China bike-sharing turns into VC pileup 2 Mar 2017 Startups Mobike and ofo have raised huge sums. But a glut of venture capital sloshing around, combined with misguided state support for entrepreneurship, has attracted a parasitic swarm of competitors too. Without policy changes, investors could suffer, as could the public good.
Hong Kong gets temporary face-lift from selfie IPO 15 Dec 2016 The city has burnished its financial centre credentials with photo-app Meitu's $629 mln listing, the biggest tech deal in a decade. Other Chinese entrepreneurs are watching intently. But Hong Kong's lacklustre aftermarket may still send mainland unicorns galloping to New York.
SoftBank’s $50 bln U.S. pledge is the easy bit 7 Dec 2016 The Japanese group is raising a tech fund twice that size, so boss Masa Son's promise to Donald Trump looks doable. It can also curry favour for his longed-for merger of SoftBank's Sprint and T-Mobile. But creating 50,000 jobs in the thinly staffed tech industry won't come easy.
China’s “bicycle Ubers” worth taking for a spin 25 Oct 2016 MoBike and ofo are billed as sexy pedal-powered answers to the ride-hailing app. The startups, backed by local tech giants, are actually asset heavy and capital-intensive. They face unique risks, but pairing smart hardware with rental economics justifies some enthusiasm.
SoftBank and Saudi pump fresh air into tech bubble 14 Oct 2016 Masayoshi Son's group and Saudi Arabia are plotting a $100 bln tech fund. That incredible sum could finance some huge LBOs, or inflate startup valuations again just as other investors start to fatigue. Even if Son casts his net very wide, it will be hard to stay disciplined.
Asian tech titans Hike to India’s unicorns 17 Aug 2016 WhatsApp rival Hike has joined a handful of local startups valued at over $1 bln with a fundraising led by China's Tencent and Taiwan's Foxconn. Even as global funding dries up, giants from the Far East are racing to dominate a market that offers exceptional size and openness.
Virtual foes throw down against networking giants 24 Aug 2012 The latest technology craze to follow cloud computing is software to program networks more efficiently than routers. Billion-dollar paydays for startups are evidence of the hype. Incumbents like Cisco should weather the shift, but not necessarily with their margins intact.