These apps and services range from the recently launched “ A100” business transformation initiative, where Alibaba proposes working with large companies to digitise and modernize (and help run) their IT backends, through to specific products, such as Alibaba’s Slack competitor DingTalk. On top of that, Alibaba has been building and integrating a number of apps and other services that leverage that cloud infrastructure, providing more stickiness for the core service as well as the potential for developing further revenue streams with customers. (And it’s not the only one: ByteDance - more known for consumer services like TikTok - is rumored to be building a Slack competitor, and Tencent also has its sights on the sector, as does Baidu.)Īs with AWS, Alibaba’s enterprise business stems out of the cloud-based infrastructure Alibaba has built for its own e-commerce powerhouse, which it has productised as a service for third parties that it calls Alibaba Cloud, which (like AWS) offers a range of cloud-storage and serving tiers to users. In China alone, it has been estimated that enterprise services is a $1 billion opportunity, but with no clear leader at the moment across a range of verticals and segments that fall under that general umbrella, there is a lot to play for, and likely a lot more consolidation to come. The deal is another sign of how Alibaba has been slowly building a business in enterprise powerhouse over the last several years as it races to keep its pole position in the Chinese market, as well as gain a stronger foothold in the wider Asian region and beyond. In addition to the main planning interface, there is one designed for CRM, called Bingo, as well as a “knowledge base” where businesses can keep extra documentation and other collateral. Alibaba’s last acquisition in enterprise was German big data startup Data Artisans for $103 million.Īs with others in the project management and collaboration space, Teambition provides users with mobile and desktop apps to interact with the service.
Gobi also manages investments on behalf of Alibaba, and that might have been one route to how the two became acquainted. Teambition had raised about $17 million in funding since 2013, with investors including Tencent, Microsoft, IDG Capital and Gobi Ventures. Alibaba has now confirmed the acquisition to TechCrunch but declined to provide any other details. There were rumors of an acquisition circulating yesterday in Chinese media. TechCrunch has confirmed that the e-commerce and cloud services giant has acquired Teambition, a Microsoft and Tencent-backed platform for co-workers to plan and collaborate on projects, similar to Trello and Asana. With a small team, TechNode provides timely news and thoughtfully researched articles for worldwide readers interested in learning more about the Chinese tech industry.Alibaba has made an acquisition as it continues to square up to the opportunity in enterprise services in China and beyond, akin to what its U.S. Teambition’s previous investors include Gobi Partners, IDG, Northern Light Venture Capital and Vangoo Capital Partners. Lat week they also invested in fitness app KEEP, which has synergies with Tencent’s own WeChat-enabled fitness tracking services.
Tencent has been aggressively investing in startups that could potentially be integrated into the WeChat ecosystem, including productivity, entertainment and payments services. “Since China doesn’t have those products, we decided poise ourselves as a one-stop-shop for providing all of them,” said Mr. He also pitched the company as a local replacement for several western a SaaS services including Trello and Dropbox.
#Teambition move from international to china series
Shanghai-based Teambition sealed an undisclosed amount of funding from the tech giant as part of a B+ funding round, following a 12 million USD series B in September last year.īoth companies have remained tight-lipped on the investment, though in an interview with Technode in May last year Teambition CEO Junyuan Qi said the company had already begun working with paying customers abroad in Australia and Japan. Tencent made a huge bet on the enterprise market with the launch of WeChat enterprise this year, hoping to tap the large number of businesses already using the hugely-popular message platform for work.Īccording to the company’s latest earnings report, WeChat enterprise has over 20 million registered users, and they’re now doubling down on productivity tools with a new investment in workflow startup, Teambition.
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