Bottom line: Alibaba's purchase of Ele.me and Tencent-backed Meituan's purchase of Mobike underscore the growing rivalry between Alibaba and Tencent, as each uses its deep pockets to try and dominate money-losing emerging sectors.

Trade wars are making all the big headlines these days in US-China news, forcing a couple of mega-mergers that would normally be front-page news into the back pages. Each of the latest deals is quite significant for China's Internet, as both quietly underscore the i...

Bottom line: Didi's Brazilian acquisition looks relatively shrewd and could be followed by more such moves in developing markets, while its purchase of a local bike-sharing firm looks less prudent.

Didi drives into Brazil

China's homegrown Uber is in a couple of headlines as we round out the first week of the new year,  reflecting its global aspirations and also its desire to expand beyond its original car-based services at home. The first headline has Didi Chuxing makin...

Bottom line: A peak-time outage for Mobike highlights how popular the shared bike service has become in a very short time and its vulnerability to hiccups, even though bigger issues are more likely to threaten its longer-term survival.

Bottom line: The departure of Ofo from 14 cities reflects growing frustration by local officials with bike sharing services, and could be followed by more expulsions until the industry consolidates to a single major player.

Ofo withdraws from 14 cities

The honeymoon seems to be rapidly ending for China's cash-rich shared bike services, with word that Ofo, one of the oldest players, is withdrawing from 14 cities in its bid to figure out what exactly it's doing. At the sam...

Bottom line: Ofo and rival Mobike will use their hundreds of millions of dollars in new funds to buy better and more expensive bikes to flood city streets, even though neither has a sustainable business model that can justify such long-term expense.

Ofo raising $150 mln in new funds

The race for supremacy in China's fast-moving shared bicycle realm is kicking into high gear, with word that second-place Ofo is raising $150 million with an eye on achieving a $1 billion val...