Anti-Baidu Alliance Wins USD 625,000 Strategic Investment

From Interfax China:

"Fanbaidu, which means "anti-Baidu" in Chinese, was founded in June 2005 as an alliance of webmasters with grievances against Baidu.com, the largest search engine operator in China. Most of the webmasters in the alliance, which now has more than 4,000 members, accuse Baidu of blocking their websites from appearing in online search's because they refused to pay for their links to appear in search results as part of Baidu's bid-for-placement service.

However, as the ranks of the alliance swelled, Guo Zhendong, founder of Fanbaidu, told Interfax Tuesday that he felt the alliance should also benefit its members, not just protest Baidu.

Fanbaidu began working on a website named 159.com designed to help webmasters generate revenues by using the large number of websites in the alliance to attract online ad buyers. Companies that sign advertising contracts with 159.com can have their ads appear on all of the websites in the anti-Baidu alliance. A Chinese company, which Guo declined to identify, liked the idea enough to invest RMB 5 mln (USD 625,000) to help build up 159.com's online advertising business."

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