Alibaba has spearheaded a Series B funding round in Israeli company SQream DB, marking its first major investment in the Middle Eastern nation. The round, totaling $26.4 million, also included Hanaco Venture…
Alibaba Makes Pakistan e-Commerce Play with Daraz Acquisition
Chinese tech giant Alibaba has made a big play for the South Asian e-commerce market, with its acquisition of Rocket Internet-owned Pakistani platform Daraz. The Karachi-based firm, founded in 2012, operates in…
Alibaba Buys Food Delivery Firm Ele.me in $9.5bn Deal
Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has acquired Ele.me, an online food delivery service, in a deal worth $9.5 billion. Ele.me, founded ten years ago and headquartered in Shanghai, is operational in over 2,000…
Amazon Opens First Checkout-less Store in Seattle
Amazon Go, the supermarket with no checkouts, has opened to the public today for the first time. The store, which has been in testing for the past year, uses an array of…
Amazon Announces Increases in Prime Deliveries
Amazon has announced that its Prime service saw more uptake than ever before in 2017. The company, whose chief Jeff Bezos this year became the world’s richest person, will still not reveal…
Asia’s Top Tech Trends in 2018: By the Letters
Across Southeast Asia, rising tech startups and firms are vying for glory in 2018. While artificial intelligence (AI) and augmented reality (AR) may be touted as the next big things in Silicon…
Personio CEO Renner: “Focus on the Future, Not Just Now”
Hanno Renner is co-founder and CEO of Personio, a cloud-based HR management and recruitment solution for small and medium businesses (SMEs). The Munich-based startup has won over $14m in funding since its…
Indonesia’s Tokopedia wins $1.1bn Alibaba-led Round
Tokopedia, one of southeast Asia’s leading e-commerce companies, has received a $1.1 billion funding round led by China’s Alibaba, which will see the latter become a minority stakeholder. The round, which follows…
Streamlining The Shoe Shopping Experience Online
When it comes to online purchases, the footwear industry is lagging far behind the rest of the retail industry. With less than 10% of shoe purchases taking place online, far below 50%…
CodeCheck Founders: “Our Biggest Challenge was Language”
CodeCheck is a Zurich-based startup that aims to streamline the shopping process, and better inform consumers about the contents of items such as food, household goods and cosmetics through verification by third…