Global IT giants woo China

Global IT giants woo China. May. 18, 2016 07:21. by 베이징=구자룡특파원 bonhong@donga.com. American IT giants seem to be turning to the Chinese market. In March, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was caught jogging on the streets of Beijing on the same day when yellow alert for smog was issued, without even a mask on. More recently on this Tuesday, Apple CEO Tim Cook tweeted a picture of himself on a cab hailed using a Chinese car sharing service in Wangfujing area, the center of Beijing. Zuckerberg’s jogging was a testimony of his indifference towards Beijing’s notorious air pollution, while Cook’s picture presented the city’s leadership in the recent trend of sharing economy.

According to China Daily, a public news agency, Mr. Cook had begun his Beijing visit the day before by hailing a taxi with an application named Didi Chuxing, China’s biggest car sharing service, together with the company’s CEO Liuqing. He had also announced Apple’s plan to invest 1 billion dollars to the start-up before embarking on the visit, on last Friday.

Didi Chuxing was born by a merger deal between Alibaba’s Kuaidi Dache and Tencent’s Didi Dache, the two former leaders in the business, now grown into a successful start-up with 300 million users and 11 million rides per day.

It is already the 8th time Cook came to China since his inauguration in 2011. The Wall Street Journal assumed that his minds must be preoccupied with China lately more than any time before. Apple has seen its sales drop for the first time in 13 years during the second quarter of this year, as well as its stock prices fall to the lowest in recent 2 years. The number of smart phone devices sold in China, the second largest market following the U.S., decreased to 13.1 million in Q1, compared to 16.2 million during the same period of the previous year.

“Chinese IT developers have strong skills and we would be glad to help them advance into the global market,” said Mr. Cook during a meeting with start-ups at Apple Store in Wangfujing with Mr. Liu. He highlighted how proud and happy he was to have the chance to work with them. He also praised the Chinese government’s policies to encourage innovation. Brian Ma of a market survey agency IDC, said in an interview with WSJ that “Cook wanted to show the shareholders how much Apple trusts the potential of China.”