16 June 2017, India:
The Titans- Masayoshi Son of SoftBank and Jack Ma of Alibaba might team up to invest $1.5 billion in ride-hailing company Grab as per the report by Bloomberg.
Grab is aiming to conquer the Southeast Asian market from the fierce rival Uber Technologies, in order to do that, Grab is raising funds. Ma is planning to invest via Alibaba Group Holding Ltd or payments affiliate Ant Financial. An alliance with Grab would let Ma market Ant Financial’s digital payment service, Alipay, to millions of riders in the region, where Tencent has already partnered with Grab’s biggest competitor to promote its own payment service.
Back in September 2016, ride-hailing company Grab raised $750 million in a funding round led by investor SoftBank Group. Chinese transportation network company Didi Chuxing also led the round of funding in 2016. The company operates more than 1.5 million daily bookings across six countries. Since its launch in 2012, the company has expanded into motorbike hailing, carpooling and delivery.
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