event portfolio and decided to retire the IDF program moving forward. Thank you for nearly 20 great years with the Intel Developer Forum! Intel has a number of resources available on intel.com, including a Resource and Design Center with documentation, software, and tools for designers, engineers, and developers. As always, our customers, partners, and developers should reach out to their Intel representative with questions,” according to the official IDF website.
HTC leads in China VR market
HTC has captured the top spot in the virtual reality (VR) headset market in China with 18 percent market share, according to Canalys. It shipped more than 50,000 of its Vive headsets in China.
Local vendor DeePoon came a close second, taking a 17 percent share with two headsets to compete with HTC. In 2016, almost 70 percent of DeePoon’s shipment were of its M2 smart VR headset.
Overall, around 300,000 VR headsets were shipped in 2016, making it the world’s second largest market with a share of around 15 percent.
China smartphone market hits record high
Everybody knows China is big but with nearly half a billion smartphones shipped last year, the market is massive — that’s one smartphone for every three person in the world’s most populous country.
According to Canalys estimates, China reached 476.5 million unit shipment, growing year on year at 11.4 percent, far exceeding the annual growth rate of 1.9 percent in 2015. China shipment reached 131.6 million units in Q4, which is the highest single quarter total in history, accounting for nearly a third of worldwide shipment.
Huawei took the top spot in the market with 76.2 million shipment, a small lead ahead of runner-up Oppo with 73.2 million units, followed by Vivo in third place at 63.2 million units.
China phone makers dominate India market in Q4
While Samsung remained at the top, China smartphone makers occupied four of the top five positions to snare the lion’s share in India in Q4, according to Canalys.
Their extremely price-competitive devices pushed out India makers, who have been hit hard by the Indian government’s decision to demonetise the INR500 and INR1,000 (US$7.30 and US$14.65) banknotes.
“Local brands’ target customers typically buy in cash and from independent retailers. With the short-term liquidity crunch caused by demonetisation, these retailers are suffering a slowdown in consumer spending. Local vendors are losing out as retailers look to shift their stock to fast-moving, current devices. In Q4 2015, Micromax, Intex and Lava took second, third and fifth place, accounting for almost 30 percent of the market. One year on and all three vendors have dropped out of the top five, with their collective share falling to around 11 percent,” said Rushabh Doshi, Analyst of Canalys.
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NVIDIA launches new Shield TV
NVIDIA has unveiled at CES a new Shield TV media streamer, which like its predecessors will not be available in the Asia-Pacific region. However, a separate version of Shield, with custom software optimised for China, will be available later this year.
The new device is an Android open-platform media streamer that is claimed to deliver unmatched experiences in streaming, gaming and AI.
Sporting a sleek, new design and now shipping with both a remote and a game controller, the new Shield delivers rich visual experience with support for 4K HDR and three times the performance of other streamers.
1 in 5 user interaction with smartphone will be via VPAs in 2019
Advances in various technologies will drive users to interact with their smartphones in more intuitive ways, said Gartner. It expect that, by 2019, 20 percent of all user interactions with the smartphone will take place via virtual personal assistants (VPAs).
“The role of interactions will intensify through the growing popularity of VPAs among smartphone users and conversations made with smart machines,” said Annette Zimmermann, Research Director of Gartner.
Gartner’s annual mobile apps survey conducted in Q4 among 3,021 consumers across three countries (US, UK and China) found that 42 percent of respondents in the US and 32 percent in the UK used VPAs on their smartphones in the last three months. More than 37 percent of respondents (average across US and UK) used a VPA at least one or more times a day.
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Xiaomi: No money from smartphones
Many of us may know Xiaomi as a leading China handphone maker with its unique business model of selling in batches online.
In an interesting revelation to Reuters, Xiaomi Global Vice President declared that the company does not make money from selling handsets.
He is essentially saying that Xiaomi is giving away smartphones because the focus is on “recurring revenue streams over many years”. The company is looking at revenue from other products, such as smart-home device, software and services.
Worldwide semiconductor spending to dip 0.7% in 2016
Worldwide semiconductor capital spending is expected to slide 0.7 percent in 2016, to US$64.3 billion, according to Gartner. This is up from the estimated 2 percent decline in Gartner’s previous quarterly forecast.
“Economic instability, inventory excess, weak demand for PC’s, tablets, and mobile products in the past three years has caused slow growth for the semiconductor industry. This slowdown in electronic product demand has driven semiconductor device manufacturers to be conservative in increasing production,” said David Christensen, Senior Research Analyst of Gartner.
“Looking ahead, it appears the second half of 2016 may see improved demand. However, following Brexit, semiconductor inventory levels may rise in the third and fourth quarters, which could lead to reduced production volumes,” he added.
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China’s world’s fastest supercomputer built without US chips
China has continued its lead in the race for the world’s fastest supercomputer with the Sunway TaihuLight, whose Linpack mark of 93 petaflops outperforms the former TOP500 champ, Tianhe-2, by a factor of three.
What’s more remarkable is that the new powerhouse is driven by a new ShenWei processor and custom interconnect, both of which were developed in China. This breaks a traditional reliance on US supercomputing technologies.
Located at the National Supercomputing Center in Wuxi, it will be used for research and engineering work in areas such as climate, weather and earth systems modeling, life science research, advanced manufacturing, and data analytics.
Alibaba to take US$1b stake in Lazada
Leading e-commerce giant Alibaba has announced that it would pay US$1 billion for a controlling stake in Singapore startup Lazada, which has e-commerce operations across Southeast Asia.
Established by Rocket Internet in 2011, Lazada is a popular e-commerce platform for a wide range of consumer products.
“With the investment in Lazada, Alibaba gains access to a platform with a large and growing consumer base outside China, a proven management team and a solid foundation for future growth in one of the most promising regions for e-commerce globally,” said Michael Evans, President of Alibaba.
