China's Alibaba, the world's biggest e-commerce company, formed an automotive unit and a 'smart living' division in the past week, as it ramps up its cloud computing, hardware and big data operations.
Alibaba, like many rival Chinese tech firms, is racing to introduce Internet and computing capabilities to everyday products, from televisions and home appliances, to cars.
This has the $214 billion company pitched against rivals like social networking and online entertainment giant Tencent, search leader Baidu, e-commerce competitor JD.com, and smartphone-maker Xiaomi.
In this packed field, China's online shopping titan is banking on its big data analysis and cloud computing abilities to provide an edge, as it looks to repeat the successes it has seen in overall e-commerce with more specialised categories.
The automotive business unit includes car marketing services built around Alibaba's big data analysis, online retail site Tmall's car sales section, and providing loans to help people buy vehicles, an Alibaba spokesperson said.
Almost 50 car brands and 10 000 dealerships have partnered with Alibaba in China, the company said. Last month, Chinese automaker SAIC said it would join forces with the e-commerce company to invest 1 billion yuan ($161.08 million) in a fund to develop Internet-connected cars.
Alibaba's new 'smart living' division comprises Tmall's electrical appliances online shopping category, some cloud computing operations, and online customer-to-customer marketplace Taobao's crowd funding platform, said the firm. This platform allows smaller businesses to raise capital from a large group of investors and promote and sell their goods.
Share