Meituan Dianping with Liza Lin

Liza Lin from Wall Street Journal joined us to discuss one of the upstart Internet giants from China: Meituan Dianping with their upcoming IPO and described her recent interview with their charismatic founder, Wang Xing and where the company is heading. We discussed the backstory of the company, Meituan till its merger with Dianping, their focus as the “Amazon of Services” in China, their recent foray into ride-hailing taking on Didi and their shifting alliances from Alibaba to Tencent.

Here are the interesting show notes and links to the discussion (with time-stamps included):

• Liza Lin, (@Liz_in_shanghai, LinkedIn), Technology Reporter at Wall Street Journal [0:24]
  • Since our last conversation, what have you been up to? [0:26]
  • Thoughts on Xiaomi IPO [0:58]
  • Discussion on Smart Retail and other major technology trends in China [1:16]
• Meituan–Dianping and their upcoming IPO [2:44]
  • Can you briefly describe the company Meituan Dianping and why it is given the status of TMD (Toutiao-Meituan Dianping-Didi) in the Chinese technology world? [3:01]
  • How does the typical Chinese consumer access Meituan Dianping and what kind of products and services do they provide? [5:08]
  • What’s their current revenue and are they profitable or still running at a loss before their IPO in Hong Kong with their valuation at US$60B? [8:11] 
  • Why did Meituan Dianping changed their IPO location from New York to Hong Kong Stock Exchange? Is it because of HKSE allow dual class shares and the ongoing US and China trade war? [9:54]
  • Can you talk about the founder Wang Xing who have a history in building Ren Ren (which is the facebook of China) and Fanfou (the first generation of twitter clones before Weibo)? [11:02]
  • Meituan-Dianping has a history with both Alibaba and Tencent, first invested by the former and then switched sides to be with Tencent. What has Alibaba started doing to compete with them (with Koubei and Ele.me)?  [15:42]
  • In its own, Meituan Dianping has also started to enter into ride-hailing (and the backstory is that both Wang Xing and Cheng Wei were buddies before this happened), and why have they decided to enter into this space? [18:16]
  • Why has the reverse not happened with Didi entering into Meituan-Dianping’s space yet? [22:09]
  • Where do you see Meituan Dianping’s evolution in China will be in the next 1-2 years? [22:45]
  • Does Meituan Dianping wants to focus on expansion into markets such as Southeast Asia or instead focus on continue their market domination in China? [25:15]
• Closing [27:40]
  • Can you recommend a book, movie, podcast or anything else that has recently impact your personal or work life? [27:46]
  • Where can my audience find you? [30:00]

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The show is hosted by Bernard Leong (@bernardleong & weibo) and are sponsored by Ideal Workspace (Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn) with their new Altizen Desk (Twitter, Facebook, Medium). Sound credits for the intro music: Taro Iwashiro, “The Beginning” from Red Cliff Soundtrack.