Didi Chuxing, operator of China’s top ride-hailing mobile application, has received a massive US$1 billion investment from Apple that could give new vigour to the country’s information technology industry amid the lingering economic slowdown.
It marks the single-largest investment received by DiDi, a four-year-old start-up in Beijing that competes against San Francisco-based ride-hailing giant Uber.
“The endorsement from Apple is an enormous encouragement and inspiration,” DiDi founder and chief executive Cheng Wei said.
Apple has joined Alibaba Group and Tencent Holdings among the biggest stakeholders in DiDi, which serves nearly 300 million users in more than 400 Chinese cities.
“DiDi exemplifies the innovation taking place in the iOS developer community in China,” said Apple chief executive Tim Cook. “We are extremely impressed by the business they’ve built and their excellent leadership team, and we look forward to supporting them as they grow.”