Business

Alibaba’s breakup lifts investor hopes that China’s regulatory grip is loosening

Investors cheered a major revamp of Alibaba Group as a sign Beijing’s crackdown on the corporate sector was nearing an end, sending shares of the Jack Ma-founded company and its peers soaring on Wednesday.
Alibaba said on Tuesday it was planning to split into six units and explore fundraisings or listings for most of them, in the biggest restructuring of the technology conglomerate in its 24-year history.

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The group’s Hong Kong-listed shares jumped as much as 16.3 percent, tracking a 14.3 percent rally in its US-listed shares overnight, leading the benchmark Hang Seng Index and broader markets in the region higher.
The move represented a light at the end of the tunnel for many investors who had seen a wave of regulatory blitzes as a major cloud hanging over China’s private sector.
“We think this is likely a sign that we are moving closer to the end of the regulatory scrutiny on BABA and we would expect that the company moves back into the good graces of the regulators and policy makers after this,” said Jon Withaar, head of Asia special situations at Pictet Asset Management.
The company said it will hold a conference call on Thursday to discuss its plan to split.
China’s wide regulatory crackdown over the last couple of years on its marquee domestic companies, mainly from the
internet, private education and property sectors, had wiped off billions in market values and weighed on investor sentiment.
Alibaba said on Tuesday it would split into six units — Cloud Intelligence Group, Taobao Tmall Commerce Group, Local
Services Group, Cainiao Smart Logistics Group, Global Digital Commerce Group and Digital Media and Entertainment Group.
The group had been planning to spin off individual business units for a long time, according to two sources familiar with the company’s thinking.
“There was a consensus within and outside Alibaba that the stock was trading at a major discount to the inherent value of the businesses,” said one of the people, adding that the company had become “too bloated.”
The person said there would be five initial public offerings from the units, while Taobao and Tmall, Alibaba’s core revenue drivers, would remain with the current listed entity.
Hong Kong is the most likely venue for these IPOs, said the person, and a separate source familiar with Chinese tech
companies’ capital markets transactions.
Alibaba did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In Japan, SoftBank Group Corp, which has a 13.7 percent stake in Alibaba, shot up 6 percent. SoftBank did not respond to a request for comment.
Alibaba itself would re-organize into a holding company structure, with Daniel Zhang retaining his position as group CEO, and the six sub-divisions each with their own CEOs and boards. Zhang will also head the cloud-focused unit.

Pain ending?

Analysts at Bank of America on Tuesday described Alibaba’s restructuring as “an important experiment”, which would test
whether or not China’s biggest companies could meet Beijing’s demand to “contribute to society.”
Alibaba was a common target during the crackdown period. It faced scrutiny for engaging in monopolistic behavior in the
e-commerce space, as well as its data security practices in its cloud business and labour practices for its delivery units.
In what many observers viewed as symbolic of the regulatory chill, Ma, its founder, left China in late 2021 and was seen
travelling a number of different countries.
He was spotted on Monday in Hangzhou, just one day before Alibaba announced the restructuring.
Zhang Zhihua, chief investment officer at Beijing Yunyi Asset Management, said that on top of Ma’s return and the
restructuring, new leadership and local governments have recently softened their stance towards China’s private sector,
giving investors confidence.
Shares in JD.com Inc, Alibaba’s longtime e-commerce rival, jumped as much as 7.8 percent on Wednesday.
Tencent Holdings Ltd, China’s largest gaming company, saw shares rise as much as 5.1 percent.
Alibaba’s split may pave the way for other Chinese tech giants to undergo similar restructuring, CMC Markets analyst Tina Teng said.
“This helps break down the monopolistic power of these conglomerates, which complies with the Chinese government’s regulatory overhaul over antitrust issues,” she said.
Brian Tycangco, who tracks China’s tech sector at Stansberry Research, said that in addition to enabling higher valuations, the restructuring better protects individual divisions from future government regulation.
“Any new regulations will likely not affect the whole company now — just the particular division that that regulation covers,” Tycangco told Reuters.

Business

Almarai signs multiple agreements to localize jobs through training and recruitment programs

Almarai signed a cooperation memorandum with the Food Industries Polytechnic, the
Transport General Authority, and the Saudi Logistics Academy to localize jobs in the
food and beverages sector through training and rehabilitation programs ending in
employment. This came within the first international conference on the labor market,
organized by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development on 13 – 14
December 2023 at the King Abdulaziz Convention Center in Riyadh.

‘These agreements are part of Almarai’s corporate program for the social responsibility
to achieve localization in the food industry sector, which is one of the top priorities of the
comprehensive strategic plans in Almarai, especially since the company is one of the
largest working environments in the kingdom, with more than 9,000 Saudi employees,
including more than 900 Saudi female employees.”Fahad Aldrees, Chief Human
Resources Officer of Almarai, said.

He added that the agreements signed to train and qualify young people are part of the
integrated initiatives and training and rehabilitation programs for national human
resources in Almarai. He pointed out that the company provided about half a million
employee training hours during 2022, raising its retention rate to 90% during 2022.

It is worth mentioning that Almarai is the world’s largest vertically integrated dairy
company, and the largest food and beverage producer and distributor in the Middle
East. Almarai was ranked among LinkedIn’s top 15 Saudi companies for professional
career development for 2022.

Business

SEBA Bank rebrands to AMINA Bank and continues to write its success story

a fully licensed Swiss crypto bank, announced today its new brand identity: AMINA Bank AG. The group operates
globally from its regulated hubs in Zug, Abu Dhabi and Hong Kong, offering its clients traditional and crypto banking services.
SEBA Bank made history in 2019 by becoming one of the first FINMA-regulated institutions to provide crypto banking services. This rebrand marks a new chapter for the company, which has proudly been in operation for more than four years. AMINA Bank is inspired by the same trailblazing ambition to lead the way for its clients and to write its own future as a Swiss-
regulated crypto bank offering services to its traditional and crypto savvy clients around the globe. The name ‘AMINA’ stems from the term ‘transAMINAtion’, meaning transference of one compound to another. AMINA is a brand driven by perpetual change, bringing together the various ‘compounds’ of traditional, digital, and crypto banking to unlock new potential and
growth for our clients. This vision of change represents the transformation of our clients’ financial future. Franz Bergmueller, CEO of AMINA, said: “We are delighted to introduce the world to our new brand identity. While we say goodbye to the SEBA name, we remain forever proud of the achievements made by the group under the former brand. “Our brand signifies a new era in the company’s growth and strategy; we are a key player in crypto banking and are here to define the future of finance. With our client-focused approach, our years of traversing traditional and crypto finance, we offer a platform for investors to build
wealth safely and under the highest regulatory standards.” “We are grateful to be encouraged by our supportive and committed investors who have been very helpful, supporting the growth of the company. We thank our employees in all the regions
for their dedication and client focus. As we look forward to 2024, our ambition is to accelerate the growth of our strategic hubs in Switzerland, Hong Kong, and Abu Dhabi, and to continue our global expansion, building on all the successes we have laid down over the past years.” Current clients of AMINA Bank (formerly SEBA Bank) will be unaffected by the rebrand other than encountering the new name; all operations will be business as usual across the board. The branch office based in Abu Dhabi and the subsidiaries in Hong Kong and Singapore will subsequently apply for a name change to align with the head office in Zug.

Business

Uptime Appoints Mustapha Louni Chief Business Officer

Uptime Institute is pleased to announce the appointment of Mustapha Louni to the position of Chief Business Officer, a role specifically created to drive strategic leadership and client success. In this new role, Mr. Louni will assume responsibility for the global Uptime sales and marketing organizations and drive overall business value for all Uptime clients. He will retain his existing responsibilities overseeing operations in the Middle East, India, Africa, and the Asia Pacific regions. In this elevated capacity, Mr. Louni is poised to play a pivotal role in driving Uptime’s next phase of global expansion through strategic initiatives to enhance market awareness of the dramatically expanding global service lines and delivery capabilities of Uptime that uniquely support the global data center industry in its pursuit of ever higher performance through elevated availability, resiliency, sustainability, and cyber-security of digital infrastructure. Louni’s appointment renews and expands Uptime

Institute 39;s 30-year commitment to advancing excellence in the data center sector on a global scale. “Today we are experiencing the next phase of the one-time, planetary transformation from analog to digital. This unprecedented, once-in-a-generation growth in data center demand is primarily driven by continuing cloud adoption, the new promise of AI, and the demonstrable fact
that hybrid digital infrastructure is here to stay for the foreseeable future,” said Martin McCarthy, CEO, Uptime Institute. “These complex and nuanced market demands require a visionary talent like Mustapha Louni. He is someone who cannot only deftly manage specific aspects of the business but also remain ahead of accelerating changes and trends. He continues to earn client
trust and respect by timely delivery on demanding commitments while he also inspires and energizes colleagues and clients alike. I am delighted to announce Mr. Louni’s new position and know that he will continue to expand the impact that he has already brought to Uptime since his arrival.” In 2014, Mr. Louni joined the Uptime organization in the United Arab Emirates, leveraging his extensive experience from roles at Panduit and Schneider Electric in Paris and Dubai. As the company’s first commercial resource in the Middle East and Africa region, Mr. Louni played a pivotal role in expanding Uptime’s presence. Within a year, he successfully established what became and remains Uptime’s fastest growing regional office. Under his leadership, Uptime has
extended his impressive trajectory of growth in MEA to the Asia-Pacific regions, augmenting the Uptime workforce with dedicated team members spanning more than a dozen countries across these regions. A new Uptime office has been inaugurated in Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) this year, further fortifying the company’s ability to meet its commitment to sustained
growth and excellence and serve clients in critical, accelerating markets for digital infrastructure.

Uptime Institute began development of its proprietary and now globally recognized Tier Standards and its Tier Certifications 30 years ago to ensure that the mission critical computing needs of all organizations could be met with confidence and understood by executive management. Since that time, Uptime Tier Certification as well as other Uptime offerings including assessments and awards in digital infrastructure for ensuring business performance in areas of management and operations, risk and resilience, sustainability, and more recently cyber- security have gained global adoption. Uptime’s expanding success is based on delivering a
unique business service that is based upon unparalleled engineering excellence and technical mastery, while remaining vendor independent and technology agnostic.