Every fortnight we compile a list of important news updates and events covering the Chinese FINTECH, MFGTECH, CLNTECH, and AGRTECH sectors.

For a downloadable copy of China’s Issue #41

FINTECH

Nearly 1,000 bank branches have closed since 2021
Nearly 1,000 commercial bank branches have closed so far this year. Smart branches will become an important direction for the development of branches in the future. Currently, the banking industry is undergoing transformation and upgrading, and the implementation of smart branches is a manifestation of commercial banks’ active embrace of technology.

CCB Financial Technology increases capital from 3 new shareholders
CCB Financial Technology has introduced three new shareholders, including China Clearing Corporation, China Development Finance and Shanghai Uniyin Venture Capital. The three companies each invested 250 million CNY and each held 2.5% of the equity of CCB Financial Technology after the capital increase.

PBOC held talks with banks over the speculation of virtual currency transactions
The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) has invited the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), Agricultural Bank of China (ABC), Construction Bank of China (CCB), Postal Savings Bank (PSBC), Industrial Bank of China (Industrial Bank) and Alipay discuss about the speculation of virtual currency transactions.

China’s cloud spending hit $6 billion in the first quarter of 2021
Spending on cloud infrastructure services in China surged 55% to $6 billion in the first quarter of 2021. As the Chinese government has made cloud computing a top strategic priority, the growth of cloud infrastructure services in the Chinese market continues to outpace the rest of the world.

Ant Chain releases BTN, a high-speed communication network based on blockchain
At the 2021 Ant Chain Developer Conference, Ant Chain released BTN (Blockchain Transmission Network). BTN is a blockchain-oriented communications accelerator network built by global service nodes. The network has the characteristics of supporting large-scale communication, global access, guaranteeing communication quality, real-time transaction support, low network cost, security and credibility, etc.
Alan Wang is the General Manager at Ant Financial

The market share of Baidu’s intelligent Cloud AI Cloud ranked first
According to a report released by consultancy IDC, Baidu’s Intelligent Cloud market share ranks first in China’s public AI cloud service market. Baidu Intelligent Cloud ranked first for four years in a row.
Robin Li is the Founder and CEO of Baidu

Tencent Cloud and Shenzhou Information released the joint program of “financial distributed core“
The scheme adopts the architecture design of “cloud platform + distributed database + micro-service”, and can be compatible with a variety of domestic server devices and operating systems. This solution is the first financial distributed core system solution in the industry that satisfies the multi-location and multi-center deployment of banks and other financial institutions under the independent and controllable technology system.
Terry Li is the General Manager at Tencent Cloud

Lexin signs cooperation agreement with Huawei
Lexin has signed a cooperation agreement with Huawei, making Lexin an important partner of Huawei Mobile Services (HMS) Ecosystem in the fintech sector. The two sides will create quality consumption experience for users and promote consumption upgrading.
Cynthia Wang is the Head of Brand and Marketing Strategy at Huawei

Shannon.AI completed strategic investment
Shannon Technology recently completed a new round of strategic financing. The investor is Tencent. This round of financing will be used to continue to promote the continuous research and development of AI core technologies, market expansion, team expansion and industrial ecological cooperation. Shannon.AI is an AI financial investment information service provider
Sophie Bu is the Partner at Shannon.AI

CloudWalk reached strategic cooperation with Hefei Advanced Computing Center
As one of the first five signed cooperation enterprises, CloudWalk and Hefei Advanced Computing Center reached a strategic cooperation on “building a collaborative innovation platform for artificial intelligence industry”. The cooperation will focus on “smart city operation” and build a city-level human-computer collaboration ecosystem and business model.
Xi Zhou is the President at Cloudwalk

Agricultural Bank of China Fintech Innovation Center was established
Agricultural Bank of China (ABC) inaugurated the Fintech Innovation Center in Xiongan. Applying 5G slicing technology, the Fintech Innovation Center takes the lead in setting up the first 5G smart bank in Xiongan New Area. Blockchain information system for fund management of new area construction projects was launched. Launch a pilot project for the digital RMB in the Xiongan New Area.

AGRTECH

Guangdong Unicom cooperates with Jieyang City for rural revitalization
Guangdong Unicom and Jieyang Municipal Government will cooperate to implement the rural revitalization strategy. The two sides will cooperate in digital agriculture, digital countryside, talent science and education, rural e-commerce and other fields. Guangdong Unicom will build a digital agricultural industry cloud application service platform, an agricultural IoT perception platform, and an agricultural digital operation and management platform to promote the agricultural digital construction in Jieyang City.

Hema signed a cooperation to promote country specialties
This year, Alibaba will promote agricultural products from 100 counties (districts) across the country to enter Hema. With the support of digital technology and sales channels, Alibaba will reduce the cost of matching supply and demand information and boost the branding of characteristic agricultural products. The first batch of 10 characteristic counties have signed contracts with Alibaba to obtain its digital support and promote the building of a new supply and marketing system.
Chirs Tung is the Chief Marketing Officer at Alibaba Group