Weekly News Wrap: Singapore stuck on digitising hawker stalls; China launches antitrust probe on Meituan

And Indian food delivery startup Zomato files IPO of up to $1.1b.

From Bloomberg:

Singapore officials trying to digitize the economy are targeting a tricky group of holdouts: elderly vendors who run the country’s famed hawker stalls.

For generations of Singaporeans, stalls selling popular street food have been an indispensable part of local life. Even amidst unbearable midday heat, these open-air complexes draw office professionals, families and retirees with favorites such as chicken rice, prawn noodles and the nasi lemak coconut rice dish.

Most of these stalls have been cash-only businesses though, and that’s part of the challenge as Singapore encourages consumers to use electronic payments.

As part of the Hawkers Go Digital program that offered incentives like cash payouts, more than 10,000 stallholders, or about half of the total on government-owned premises, have adopted e-payment solutions, according to a statement by the government agencies in charge of the program.

Read more here.

From Reuters:

China launched an antitrust investigation into food delivery giant Meituan, the market regulator said. According to the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR), its investigaton was focussed on the practice whereby a company forces vendors to use their platform exclusively, known as "choose one from two".

Tencent-backed Meituan, which this month raised $10b in a stock and convertible bonds sale, said in a statement it would cooperate with the investigation and that its business was operating normally.

This month, SAMR imposed a record $2.75b fine on e-commerce giant Alibaba over the same practice and summoned 34 internet firms including Meituan to tell them to learn from Alibaba's penalty and not use banned practices. read more

Meituan, which competes with Alibaba-backed Ele.me among others, had an estimated 68.2% of China's food delivery market in the Q2 2020, according to Trustdata.

Read more here.

From Reuters:

Indian food delivery startup Zomato, backed by China's Ant Group, filed for an IPO of up to $1.1b (INR82.5b) to cash in on a pandemic-led surge in online ordering.

"Being the only online food delivery platform to list in India, Zomato is sure to see a bumper debut," said Shikher Jain, manager, fundamental equity research at Anand Rathi in Mumbai. "It is an online company, a familiar brand, their business model is sustainable in a pandemic, so one can expect a lot of interest for it."

A flush of money from foreign funds and feverish interest from mom-and-pop investors putting their lockdown-led savings to work has driven listings in India so far this year, but a recent surge in infections is dampening investor appetite.

Earlier this year, companies such as paint maker Indigo Paints, engineering firm MTAR Technologies and online travel agency Easy Trip Planners saw strong demand for their listings.

Read more here.