Apple's Tim Cook arrives in China, takes $1BN taxi ride

Tech Industry

by Richard Trenholm May 16, 2016 5:17 AM PDT

@rich_trenholm

Apple boss Tim Cook is in Beijing this week to stem the company's China crisis.
Josh Miller/CNET

Tim Cook just took a $1 billion taxi ride. Arriving in China, the Apple CEO jumped into a cab from Didi Chuxing, the ridesharing app and Uber rival in which Apple recently invested $1 billion.

Cook is reported to be visiting China to smooth over recent troubles. The country has been a tough territory for Apple recently: the US company lost the "iPhone" trademark there and saw iTunes blocked, while falling iPhone sales drove billionaire investor Carl Icahn to offload his stake in the company.

Cook was bullish about those results, however. "I could not be more optimistic about China," he said earlier this month.

Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the purpose of the visit.

Upon arriving, Cook headed for the Apple Store in Beijing's popular shopping district Wangfujing to meet with the boss of Didi Chuxing and founders and CEOs of some of China's top apps, including Meituan, Toutiao.com and Tap4Fun.