Daily Tech Snippet: Tuesday, July 28

• Archived snippets are here, and MP3 versions are here

• Google Loosens Ties to Google Plus: On Monday, Google said it would move features once integrated into Google Plus out of the social network and into other Google services. Photo features have already been moved to the newly introduced Google Photos. Location-sharing will go to Google Hangouts, the company’s chat app. Users will also no longer need a Google Plus account to comment on YouTube, long a point of contention among customers who felt as if they were being roped into using a social network they did not ask for. Altogether, the moves, announced in a blog post on Monday, are a moment of reckoning for Google Plus and those who created it. “While we got certain things right, we made a few choices that, in hindsight, we’ve needed to rethink,” Bradley Horowitz, who oversees Google Plus, wrote about the moves. He was even more contrite on his personal Google Plus page: “We want to formally retire the notion that a Google+ membership is required for anything at Google.” Driving home that point, Google said it would make it easier for users to delete Google Plus accounts, if they choose to. Started in 2011 and promoted as Google’s answer to Facebook, Google Plus initially appeared popular on paper. The social network reached 300 million monthly active users in just two years, according to the company. But much of that growth, analysts say, came because users needed to create Google Plus accounts to use some of the company’s other services, like YouTube, annoying many longtime users of those services. But Google’s decision to dismantle Google Plus may have less to do with appeasing users’ anger than with meeting the demand of mobile phone owners, who expect apps for each individual service. Rather than make an app or website that is a one-stop shop, tech companies instead are introducing stables of services. Twitter has Vine, a video-sharing app, and Periscope, a live-streaming app, separate from the main Twitter platform. Facebook not only broke out photos and messaging into separate apps, but also decided to acquire Instagram and WhatsApp, direct competitors to those services, and maintain them both as yet another set of options for smartphone owners.


• In its next move, Amazon could turn to physical grocery stores: Amazon wants to set up drive-through grocery stores where consumers can pick up goods they've ordered online, according to the Silicon Valley Business Journal. Where this could have the biggest impact is on perishables, which obviously require timely delivery. Although shoppers can already buy some perishables through Amazon Fresh and get them delivered the same day, the $300 annual membership isn't for everyone. And the logistics of delivering fresh groceries right to people's homes is still a big challenge. Amazon has reportedly explored retail locations before, but doing it just for groceries would be a different thing entirely.


• EBay Ends Same-Day Delivery in U.S. in Face of Amazon Effort: EBay Inc. is killing its U.S. same-day delivery service EBay Now, an acknowledgment it won’t try to match the speedy delivery of e-commerce giant Amazon.com. The online marketplace hinted the service wasn’t performing last year when it canceled the EBay Now mobile application and encouraged its use on desktops. The program had been available in the San Francisco area, New York, Dallas and Chicago. Amazon has invested heavily in same-day delivery, offering the service for free to Amazon Prime subscribers in New York, Seattle, San Francisco and other large cities.


• Baidu Sales Outlook Misses Estimates on Weaker Chinese Economy; Shares Tumble: Baidu shares fell as much as 9.5 percent after U.S. markets closed, after already being down 6.3 percent at during the Asian trading day; forecast quarterly sales missed estimates as China’s biggest search-engine provider expands into delivery services and movie ticketing amid a weakening domestic economy. The company’s second-quarter net income climbed 3.3 percent to 3.66 billion yuan, missing the 3.9 billion-yuan average of analyst estimates. Second-quarter revenue rose 38 percent to 16.6 billion yuan, compared with the company’s April forecast of 16.365 billion yuan to 16.75 billion yuan. Mobile accounted for 50 percent of sales, in line with the prior quarter, Baidu said. Active users of its mobile wallet climbed by 9 million to reach 35 million in June, Li, the chief executive officer, said in a conference call Tuesday. Revenue for its IQiyi service climbed to 1 billion yuan during the second quarter, he said. Baidu is also said to be in talks to buy a new stake in the local unit of car-booking provider Uber Technologies Inc., adding to its investment in the company’s global operations. Baidu last month sold $1.25 billion of debt to fund Chinese operations and said it will invest 20 billion yuan over three years into Nuomi.


• Alibaba Appoints Tsai to Lead Board at New Local Services Unit Koubei: Alibaba Vice Chairman Joseph Tsai will head up the board at Koubei, underscoring the strategic importance of a new business unit that will spearhead the e-commerce company’s drive into the local services market. Tsai’s new responsibilities as Koubei’s chairman come on top of his current role as the number two executive at Alibaba, the company said in an email confirming his appointment on Monday. Alibaba executives have stressed the importance of establishing a foothold beyond e-commerce in what they call an “online to offline” market, which refers to the increasing use of mobile devices to buy physical goods and services. Tsai joined Alibaba in 1999 and he helped transform Alibaba into a global powerhouse, leading negotiations on dozens of acquisitions and early financing rounds, including with SoftBank Corp. Koubei, a joint venture set up by Alibaba and its financial services affiliate, is competing with Baidu and Tencent in a market for local services that’s expected to reach 7.28 trillion yuan ($1.17 trillion) by 2017. Local services is a key area of contention for Chinese Internet companies as people turn to the web to order take-out, beauty treatments and domestic helpers. Chinese users of location-based services could rise 29 percent to 400 million people in 2017 compared with this year, according to a research report by Shanghai-based Internet consultant IResearch. Baidu said in June it would invest 20 billion yuan in three years to expand its own location-based services platform, called Nuomi. And group discount website Meituan.com, which is also competing in the same field, raised $700 million in January this year to fund expansion.


• Pepperfry raises $100M from Goldman Sachs, Zodius, others: Mumbai-based Pepperfry.com, an e-commerce marketplace for furniture, home decor and appliances, has secured $100 million in funding from Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Zodius Technology Fund. The company’s existing investors Norwest Venture Partners and Bertelsmann India Investments have also participated in this round of funding, according to its founder and CEO Ambareesh Murthy. TrendSutra Platform Services Pvt Ltd, the company behind Pepperfry.com, will use the money to expand its logistics footprint in over 300 towns and for ‘quadrupling’ the size of its technology team, Murthy told Techcircle.in. The company will also use the funds to add new ‘experience centres’ and for upping digital marketing spend. Avendus Capital was the exclusive financial advisor to Pepperfry for this round of funding. Started in January 2012 with categories like home, lifestyle, fashion and more, Pepperfry now specialises in furniture and home products on its managed marketplace platform. The company not only markets furniture and home decor products through its site, but also employs carpenters and operates a fleet of over 350 delivery vehicles. Prior to the latest transaction, Pepperfry had bagged close to $30 million in funding. Pepperfry is expected to have crossed Rs 500 crore in GMV this year.