PayPal taps Tencent and UPI in bold global shopping push
US payment firm missed its chance and is banking on network of global payment winners
Welcome back—I took a welcome public holiday in Thailand yesterday, but today we are back.
When I graduated university around 20 years ago, I remember signing up for PayPal to sell my old phone and other unwanted items. What amazed me was the money never hit my bank account, it sat in my PayPal account.
Somehow the company which pioneered online payments missed the mobile payment boom worldwide. Now though, it's having another go using commerce as the pivot for a global network of local payment winners including UPI, Tencent’s payment service and more. I’m skeptical but it is certainly something unique.
Elsewhere this week, we look at how Singapore is bringing AI to tourism, how a Microsoft vulnerability gave Chinese hackers a window into hundreds of company networks, and we get the skinny on a major mobility merger in Southeast Asia.
Have a great rest of the week—best,
Jon
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News in Focus
PayPal tries to unite global shoppers with new e-commerce-payment play
PayPal arguably missed the mobile payment boom, after it failed to turn early mover advantage in the US into international dominance. Most countries already have leading payment systems so that ship has sailed but now PayPal is trying to unite them all in an ambitious international commerce play.
PayPal World, a new platform launching in the coming months will let users of digital wallets across the world to shop and send money globally. The goal is for online sellers to target multiple markets in one go, with PayPal linking them to an audience of potentially billions of buyers.
Initial partners include Mercado Pago in Latin America, India’s UPI, Tencent’s Tenpay Global—which spans China and beyond—and Venmo, the PayPal-owned mobile payment app. There’s no word on what other partners might join, but it could become compelling if PayPal World can get traction among merchants and consumers, who are already spoiled for choice when it comes to online shopping.
It’s hard to see this making a huge dent on global players like Alibaba or Amazon, however.
Singapore teams up with OpenAI for AI tourism
OpenAI and the Singapore Tourism Board have teamed up to explore AI-related opportunities for tourism.
That sounds quite spurious but the details are actually fairly interesting, according to Travel Trade Journal:
This could include working with tourism businesses to deliver tailored recommendations, multilingual assistance, and enabling immersive storytelling that creates uniquely memorable experiences. The use of Advanced AI will also help deepen insights, which could serve to refine destination marketing and product strategies, while supporting industry stakeholders in creating responsive services.
We wrote before that OpenAI is selling its services pretty hard in Asia, with Grab one of the early halo customers, and governments are also very much on the menu.
Microsoft SharePoint hack and fallout
A China-backed hacking group is behind recent active attacks on Microsoft SharePoint—the impact could hit thousands of organisations across the world including numerous national state agencies.
Already, it was confirmed that hackers had breached SharePoint systems used by the US agency that oversees nuclear weapons and other units—but no classified data was compromised.
At least three China-based groups were said to have exploited or explored the vulnerability. Hackers are said to have breached about 400 government agencies, corporations and other groups, according to estimates from Eye Security.
The issue appears to stem from a number of security patches issued this month which were bypassed by hackers, and even served as a road map to enable them to refine their attacks. Two months prior, a Vietnamese researcher won $100,000 and a laptop after he showed an audience at a Berlin hackathon how to break into SharePoint. Microsoft representatives met the man off-stage and began working on the fixes.
But days after the patches were issued, researchers found bypasses with one using ChatGPT for assistance. More than 80 government agencies were understood to have been impacted.
A major Southeast Asia mobility merger, and no, it’s not Grab-Gojek
The Grab-Gojek deal might not have happened, but another tie-up between aggressive rivals in Southeast Asia has taken place: e-scooter startups Beam and Neuron agreed to merge.
There’s no price on the deal right now, but it is slated to be completed within the next two months. Neuron CEO Zachary Wang will lead the business as chairman and global CEO, with Beam CEO Alan Jiang taking the role of CEO of Asia.
The two companies are present in more than 100 cities, combined. They plan to retain their individual branding while using their combined operations and market overlaps to pursue “a clear path to profitability,” Wang said.
The e-scooter market may have lost its hype, and plenty of the other also-rans, but this combined entity will be an interesting one to watch. Can the industry really fulfil its potential and give Southeast Asia a category leader and successful exit?
China
China is moving to rein in the unchecked expansion of data centres after a building boom led to excess capacity and underused resources—the state planner is conducting a nationwide review, while Beijing is pushing to create a national cloud service to tap surplus computing power link
More than $1B worth of Nvidia’s AI chips were shipped to China in the three months after Trump tightened export controls, highlighting the limits of US efforts to curb Beijing’s tech ambition link
Demand is rising in China for a business that technically shouldn’t exist: repairing banned Nvidia AI chips link
Nvidia is adding support for the RISC-V chip architecture on its CUDA platform, a move likely to boost the open-source ecosystem China backs for tech self-reliance link
China used its first big AI expo since DeepSeek’s breakout moment to flex its tech ambitions and offer a contrast to the US’s “America First” stance. The World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai featured 800+ companies and drew a more global crowd than usual, including ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt and AI heavyweights Yoshua Bengio and Geoffrey Hinton. Premier Li Qiang surprised attendees with plans for a Shanghai-based AI cooperation body and two new UN forums—clear signs of Beijing’s push for a bigger role in shaping global AI. link
Huawei debuted its CloudMatrix 384 AI system, a rival to Nvidia’s top-tier GB200 NVL72, at the show link
Alibaba released an upgraded Qwen3 LLM that outperforms rivals like OpenAI and DeepSeek in math and coding link
Qwen3 includes a coding model for developers to push AI agents link
Alibaba also joined China’s smart glasses race with the unveiling of its first AI-powered Quark specs link
China now hosts 1,509 AI models—over 40% of the global total—highlighting its rapid progress in the field, according to data from the conference link
Temu’s attempt to source US suppliers after Trump’s crackdown on Chinese imports is being blocked by Amazon’s dominance, as sellers say they can’t offer lower prices link
Unitree Robotics unveiled one of the world’s first humanoid robots priced under $6,000, aiming to make AI-powered machines more accessible for homes and workplaces link
McKinsey has halted work on generative AI projects in China, citing rising US scrutiny of sensitive tech sectors link
Amazon is closing its Shanghai AI lab, joining other US tech firms like IBM and Microsoft in scaling back China-based R&D link
China’s Qianfan satellite network, designed to compete with SpaceX’s Starlink, is facing major delays that could threaten its access to key orbital and spectrum rights link
JD.com is in advanced talks to acquire German electronics retailer Ceconomy in a deal worth around €2.2B link
KKR is in talks to buy ST Telemedia Global Data Centres in a deal that could value the Asian digital infrastructure provider at more than $5B, according to sources—KKR already owns 14% of the business link
India
Struggling to hire AI talent at home, multinationals like McDonald’s and Bupa are setting up global capability centres in India to handle core AI tasks link
TCS has paused senior hiring and frozen global salary hikes just days after announcing 12,000 job cuts, or 2% of its workforce. Senior onboarding is delayed by over 65 days, and the company is phasing out bench staff to boost utilisation. link
Google unveiled major AI initiatives for India, localising Gemini and boosting the developer ecosystem link
Zomato parent Eternal incorporated a food services arm called Blinkit Foods link
Blinkit won’t cede quick commerce market leadership under any circumstance, says CEO Albinder Dhindsa link
Rare earths shortage hits Foxconn unit; Apple AirPods production in India faces hurdles link
The Apple vendor said production hasn’t been disrupted. It had begun making AirPods at the India plant in April last year, as part of Apple’s broader strategy to diversify manufacturing from China. The earbuds contain neodymium and dysprosium, among other rare earth metals. Neodymium, used as a magnet, is mined in China and elsewhere.
Business messaging startup Gupshup raised over $60M in new funding but isn’t revealing its latest valuation—in 2021, it raised $340M at a $1.4B valuation but there’s suggestions its valuation has declined. One investor, Fidelity, previously slashed its internal estimate of Gupshup’s worth at least three times, bringing it as low as $486M link
SoftBank-backed mobile ad platform InMobi plans to raise up to $1B through an IPO in Mumbai, aiming for a $5–6B valuation link
Adani Group has scrapped plans for a consumer super app after heavy losses and internal issues, folding its Adani One digital unit into its airport division link
Tata Digital-owned BigBasket is feeling the heat as quick commerce players like Blinkit, Zepto, and Swiggy Instamart tighten their grip on urban grocery demand—The pressure is showing in the numbers:
Tata Sons' FY25 annual report reveals a 3% dip in turnover for BigBasket’s business-to-consumer (B2C) unit, Innovative Retail Concepts
Its business-to-business (B2B) arm, Supermarket Grocery Supplies, fared worse, falling 7%
Losses for the B2C business widened sharply to Rs 1,851 crore, up from Rs 1,267 crore in FY24.
Paytm posted a net profit of $14.24M, its first profit since September 2024 thanks to growth in its lending business and tighter cost control link
India’s financial crime agency has accused Walmart-backed Myntra of violating foreign investment rules by routing over $191 million through a related-party setup that masked retail as wholesale trade. link
Agentic AI startup Composio raised $25M link
Southeast Asia
Singapore’s GIC has developed AI tools to vet investment pitches, including a Virtual Investment Committee and a chatbot dubbed the “Agentic Devil’s Advocate”—the system analyses uploaded deal materials and, within an hour, produces a detailed summary with potential questions from a real investment committee link
Singapore-based Chocolate Finance, a one-year-old neobank, raised $15M and got approval to launch in Hong Kong link
Indonesia will complete its first national AI strategy next month to attract foreign investment and compete in the global AI and chip race, a government official said link
South Korea
SK Hynix plans to ramp up investment in advanced memory chips, especially high-bandwidth memory (HBM), after posting a stronger-than-expected 68% jump in Q2 operating income link
The Apple Wallet app now supports the Tmoney Card for transportation in South Korea link
FuriosaAI has secured its first major deal, partnered with LG AI Research, after turning down an $800M acquisition offer from Meta link
Samsung backs a video AI startup that can analyse thousands of hours of footage link
Samsung is in talks with OpenAI and Perplexity AI to expand AI features on its upcoming Galaxy S26 phones, aiming to offer more than just Google’s Gemini link
Chipmaker SK Hynix generated record earnings to outpace rival Samsung for a second quarter in providing high-end memory products for the artificial intelligence boom link
The country’s central bank is at odds with lawmakers over proposed rules for stablecoins, fearing they could trigger capital outflows. The ruling party wants to allow firms with as little as ₩500mn ($360,000) in equity to issue won-backed stablecoins, but the Bank of Korea warns this could undermine its ability to manage future currency crises. link
Japan
Six months after Masayoshi Son and Sam Altman joined President Trump to unveil the $500 billion Stargate initiative aimed at advancing US artificial intelligence capabilities, the project has yet to secure a single data center deal, hindered by internal disputes over key decisions link
LegalOn Technologies has raised $50M to expand its AI-powered contract review tools, already used by 7,000 orgs and 25% of Japan’s public companies, as it pushes into AI agents for legal teams link
Hong Kong
Digital assets firm OSL Group has raised $300M in equity to support its global expansion, with a focus on regulated stablecoin infrastructure and compliant payment systems link
Circuit-board maker Victory Giant could be the next major tech manufacturer to go publish in Hong Kong link
Taiwan
Taiwan is launching a “Ten Major AI Infrastructure Projects” plan to generate over $510B in economic value by 2040 and position itself as a global AI leader link
TSMC's Taiwan stock value has now surpassed $1 trillion thanks to an AI frenzy—it becomes the first Chinese company to break the milestone since China's PetroChina oil link
North Korea
The FBI believes thousands of North Koreans have posed as Americans to land remote US jobs, often using those roles to steal crypto—investigators say many share an odd obsession with Despicable Me, frequently using Minions and “Gru” references in emails and profiles link
An American unwittingly became part of North Korea’s secret remote work scheme, helping funnel millions into Kim Jong Un’s weapons program through jobs with major tech firms—now, he’s speaking out about how the regime turned unsuspecting freelancers into pawns link
The US has sanctioned three senior North Korean officials for running an IT worker scheme that used stolen identities to bypass sanctions link
An Arizona woman has been sentenced to 8.5 years in prison for operating a laptop farm that supported North Korea’s illegal IT worker scheme—prosecutors said she helped North Koreans land jobs at 309 companies—including a major TV network, a carmaker, and a Silicon Valley tech firm link