Coffee War: Starbucks faces monopoly accusation from Chinese startup

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Seattle-based coffee giant Starbucks wants to take advantage of China's growing thirst for coffee with a plan to build nearly 3-thousand new stores in the country before 2022. But trouble may be brewing for the company, after accusations of monopolistic practices levelled by a Chinese coffee firm. Wu Haojun has the story.

In the world's oldest living civilization, people make their tea to a tee.

And today that attention to detail carries on, but there's a new beverage on the block.

HOWARD SCHULTZ EXECUTIVE CHAIRMAN OF STARBUCKS COFFEE "And we strongly believe and we're committed to building a long-term business in China that will be bigger, more powerful and more significant than our business in the U.S., that China will be bigger than here."

China's young and old are embracing coffee culture. The young in particular are making coffee a staple of the Chinese metropolitan experience, and this "black gold" into a "cash cow".

As profits expand, competition is only getting hotter.

Luckin Coffee, a "new retail" app-based coffee chain in China, recently filed a lawsuit against Starbucks, saying in an open letter the Seattle coffee giant had violated antitrust laws.

In response, Starbucks brushed off the smaller company's grievances, dismissing the lawsuit as marketing hype.

The two seem like unlikely rivals, one already a global giant, the other the new kid on the block.

But experts say it might not be all that clear who is the David and who, Goliath, as Luckin Coffee's explosive expansion approach looks more like that of a typical internet company than a traditional coffee shop.

One thing is for sure, in the age of the Internet, you have to know your business like you know your beans.