There wasn't much new or wow at this year's CES -- at least if you don't count all the new AI-empowered refrigerators, toasters and toilets plus the black-out moments at the convention hall. Makes you wonder about the future of tech and all those e lectricity-sucking gadgets. But Baidu, Alibaba and other of China's tech titans were in the spotlight. 
Like last year, one-third of the exhibitors at CES were from China!

Things were bright at Silicon Dragon's Happy Hour at CES 2018, where VCs and entrepreneurs mixed for networking, media interviews, a fireside-style chat with  Hans Tung  of  GGV Capital,  and a welcome by Nevada state treasurer Dan Schwartz.
Check out Silicon Dragon  livestream  at our Facebook page. See pix above and more at our Silicon Dragon site:  Hans Tung , Rebecca Fannin,  Anna Fang  and Wei Jiang of  ZhenFund and  S ophia Xu  of  Vipkid. 

 N otable  at CES was  Baidu's splashy event where

its new line of smart hardware products AI and an autonomous driving platform were  launched. What most impressed me were such comments from 

Baidu execs as: "

innovating at China speed." and 

"Innovating for the world."  It was a little Ste ve Job s-like. 

 Impromptu m eeting with Monster CEO Noel Lee at Huawei's press event. Got to hear about Monster's deal with Huawei to bring improved sounds to its new cellphones.  

Taiwan startups also had a good showing at CES and unveiled breakthroughs in smart devices and IoT with a spotlight on three startups:  AEON Motor,

 Geosat and Taiwan Main Orthopedics.

 

It was interesting to see 

Alibaba's 

giant tent featuring logistics and design

services, right at CES and emphasizing some of its core services. Seemed smart! 

  26 Observations about CES 2018
A write-up by  HAX  partner  Benjamin Joffe  tells what you  missed at CES this year. No dominant theme, pro-looking booths, more B2B and sophisticated, high quality exhibits by Chinese companies - a big difference from years past when shoddy China booths were relegated to back  rows.  Read spotting CES.

FUNDING DEALS
Alibaba  is reportedly buying a $3 billion stake in Chinese-bike-sharing startup 

Ofo 

from 

GSR Ventures 

in

a 

deal

  valuing  Ofo at $10 billion. It looks like a full exit for GSR, and a solid return for partner Allen Zhu who did Ofo's series A financing in 2016.  This new mega investment comes after Ofo raised $700 million in mid-2017 from  Alibaba  and Chinese ride-sharing service Didi Chuxing and others. 

Chinese social trip planning site

Mafengwo has raised $133 million in series D financig from

General Atlantic,  Temasek ,  Yuantai Investment and

Hopu. Prior investors  Capital Today ,  Qiming Venture Partners and  Hillhouse Capita l also pitched in. 

 

China's major e-commerce JD.com is looking to bulk up its logistics business with a $2 billion fund raise. Hillhouse Capital and Sequoia Capital China are reportedly in as investors. The logistics business is also possibly being readied for an IPO overseas, following JD's public debut on Nasdaq in 2015.  

Sequoia Capital China has funded Australian design startup Canva with $40 million in a deal valuation in the unicorn sphere deal.  The startup, which Silicon Dragon featured at a Sydney event in 2013 (!) and has covered regularly, becomes Australia's second tech unicorn, after Atlassian, which we also spotlit very early on.  It was 2013 that Rick Baker of Blackbird Ventures first invested in Canva, which prides itself on being easier to use than design products from Adobe or Microsoft.

IPOs

A partner of China's smartphone + plus maker  Xiaomi, Huami Corp.,  which is in the smart wearable space,  has filed fo r a $150 million IPO on Nasdaq.