Wal-Mart Stores Inc is planning to test a new unlimited online shipping service this summer for $50 per year, a move that may hurt Amazon's annual $99 Prime shipping service. Wal-Mart's service, which will be by invitation only for now, will offer selected products on the company's website to customers within three days or less, company spokesman Ravi Jariwala told Reuters
Read moreBEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Wanda Group's Wang Jianlin and an investment firm founded by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's Jack Ma took part in a 800 million yuan ($129 million) funding round for a little-known sports entertainment company backed by local tech firm LeTV. The funding, conducted in two parts, valued LeTV Sports at about 2.8 billion yuan ($451.37 million), Leshi Internet Information & Technology Corp Beijing (LeTV) said in a statement on Wednesday.
Read moreBy Paul Carsten BEIJING (Reuters) – Tencent Holdings Ltd, China's biggest social network and online entertainment firm, posted higher-than-expected first quarter revenue as a drive to sell more advertising on its social networks and entertainment services began to pay off. Tencent's social networks are as ubiquitous in China as Facebook Inc is in many parts of the world, and the company has said it wants to emulate the success of its U.S
Read more(Reuters) – Facebook Inc tied up with nine news publishers to launch “Instant Articles” that will let them publish articles directly to the social network's mobile news feeds. Instant Articles will let stories load more than 10 times faster than standard mobile web articles and will include content from publishers such as the New York Times, BuzzFeed and National Geographic, Facebook said in a blog post on its website
Read moreGlobal beauty retailer Sephora, part of French luxury goods group LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE, launched its first online store in China on shopping platform JD.com Inc, the latest global firm to tap into China’s booming e-commerce market. The cosmetics chain, which has 174 physical stores in mainland China, said on Wednesday it had chosen JD.com partly due to its focus on fighting counterfeit goods, an issue that has plagued China’s online retail market including sector leader Alibaba Group Holding Ltd
Read moreBy Paul Carsten and Lisa Richwine BEIJING/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – In a multi-billion dollar dogfight with Alibaba Group Holding Ltd for leadership in China's online entertainment market, mobile messaging app WeChat is Tencent Holdings Ltd's trump card. The wildly popular app allows Tencent to channel 500 million monthly active users to its entertainment services, a huge consumer base for subscriptions or marketing – pay dirt for media and advertising partners.
Read moreUber is testing cash payments in India as the online taxi-hailing company seeks a stronger foothold in a country where many fewer people have credit cards than internet connections. San Francisco-based Uber has grown rapidly in value to be worth around $40 billion. Many analysts say that is because Uber has not adapted its business model enough to suit India's needs
Read moreThe maimed woman, Rafida Ahmed, scanned the room nervously. The Atlanta financial executive has been hiding since Islamic militants wielding machetes attacked her on Feb. 26 in her native Bangladesh
Read moreRepublican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina apparently has learned something about registering website domain names. Shortly after the former Hewlett-Packard chief executive announced her campaign last week, she found out that a cybersquatter had bought the rights to carlyfiorina.org and was using it to criticize her record. Chuck Todd of NBC News brought up the issue while interviewing Fiorina on “Meet the Press” and showed the website, which features row after row of frowny-face emoticons representing 30,000 people laid off during her Hewlett-Packard tenure from 1999 to 2005
Read moreBy Aziz El Yaakoubi RABAT (Reuters) – The Moroccan Interior Ministry has filed a lawsuit against a group behind a report that allegedly accuses the intelligence services of spying on rights activists and journalists, according to the state news agency MAP. International rights groups condemn curbs on freedom of speech and information in Morocco, where journalists and activists are regularly prosecuted under laws that criminalize defamation of the state or king. MAP did not identify the group in question, nor did it give details of the lawsuit, but the action follows the publication last week of a 40-page report on government surveillance in Morocco, compiled by the UK-based Privacy International.
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