Apple was asked to remove the Didi Chuxing app from the Chinese App Store, even though the shipping company received a USD 1 billion injection from Apple.
This injection of funds was given by Apple in 2016 to Didi Chuxing, which at the time was Uber's biggest competitor in China. According to Apple CEO Tim Cook at the time, this investment provided many strategic opportunities for Apple.
But now, not long after Didi Chuxing's IPO in the United States, they are in trouble. They were accused of illegally collecting user data in China, then the Cyberspace Administration of China ordered Apple to remove the app from the App Store.
The announcement was made last Sunday (4/7/2021), where Didi Chuxing was accused of serious violations for collecting using users' personal data. The announcement came just two days after regulators began investigating the case.
As a result, applications must be removed from the Apple App Store as well as various application stores belonging to other manufacturers such as Huawei and Xiaomi. Didi himself admitted that he updated his application to comply with government regulations.
Didi has temporarily stopped registering new users for its service, starting July 3rd, to be exact. It is not yet known when Didi will update the application in the App Store, but for now the downloaded application can still be used by users.
For Apple itself, the investment in Didi is cited as an opportunity to learn about a certain segment of the Chinese market. Cook in 2017 also mentioned that Didi has the potential to solve congestion problems in China. But since then Apple has never commented again on Didi.
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APPS & GAMES