Tag: alibaba mobile payments

Alibaba and Tencent clash in the mobile payments market

China’s mobile commerce market becomes a battelfield for two large companies

Two of China’s largest companies have entered into a proverbial war over the mobile payments market. Both Alibaba and Tencent have high hopes for the mobile space and have been aggressively establishing a strong presence in the mobile commerce sector. Alibaba has managed to capture a strong lead with its Alipay platform, but Tencent still has a strong connection to Chinese consumers through its WeChat application. Now, the two companies are beginning to fight in the cab-calling services arena.

Cab-calling services receive more attention from Alibaba and Tencentmobile payments

Cab-calling services are becoming somewhat common in China. These services are very straightforward in than consumers can call for a taxi and arrange for transportation. Some services allow users to pay for their taxi directly from a mobile device. This is meant to make it more convenient for consumers that have become more reliant on their smartphones and tablets to pay their cab fare. Alibaba and Tencent have entered into a price war with their respective Kuaidi and Didi applications.

Applications set to compete more aggressively

The two applications offer similar cab-calling services. As such, they have begun intensely competing with one another for consumers that will likely use one over the other for the foreseeable future. Tencent has announced that those using the Didi and WeChat applications will receive a price subsidy on their travels. Alibaba has also announced a similar initiative, claiming that those using the Kuaidi application and paying for their trip with the Alipay platform could receive significant discounts.

Mobile commerce competition continues in China

Competition in the mobile commerce sector is unavoidable for large companies that intend to establish a strong following in the mobile space. Chinese consumers have become enthralled with the concept of mobile payments and new services are becoming available to them at a rapid pace. These services intend to capture their attention and support for years, but few have managed to actually do so. Tencent and Alibaba have managed to attract support from most consumers in the country concerning their mobile initiatives.

Alibaba may grow more aggressive on mobile commerce

Mobile commerce may have a role to play in company’s future

Alibaba is one of the largest e-commerce businesses in the world and currently dominates the Chinese market. As a native to China, Alibaba was able to succeed in establishing itself as the country’s premier e-commerce businesses due to the lack of competition coming from companies like Amazon and eBay, which had been almost entirely exclusive to western societies in the past. In May of this year, Jack Ma, the company’s founder, stepped down as CEO of Alibaba and was succeeded by Jonathan Lu. Lu has remained relatively reserved concerning the future of the company, but believes that it must adapt in order to retain its leadership in the e-commerce sector, and that means growing more accommodating of mobile commerce.

Competition could force more focus on mobile services

Jonathan Lu and Jack Ma share a many of the same ideologies when it comes to e-commerce and business. Both have been working together for several years and both have taken note of the rising importance that mobile commerce is playing among consumers. With more people beginning to rely heavily on mobile devices, the need for Alibaba to provide comprehensive mobile commerce services to these consumers is becoming too important to ignore. This is especially true as both Amazon and eBay look to provide such services to consumers and find some foothold in the Chinese market.

Alibaba expected to go public in near future

mobile commerce chinaAlibaba already has some mobile payment platforms in place, but the company is beginning to feel pressure to become more aggressive on this front, especially if it plans to go public in the relatively near future. Since 1999, Alibaba has been a privately owned company, but that is likely to change in the coming years under Lu’s leadership. If the company where to go public, its approach on mobile commerce could generate a great deal of traction with investors due to the popularity of mobile technology and mobile-centric services.

Public offering has not yet been announced

Lu has thus far only alluded to Alibaba going public in the future. Before the company launches a public offering, it is likely to take steps to ensure that its mobile commerce foundation is well suited to the current needs of the market. This in itself could be a time consuming endeavor due to the changing interests of consumers and the increasingly problematic security issues that exist within the mobile commerce field.