Skip to main content

Apple bets big on Uber's biggest competitor in China with a $1 billion investment

Apple is betting on China in a big way. On Thursday, the Cupertino-based iEmpire announced that it had invested $1 billion in Didi Chuxing, a Chinese ride-hailing service and Uber’s main competition in the country. According to Apple CEO Tim Cook, this financial move would help Apple better understand the burgeoning Chinese market and the opportunities it presents.

The investment is one of Apple’s largest ever, and comes just three weeks after Cook met with executives at Didi to discuss potential collaborations. While Apple has historically enjoyed great success in China thanks to the popularity of the iPhone, disappointing first quarter earnings as well as pressure from Chinese regulators is clearly prompting the company to think a bit outside of the box when it comes to its overseas strategy.

Recommended Videos

“We are making the investment for a number of strategic reasons, including a chance to learn more about certain segments of the China market,” said Cook. “Of course, we believe it will deliver a strong return for our invested capital over time as well.”

Didi Chuxing already completes more than 11 million rides on a daily basis and has cornered 87 percent of the car-hailing market in China. Although the company has a staggering valuation of more than $20 billion, Reuters reports that “the company has been losing billions in a costly battle with Uber for market share in China.”

Still, the possibilities of an Apple and Didi collaboration seem boundless, with some experts hypothesizing that this could be Apple’s way to get into the autonomous car game. Didi President Jean Liu noted that the companies “are very confident we will benefit each other on product, on technology and on many other levels,” but she said nothing with regard to self-driving technology.

“The shift in Apple’s strategy to invest at such a scale highlights the strategic importance of the Chinese market to Apple both in terms of the scale of the opportunity and the need for local knowledge and local partnerships for it to further its position there,” Jack Kent, mobile director for research firm IHS Technology, told the Wall Street Journal. 

Cook reflected these sentiments in a statement of his own, saying, “Didi exemplifies the innovation taking place in the iOS developer community in China. We are extremely impressed by the business they’ve built and their excellent leadership team, and we look forward to supporting them as they grow.”

Lulu Chang
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Fascinated by the effects of technology on human interaction, Lulu believes that if her parents can use your new app…
The Lenovo Legion gaming tablet was just released. Here’s why it is already on sale
The Lenovo Legion Tab Gen 3 sitting on a table.

Lenovo seems to be really trying hard to make a grand slam in the world of gaming tablets — making them a household name instead of something that you only hear about if you're in the know. As a result, they're iterating fast, and there seems to be some sort of effort to empty out stock quickly, even on newer products.

To put it all more concretely, we just talked about the Lenovo Legion Tab Gen 3 this January, when CES stuff was going on. Now, there are rumors of an upcoming Lenovo gaming tablet already circulating. It was enough to make me double, even triple check what I was reading.

Read more
Watch the YouTube video that launched the site exactly 20 years ago
Jawed Karim in YouTube's first video in 2005.

It lacks the high production values present in so many of today’s YouTube videos, but then Jawed Karim wasn’t aiming for anything slick. It was merely a little something to launch his new video streaming site.

Filmed at San Diego Zoo by a friend and posted on April 23, 2005, Karim says straight to camera: “All right, so here we are in front of the elephants. The cool thing about these guys is that they have really, really, really long trunks, and that’s cool, and that’s pretty much all there is to say.”

Read more
How is your phone camera tested? I flew to China to find out
oppo find x8 ultra review 2

For almost a decade, we’ve lived in an incredible era of smartphones. Phones do considerably more than they did eight years ago when the original iPhone launched, and nowhere is this more apparent than in smartphone cameras.

From single cameras — and occasionally double — in the pre-smartphone era, we’ve now descended into an era where three and four cameras are commonplace on smartphones. Instead of being focused on a subject immediately in front of you, the best smartphone cameras now allow you to zoom in or out, take incredible portrait photos, and record high-quality professional video.

Read more