Shein, the online fashion giant that started in China, recently made an interesting pitch to Amazon and Google. As it considered buying more advertising on Google properties and more cloud time on Amazon or Google, Shein executives wondered whether either company might be interested in buying a stake in it, people familiar with the situation said.
The idea did not go far. Neither US firm seems to have been interested, although it wasn’t a crazy notion. Google and another tech giant, Microsoft, have in the past invested in firms that have done cloud business with them. The fact that Shein casually submitted the proposal suggests that she has noticed those other deals and thought that getting an investment from a large American firm might help her defray the cost of buying services from those firms.
