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UCWeb emerges as a core driver of Alibaba's entertainment biz

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CIOL Writers
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Alibaba invest $2.9 billion in Chinese hypermarket operator Sun Art

Alibaba Group has established a separate cultural and entertainment group. The company will also raise 10 billion Yuan($1.48 billion) fund targeting China’s cultural, media and entertainment sectors.

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The new cultural and entertainment group will include video streaming site Youku Tudou, browser company UCWeb, Alibaba Pictures, Alibaba Music, Alibaba Sports and Alibaba Digital Entertainment among others.

UCWeb plays an integral role in the newly established Digital Media and Entertainment Group as a gateway and a content distributor for the strategic restructuring. With over 420 million global monthly active users (MAUs), UC Browser, the flagship product of UCWeb serves as the driver for content distribution throughout the Indian Mobile Internet ecosystem.

As per the Alibaba Group's quarterly financial results, ending September 2016, there was $541 million revenue reported from the digital media and entertainment business with a 302 percent increase as compared to the same quarter in 2015. The growth in revenue included the significant contribution from the mobile value added services provided by UCWeb in the areas of mobile search, news feeds, and game publishing, via their flagships products UC Browser, UC News, and 9Apps.

Kenny Ye, General Manager of Overseas Business, Alibaba Mobile Business Group said, "Our data tells us that entertainment related content is the most consumed category of content on UC Browser, which has over 80 million monthly active users in India. With our UC Browser being the No.1 mobile browser in India, UCWeb envisions ourselves as being as powerful as Google and Facebook and bring the global mobile internet to an era of 'GUF'(Google, UCWeb, Facebook)."

UCWeb is also setting news trends with a popular tool called 'We-Media'. We-Media initiative gives both, a common man and a celebrity, a platform to make their opinions heard by millions of users. People get an opportunity to create, to write, share thoughts and engage with their followers on UC News and UC Browser.

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