Receiving huge backing
Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has invested USD206m in USShopRunner in a bid to tighten its competition with US heavyweight Amazon.com. As part of the deal, eBay has sold its 30% stake in the company for a profit. Alibaba had invested about USD70m in the round, but reportedly upped the offer, resulting in the company now being valued at around USD600m.
Whilst relatively small in comparison to Amazon, the investment gives Alibaba a foothold in a market significantly dominated by Amazon. Moreover, the news comes at a time when the Chinese e-commerce giant is reported to be exploring the possibility of going public in the US.
“Alibaba and American Express recognize ShopRunner as a disruptive model which will have a significant role in the U.S. e-commerce market,” Shoprunner CEO Scott Thompson said in a statement. “This funding will help accelerate ShopRunner’s growth and enable us to continue to build great online shopping experiences for our members.”
Whitepapers
Related reading
Central banks best suited to issue digital currencies
By Aaran Fronda A recent report by the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum (OMFIF) said that central banks rather than private ... read more
Instant payments: innovations inbound for corporates
In 2020, instant payments look set to continue their current trajectory to become the biggest trend in payments. While these schemes already offer numerous benefits to corporates, leveraging innovations such as APIs and request to pay will go some way to unlocking their full potential, argues Michael Knetsch
Obstacles exist for banks to meet ECB’s instant payments goal
The cost of joining instant payment platforms will be one of many hurdles banks and payment services providers must overcome to meet ... read more
Banks must be aware of “biases” in data used to train ML models
Financial institutions need to be conscious of biases in the historical data that is being used to train machine learning (ML) models, ... read more
