General Motors Co. and Lyft Inc. are going to have a lot harder time wringing benefits from their newly minted partnership now that their biggest ride-sharing rivals just formed an alliance of their own in the world’s largest economy.
Earlier this year, GM poured $500 million into Lyft, half of a $1 billion round that valued the San Francisco-based startup at $5.5 billion. Just months before, Lyft had received a $100 million check from Didi Chuxing, China’s biggest ride-hailing business, solidifying an arrangement that would have helped both companies battle their shared global competitor, Uber Technologies Inc.
That all but dissolved this week when Didi and Uber joined forces for a $35 billion alliance in China. With it, Uber got $1 billion in cash that it can now use to focus on the U.S. market, where GM is counting on Lyft’s rapid growth to give it a real presence in the emerging business of ride sharing.
