Mobile Internet shakes up stodgy China industries

Published May 8, 2014 8:55am ET



BEIJING (AP) — Alibaba, the e-commerce giant planning a blockbuster share sale in the U.S., shook up China’s vast but sleepy retailing industry by popularizing online shopping. Now it and China’s other Internet companies are mounting challenges in areas from banking to broadcasting.

The new wave of change was triggered by the abrupt shift of Chinese Internet users to surfing the Web via smartphones or tablets. Some 81 percent of China’s 618 million Internet users now go online wirelessly. Companies such as Alibaba that arose in the era of the desktop computer-based Internet are scrambling to roll out mobile-friendly services.

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