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Uber Expands a Big Partnership To Lure Chinese Customers

Uber is expanding its two-year-old partnership with a popular payments service.

In a chase for Chinese customers, Uber is now going after their wallets—their digital wallets, that is.

The ride-hailing company said on Tuesday that it would begin to let Chinese customers pay for rides using popular Chinese digital payments app Alipay when they travel to more than 68 countries and 400 cities.

As part of the partnership, Uber’s service will now also be available through Alipay’s mobile app, helping Uber skip the line and land right into the palm of Alipay’s 450 million Chinese users. Alipay’s users will be able to hail an Uber ride through the app outside of China as well.

Uber’s move is designed to give it a leg up in the potentially huge Chinese ride-hailing market, where the company is a distant second place behind local leader Didi Chuxing. Uber controls about one third of all Chinese ride hailing bookings, according to Uber China strategy head Zhen Liu.

(Source: Fortune )