Chinese E-Commerce giant Alibaba Group’s UCWeb — a leading user-generated content ecosystem in India — has announced the launch of a self-creating content platform in India —We-Media Reward Plan 2.0 with initial investment of Rs 5 crore. The internet major is investing Rs 200 crore in India for driving content distribution over the next 2 years.
Announcing the initiative on his visit to India, He Xiaopeng, Co-Founder UCWeb and President, Alibaba Mobile Business Group said, “Dominance of mobile and digital proliferation is leading to an increased adoption of mobile internet and is making India ‘Digitally Ready’. UCWeb is realising its vision of “Serve half the population of the planet”, and we are moving forward to the era of “GUF” (Google, UCWeb and Facebook). The investment falls under Alibaba Digital Media and Entertainment Group’s targeted investment of $7.2 billion in content over the next three years.”
UC News — UCWeb’s content distribution platform, launched in June 2016, has registered a new milestone by becoming one of the fastest growing apps in the country with over 80 Million Monthly Active Users in India.
Guardian 20 spoke to Kenny Ye, GM-Overseas Business, Alibaba Mobile Business Group over the launch of UC News and he said, “To launch UC News is quiet a great job, we have done this because it is a game changer in the industry. We utilized big data and Artificial Intelligence technology to do the personalization for our articles and on the supply side we also launched “WeMedia Program” to encourage more and more content curation, to provide more content for our users.”
UCWeb is upgrading its content and services portfolio by adding more short video-related content. Short Videos are fast becoming the most popular form of content consumed in China today and UCWeb sees huge potential for this concept here in India as well.
“The latest data on UC News shows that we generated over 3,100 million page views in January, 2017 alone, which translates to 100 million page views daily. Moreover, we are experiencing a fast rise in the average time spent on UC News. As of this quarter, an average user spends over 23 minutes on UC News. Our strong user base number indicates the success of our strategy of moving “From Tool to Content”, said Kenny Ye, GM-Overseas Business, Alibaba Mobile Business Group.
Besides an upgrade in the Ad revenue sharing model, We-Media Reward Plan 2.0 will open the door of opportunity to the most talented writers in the country. 1000 We-media writers will be recruited in India and Indonesia who will be able to earn at least Rs 50,000 per month through the UC News platform. UCWeb has been setting new trends under the UC We-Media program where people get an opportunity to create, to write, share thoughts and engage with their followers on UC News.
Late last year, Alibaba Holdings announced its new digital media arm, Alibaba Digital Media and Entertainment, in a major reorganization of the company’s entertainment assets. The transformation marked a total consolidation of Alibaba’s media businesses, including video website YoukuTudou, UCWeb and Alibaba Pictures Group as well as the company’s sports, games, literature, music, and the digital entertainment divisions.