Alibaba invests in online tourism site
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E-mail Shanghai Daily, March 14, 2014
Alibaba Group and CBC Capital jointly invested US$20 million into online tourism website Byecity as they seek to expand in the online tourism sector, the Beijing-based Byecity said Thursday.
The US$20 million investment was the second round financing for Byecity and would be used to build up the website, brand promotion and improve user experience, according to the website.
Byecity offers users online tourism services, including complete visa applications, through online or mobile phones. In 2013, 400,000 people used its services to go abroad.
Tencent Inc and two investors announced last month that they would inject 500 million yuan (US$81.5 million) into 17U.cn, which offers discounted tickets to tourist sites online. In 2011, Tencent, the country’s biggest social and game service provider that owns QQ and WeChat, bought 16 percent of tourism website eLong for US$84 million.
In 2011, Baidu Inc, China’s No. 1 online search provider, invested US$306 million in Nasdaq-listed Expedia-like website Qunar.com.
Baidu, Alibaba — the country’s No. 1 e-commerce website — and Tencent as well as the invested firms are competing with market leader Ctrip.com in the booming Chinese online tourism market.
The number of China’s tourists traveling overseas may hit more than 100 million in 2014 to rank the country as the world’s No. 1 and helping it surpass the US and Germany for the first time, said the China National Tourism Administration.
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