Apple invests $1b in China's ride-hailing service Didi Chuxing

An Apple store is seen in Los Angeles, California, United States, April 22, 2016. [Photo/Agencies]

China's largest ride-hailing application Didi Chuxing said on Friday that it has received $ 1 billion in strategic investment from US tech giant Apple Inc.

The investment from Apple is the single largest investment Didi has ever received. Apple is among a group of Chinese and international institutions that are bankrolling Didi's ambitious expansion plan in its latest fundraising round.

Through this investment, Apple has become a strategic investor in Didi, and joins Tencent, Alibaba and other key supporters to help further Didi's mission of building a data-driven ride-sharing platform to serve hundreds of millions of Chinese drivers and passengers.

Cheng Wei, founder and CEO of Didi, said: "The endorsement from Apple is an enormous encouragement and inspiration for our four-year-old company. Didi will work hard with our drivers, riders and global partners, to make available to every citizen flexible and reliable mobility choices, and help cities solve transportation, environmental and employment challenges."

"Didi exemplifies the innovation taking place in the iOS developer community in China," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "We are extremely impressed by the business they've built and their excellent leadership team, and we look forward to supporting them as they grow."

Building on its data mining and analysis capabilities, Didi said in a statement on Friday that it records over 11 million rides a day on its platform, serving close to 300 million users across over 400 Chinese cities with a diverse range of mobile technology-based transportation options.