Alibaba Wants To Help Tech Companies Break Into The Chinese Market Image courtesy of Leon Lee
Whenever you start a new job or transfer to a new school, there’s always that guy that really wants to help show you the ropes and let you in on the local scuttlebutt. When it comes to the expanding frontier that is the Chinese tech market, e-commerce giant Alibaba wants to be “that guy.”
Getting a foothold in China is not always easy for foreign companies, regardless of their success elsewhere; just ask Uber. Earlier today, in an effort to make things less byzantine, Alibaba unveiled AliLaunch, a program aimed at assisting tech companies branch out into China by helping them comply with local regulations.
The program uses Alibaba’s cloud computing platform to help clients overcome common obstacles that international companies have when expanding into China including scalability and technology compatibility.
Through AliLaunch, these partners can leverage a variety of value added offerings such as joint ventures, marketplace partnerships and wholesaling to capitalize on this growing market.
“The AliLaunch program and Global Technology Partners Marketplace serve as the perfect platforms for making different software products accessible to businesses and organizations in China,” Alibaba Vice President Yu Sicheng said in a statement.
At first the program will serve as a type of online store where enterprises in China will have access to different technology partners and can deploy software or services in a convenient and quick way through Alibaba Cloud.
By offering the service, Alibaba is opening a window for many companies that otherwise would be shut out of China, thanks in part to tighter regulations in the country.
The company expects to sign up 50 partners over the next 12 months. So far, AliLaunch is working with 11 technology partners from United States, Europe, Japan and Thailand. The largest client is German company SAP SE, which has used the cloud to sell its Hana data-software and services, Bloomberg reports.
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