China's Most Popular Web2.0 Services

From China Web2.0 Review:

"According to the web2.0 report by Internet Society of China (ISC), the most popular Chinese web2.0 services are as follows:

Blogging service: Most used blogging services are Bokee(51.4%), Sina Blog(26.3%) and Sohu Blog(18.0%). The survey does not include MSN My Spaces service.

RSS readers: The leading rss readers are Sina DDT, Bokee RSS Reader, My MSN, Gougou, Potu, Kantianxia;

Social Networking: The leading SNS are Yeeyoo, UUZone, ChinaCircle, You2You, Niwota, UUMe and Linkist.

Social Bookmarking: Sina Vivi ranks No. 1 (27.2%), followed by Bokee Blogmark(22.5%), 365key(14.6%) and Hexun Bookmark(11.6%). "

Related:
10 Findings of Web2.0 Report by ISC

Earnings Recap: Chinese Internet Outfits

From MSN Money:

"NetEase.com Inc., a Beijing-based online gaming and e-commerce company posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter results Thursday, prompting two analyst upgrades and a 14 percent gain in its shares on Friday."

"Another large online gaming company, Shanghai-based The9 Ltd., also posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter earnings on Wednesday, but the results failed to impress investors. Following an after-hours spike in the company's American depositary shares that evening, the stock has more or less leveled off and was recently up just 11 cents at $21.21 on the Nasdaq."

"Going with the pack, Baidu.com Inc., a large Chinese-language search engine, also posted fourth-quarter results above consensus targets. The Beijing-based company said Tuesday it earned 9 cents per share, 2 cents above average analyst estimates."

"Sina Corp., a Shanghai-based operator of Chinese-language Web portals, bucked the upward trend and posted a 21 percent drop in its fourth-quarter profit Wednesday, as revenue fell 9 percent. The results were a penny below consensus estimates, and the company's first-quarter outlook also fell short of expectations."

Netease.com Inc Q4 2005 Earnings Conference Call Transcript
The9 Q4 2005 Earnings Conference Call Transcript
Baidu Inc. Q4 2005 Earnings Conference Call Transcript
SINA Corp Q4 2005 Earnings Conference Call Transcript
Ctrip.com Q4 2005 Earnings Conference Call Transcript
SOURCE: Seeking Alpha

China Internet Portal Sina Sees Fourth-Quarter Profit Drop 21 Percent

From MarketWatch:

"The Shanghai-based company said its profit was $13.8 million, or 24 cents a share, down from $17.4 million, or 30 cents a share for the period ended Dec. 31, 2004.

Pro forma per-share income for the quarter was $12.4 million, or 21 cents, compared with 31 cents last year. Analysts polled by Thomson First Call expected earnings of 22 cents a share.

Revenue fell 9% to $52 million, compared to $56.9 million from the year-ago period. Analysts were expecting sales of $51.9 million.

Sina said its advertising revenue was $25 million, up 37% from a year ago."



Excerpt from the Q4 Conference Call (about Sina's Search business)

William Bao Bean - Deutsche Bank AG
A last question. Could you just give us a sense of how you expect search revenues to play out over the next year or two? Just some rough guidance there? Are you really focused on just traffic, or are you going to start monetizing? And if so, when?

Hurst Lin (COO Sina Corp)
In terms of SINA, right now because we are still not a major player in the search arena, I think we are certainly not in the top three, as you are aware of. So we are going to be leaning towards increasing the traffic, increasing the number of unique users rather than trying to clutter our search with lots and lots of ads. So I think it is fair to say that we are going to be more focusing on grabbing traffic and grabbing users, spreading out the brand among the end users before we think about heavily monetizing.

Wang Yan (CEO Sina Corp)
To add to that, I would just like to make it clear here. I think it is a very important question here. In terms of search revenue, before our search revenue mainly was generated from a search engine called [dodatar]. That search engine was utilizing a different platform and we sold a lot of pay by listing products to our customers on that search engine and in Q1 2006 we are actually starting to promote our search engine and to make our search engine, iAsk, the primarily search engine on our website.

That search engine, we actually are not selling anything at this point. In fact, we are going to see search revenues decline in 2006 compared to 2005 because we are concentrating our resources to promote our search engine. That search engine cannot really, is in the process of being monetized at this point. So the traffic for the other search engine, the previous search engine, [dodatar], I think you are going to see a lot of revenues will go away.

SOURCE Seeking Alpha

Baidu.com Profit Rises Fourfold as Web Ads Surge

From Bloomberg:

"Baidu.com Inc., China's most-used Internet search engine, said fourth-quarter profit increased almost fourfold after advertising sales beat expectations. The shares soared 12 percent."

"China's Internet users rose 18 percent last year to 111 million, the world's second-largest Internet market behind the U.S., prompting more companies to advertise online, according to Ministry of Information data. Baidu.com more than doubled spending on research and tripled marketing outlays in the quarter as Google Inc. and Yahoo! Inc. stepped up competition for users.

``The Internet market in China is still in the early stages and is an extremely promising industry,'' said Safa Rashtchy, an analyst at Piper Jaffray in Menlo Park, California, who rates Baidu shares ``underperform.'' Competition in China ``is getting heated and these companies have access to more money and costs are increasing.''


Press Release

Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2005 Highlights

*Fourth quarter 2005 total revenues increased to $14.2 million, representing a 29.2% increase from the previous quarter and a 167.7% increase from the corresponding period in 2004.

*Fiscal year 2005 total revenues increased to $39.6 million, representing a 171.8% increase from 2004.

*Fourth quarter 2005 net income increased to $3.0 million, representing a 188.7% increase from the previous quarter and a 285.6% increase from the corresponding period in 2004.

*Fiscal year 2005 net income increased to $5.9 million, representing a 296.5% increase from 2004. Basic and diluted EPS for 2005 were $0.30 and $0.18, respectively; basic and diluted EPS excluding share-based compensation expenses (non-GAAP) for 2005 were $0.51 and $0.31, respectively.

*The number of active online marketing customers during the fourth quarter grew to over 63,000, an increase of 18.6% from the previous quarter.

*Outlook for First Quarter 2006
Baidu currently expects to generate total revenues in an amount ranging from $15.5 million to $16.1 million for the first quarter of 2006, representing a 174% to 185% increase from the corresponding period in 2005.

China's Fourth Quarter 2005 Enterprise Management Software Market Reached RMB1.6 Billion

Press Release

Analysys International, a leadingInternet based provider of business information about technology, media and the telecom industry in China, says that China's enterprise management software market size reached RMB1.6 billion in the fourth quarter of 2005, increasing 26.1% year on year and 13% quarter on quarter, in its recently released report China Enterprise Management Software Market Quarterly TrackerQ4 2005.

According to the report, in the fourth quarter of 2005, integrated enterprise management software occupied the largest market share, at 64.1%, followed by corporate operations management software, 16.8%. Market concentration of China's management software industry is high. The top 10 enterprise management software vendors accounted for 66.3% of the total market. UFIDA, SAP and Kingdee occupied the top 3 positions, followed by Oracle, LangChao Genersoft, NewGrand, Digital China, IBM, Bocsoft and SAS.

SOURCE Analysys International

C2C Market is Growing in China

From ChinaKnowledge:

"The consumer-to-consumer (C2C) market has become the new growth hotspot of the e-commerce industry in China, with a turnover of RMB 13.5 billion ($ 1.7 billion) – triple of the 2004 volume, according to a study released yesterday by the China Internet Development Research Center (CIDRC) under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

According to the report, Chinese e-commerce sales last year hit a record RMB 553.1 billion ($ 69 billion), an increase of 58% over 2004, and the figures are set to continue growing this year."

Taobao Beats Ebay China in 2005 Transaction Volume

From Forbes:

"China online auction site Taobao.com, a branch of Alibaba.com, conducted transactions worth 9.7 bln yuan ($1.2 bln) last year, beating eBay China to become the country's leading online auction site, the China Daily reported.

The report cited a study from the China Internet Development Research Center (CIDRC), under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, as saying Taobao claimed 70 pct of China's customer-to-customer (C2C) market in terms of users last year, according to the report. "

Related:
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EBay China to Waive Transaction Fees amid Stiff Competition
eBay China to Provide Free Services for Cyber Shop Owners
China's C2C Market Size Doubled by Q3 2005; Taobao Likely to Surpass eBay in 2006

China.com IPO Expected This Year

From Reuters:

"Internet and software firm CDC Corp. hopes to double revenue within two years largely via acquisitions and list its China.com Inc. unit on Nasdaq this year, its acting chief executive said Thursday.

China-based CDC, which owns 81 percent of the online and mobile services firm, may consider eventually spinning it off, CEO Steven Chan told Reuters in an interview."

“We would like to dual-list it (China.com) on Nasdaq sometime this year,” Chan said. “Maybe in the future we will spin it off.”

Related:
Yulgang Amassed 9 Million Registered Players in Two Months

Vodafone, Huawei Sign Deal for 3G Handsets

From BBC News:

"Vodafone is set to launch its own brand of handsets after signing a five-year deal with China's Huawei Technologies.

The world's biggest mobile phone operator by revenue said it expected to supply the new 3G handsets in 21 countries by September this year. Neither side gave any further details about the size or cost of the order.

It marks Huawei's its first significant move into the European market."

Related:
China's Networking Giant Huawei Doubles International Sales
China's Huawei and Nortel Join in Broadband Venture

China Mobile Sparks 3GSM Talk

From WirelessWeek:

"The chairman and CEO of China's largest mobile operator created a stir at the 3GSM World Congress today when he started talking about revenue opportunities and subscriber growth.
Wang Jianzhou, speaking for the first time at the conference, said China Mobile in 2005 added 42 million subscribers, a number that is more than most operators in the world have for total subscribers. China Mobile's growth came at a rate of 3.9 million new subscribers per month in the last three months of 2005.

But the biggest audience reaction came when Wang talked about the money China Mobile is making off new services. He said the total revenue of mobile music in China last year surpassed the entire revenue of the traditional music industry. A single song was downloaded 15 million times over China Mobile's network in the last six months, a rate 15 times higher than a typical best-selling music CD, he said."

China Unicom Breakup Seen

From Unstrung:

"The Chinese government is still preparing to award the country’s long-awaited 3G licenses, but the latest scuttlebutt has it that China Unicom Ltd. - the second largest Chinese mobile operator - will be a casualty of industry restructuring, according to Jefferies & Co. Inc.

Analyst George Notter writes in a research note today that "collective wisdom" from the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona "has the Chinese government awarding three 3G licenses and breaking up China Unicom."

According to Notter, the thinking goes that fixed-line carrier China Telecommunications Corp. would get Unicom's GSM network and combine it with TD-SCDMA -- China's home-grown 3G standard -- while a second fixed-line operator, China Netcom Corp. Ltd., would acquire Unicom's CDMA networks. China Mobile Communications Corp. , the country's largest wireless carrier, would be left untouched."

Tech Execs Get Grilled over China Business

From CNNMoney:

"Facing blistering new attacks from human rights advocates in Congress, Yahoo, Google, Microsoft and Cisco argued Wednesday that they are doing more good than harm in China even as they cooperate with the repressive government there.
Appearing before Congress for the first time to discuss China, the companies said they face a stark choice -- obey draconian censorship laws or leave."

"U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, who chaired the House subcommittee hearing, compared the tech company's actions to IBM's collaboration with Nazi Germany during World War II. Smith, a New Jersey Republican, dismissed the claim by firms that they have to obey local laws.
"If the secret police a half century ago asked where Anne Frank was hiding, would the correct answer be to hand over the information in order to comply with local laws?" Smith asked. "We must stand with the oppressed, not the oppressors."

U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos, a California Democrat and a Holocaust survivor, was even sharper in his attacks.
"Your abhorrent activities in China are a disgrace," Lantos told the tech executives. "I simply do not understand how your corporate leadership sleeps at night." "

Baidu Tops 2005 China Search Market in Terms of Traffic

From iResearch:

"According to the latest release of iResearch, the concentration degree of 2005 China search market in terms of traffic has increased a lot compared to that of 2004. Specifically, the sum of Baidu share and Google share increase from 55.5% of 2004 to 73.4% of 2005."

"Baidu still tops among all operators in terms of search traffic with 46.5% market share, which also achieve a lot increase from 2004. Therefore, Baidu has expanded its leadership position in the China search market. Google (26.9%) now ranks the second, which was the No.3 in 2004. Yahoo (including its Chinese subsidiaries) ranks the third, and its traffic share decreases from 30.2% of 2004 to 15.6%, losing its second place position."

Related:
Google Is Destined To Fail In China
Baidu Will Continue to Lead Google in China This Year
Google Poses Strong Challenge to Leader Baidu in China

Cisco Buys Slice of China's Largest Online Games Operator

From Red Herring:

"Cisco Systems has acquired a 9.7 percent stake in Shanda Interactive Entertainment, the top provider of online games in China, that is worth about $104 million."

"The deal apparently occurred last year and included 6.93 million Shanda shares that Cisco acquired from Japan’s Softbank, according to Reuters. The filing said that 13.7 million of the shares acquired by Cisco were represented by 6.8 million American depositary shares."

China's Computer Maker Lenovo is Aiming for Olympic Gold

From the Los Angeles Times:

"As athletes from 84 countries vie for Olympic medals in Turin, Italy, one Chinese competitor is aiming for a different kind of gold. Executives at China's biggest computer maker, Lenovo Group, hope that the exposure of being the Winter Games' official computer supplier will boost recognition of a largely unfamiliar brand.

Lenovo last year took over one of the world's best-known brands, when it acquired the personal computer business of IBM Corp., which makes ThinkPad laptops and ThinkCentre desktops. The $1.25-billion purchase made Lenovo the world's third-largest PC maker after Dell Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co."

"For Lenovo, the Olympics are a global coming-out party — and a chance to demonstrate that the 6,000 desktops, 800 laptops and 350 servers it has provided to manage statistics, store medical records and access the Internet can withstand cold, snow and high expectations."

Related:
Lenovo To Add 3G Wireless to ThinkPads
Lenovo Names Dell Executive New CEO

Interview with The9's Senior Marketing Manager for World of Warcraft in China

From Joystiq:

"Online gaming is so popular in China, the country has more than 100 online game operators. One of the most successful is Shanghai-based The9, which focuses primarily on MMORPGs. In 2003, they launched MU Online, which attracted over 15 million subscribers within two years.

The9 is also in charge of running Blizzard's international hit World of Warcraft (WoW) for Chinese gamers--who account for more than half of the game's 5.5 million worldwide customers. On a recent visit to Shanghai, I had a chance to meet with Hoyt Ma, The9's Senior Marketing Manager for WoW. We talked about his job and the growing popularity of gaming in China."

Interview

Shanda to Operate NHN Games' ArchLord in China

Press Release

Shanda Interactive Entertainment Limited (Nasdaq: SNDA), or Shanda, a leading interactive entertainment media company, today announced that it has entered into anagreement with NHN Games Corporation, a leading online game company in SouthKorea, for an exclusive license to operate ArchLord, a 3D massively multiplayer online role playing game, or MMORPG, in mainland China. The game is expected to enter closed beta testing in China during the second quarter of2006.

With an evolving storyline of conquest and betrayal, ArchLord presents an epic adventure in which users band together as they embark on a quest for the ancient relics of the Archons. Following the launch of open beta testing inMarch 2005, ArchLord was well received by Korean users. NHN Games commercially launched ArchLord in Korea in January 2006.

Ningbo Bird Becomes Top Chinese Mobile Phone Exporter

From telecomasia.net:

"Ningbo Bird has become the largest exporter of mobile phones in China, with an annual export volume of 6.11 million units in 2005.
It is also the country's first mobile phone manufacturer with a cumulative export volume of over 10 million units. "

"Clients include operators such as Mo&T, French Telecom, Orange, T-Mobile, Tim, and Mexican Telecom."

Huawei Wins 3G Deal in Poland

From Digital Media Europe:

"Huawei Technologies, a telecommunications equipment vendor in China, has reportedly signed a contract with Polish mobile operator P4 (previously Netia Mobile) under which the former will provide P4 with a 3G wireless network operating on the universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) standard."

"The first phase of the contract has been valued €150m. In an earlier report, P4 had indicated that it plans to invest over €650m in 3G infrastructure over the next 10 years."

Related:
China's Huawei and Nortel Join in Broadband Venture
Huawei on Verge of First 'Major' US Win
China's Networking Giant Huawei Doubles International Sales

China.com's Online Game Yulgang hits Concurrent Users Peak of over 260,000

From Forbes:

"Mobile and Internet value-added services firm China.com Inc said its massively multiplayer online role playing game, Yulgang, saw peak concurrent users of over 260,000 in the fourth quarter, up 39 pct quarter-on-quarter.

Average concurrent users per day stood at 162,000 in the fourth quarter, up 34 pct from the previous quarter, the Hong Kong-listed company said in a statement. Fourth quarter registered users totaled 14,966,000, a 63 pct increase over the third quarter."

China Net Investor: Yulgang is a free online game, revenues are drawn from sales of virtual merchandise.

Related:
Chinese MMOG Yulgang Amassed 9 Million Registered Players in Two Months
CDC Corporation (China.com) Acquires Casual Online Games Platform in China

China's Internet Market Facing Solid Growth but Narrowing Margins

From AXcessNews:

"Internet financial guru, Safa Rashtchy, senior analyst, Piper Jaffray & Co. says the China Internet and technology market is facing a year of solid growth but competition will play into the scenerio as well while costs increase and margins narrow.

Internet companies in particular are seeing the increasing cost of success: margins are declining as expenses increase due to competition. At the same time, core market demands remain healthy."

"The good news is that, unlike what the U.S. Internet market went through in 1998-2000, Piper Jaffray believes this trend is gradual and will not result in increasing losses; rather, it will simply cut back some of the profit margins. The Chinese companies, unlike the Web 1.0 companies in U.S., are generating significant profit from each customer they acquire. In fact, they have been generating too much profit and may have not focused enough on expanding their share at the cost of lowering some of these profits. Now the competition will force most of them to be more concerned about market share gains."

"The dual increase in cost of labor and marketing will make the operating margins much more realistic and sustainable, in the 15%-40% range rather than over 50% that was common in China early on," Rashtchy said. "A key beneficiary of this trend will be ad-based companies. Both offline players like Focus Media, as well as online portals like Sina, Sohu, and Netease will stand to benefit from their key assets: inventories of ads."

Piper Jaffray will be holding its Third Annual China Internet and Technology Conference in Beijing on February 28 to March 2. Where the core theme of this year's conference will be growth and opportunities. See www.pjc.com/china

Sohu Results Top Expectations

From Reuters:

"Chinese Internet media firm Sohu.com Inc. reported a 37 percent rise in quarterly profits led by strong growth in its wireless business and large tax benefits, sending its shares up 10 percent.

Fourth-quarter net income rose to $8.9 million, or 23 cents per diluted share, compared with the year-earlier quarter's $6.5 million, the Beijing-based company said on Monday."

China Net Investor: Sohu.com is the second most popular portal in China and a competitor in China's search market with its own search engine sogou.com.

Related:
China search market overview

Baidu Finds New Chief Technology Officer

Press Release

"Baidu.com, Inc, the leading Chinese language Internet search provider, today announced the promotion of Mr. Jerry Liu to Chief Technology Officer (CTO). Prior to the promotion, Mr. Liu had been the Vice President of Engineering since August2000."

"Mr. Liu has more than 15 years of experience in software engineering, R&D and management. He joined Baidu in January 2000 and in August 2000, he was appointed as the Vice President of Engineering responsible for supervising multiple teams of engineers and R&D projects and developing cutting edge technologies for search in Chinese.

Prior to joining Baidu, Mr. Liu was an associate professor in the department of computer science and technology at Peking University where he supervised numerous research projects funded by the Chinese National ScienceFoundation and the National Planning Committee. During his tenure, Mr. Liuand his team developed various technology products including the first Chinese language search engine."

Related:
Google Is Destined To Fail In China
Baidu Will Continue to Lead Google in China This Year
Google Poses Strong Challenge to Leader Baidu in China

China's Coolest Web Companies According to Fortune China

From China Web2.0 Review:

"Totally 16 companies from China made the Fortuna China Magazine’s 2005 Coolest Companies List, 7 among them are internet companies, their business range from online games and download tool to new online media like podcasing and e-magazine, from mobile search to WAP portal."

3G.net.cn WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) portal for mobile users
Cgogo, wireless search service
ChinaCache, most famous CDN (Content Distribution Network) provider in China
Nineyou mainly provides online casual games
Toodou Chinese web2.0 project
Thunder, provides a broadband download tool using P2S/P2P technology
Xplus (Nu Channel) is a company to distribute online interactive magazines

For more information about the companies above visit China Web2.0 Review.

Chinese Patent Applications Skyrocket In 2005

From Playfuls.com:

"According to Reuters, Chinese firms sought 44 percent more international patents in 2005 than the year before, in what WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization ) Deputy Director General Francis Gurry described as a concerted push to protect the country's booming high-technology products abroad."

"Filings from companies including telecoms equipment makers Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. and ZTE Corp. made China the 10th largest international patent seeker in 2005 -- ahead of Australia, Italy and Canada.

The United States, Japan and Germany logged the most international applications last year. Netherlands-based consumer electronics group Philips was the largest individual filer with nearly 2,500 applications, WIPO said."

ZTE to Demonstrate New Products at 3GSM Congress in Barcelona

From TMCnet:

"ZTE, (China's largest telecommunications supplier) (...) , will be demonstrating its wireless terminals, 3G handsets, 2G handsets and HSDPA-based data cards during the upcoming 3GSM World Congress, to be held Feb. 13-16, in Barcelona, Spain."

"Among the 3G handset models which will be shown is the F866, a stylish clamshell tri-band handset and the first handset ZTE has sold into the European market. More than 300,000 of these handsets were shipped to the U.K. in December. The company will also be showing the new F608 – ZTE’s latest 3G handset to come out of development."

Lenovo To Add 3G Wireless to ThinkPads

From silicon.com:

"Lenovo has become the latest company to begin integrating high-speed mobile data into its laptops.

On Tuesday, the company announced that it had signed a deal with Vodafone to allow Lenovo laptops to carry connectivity for its third-generation (3G) and GPRS wireless technologies. In the future, they will also tap HSDPA ("super 3G") technology."

"Lenovo said it will add this integrated networking to its ThinkPad T60 and X60 laptops. They will be available in some European countries, including France, Germany and the UK, in the second quarter of 2006."

China's 12 billion New Year messages

From Physorg.com:

"Telecom officials in Beijing forecast 12 billion text messages were sent over the weeklong Chinese New Year holiday.

The estimate was made public by China's Ministry of Information Industry on Jan. 29, the first day of "Year of the Dog" or "Spring Festival" celebrations. The ministry estimate runs until Feb. 4, the end of the official seven-day break."

"There are few examples more stunning of how China's numbers are numbing than the progression of SMS statistics over the last five years. After breaking the billion mark for the millennium the Chinese sent 1.89 billion messages in 2001; 90 billion in 2002; 137.1 billion in 2003; 217.7 billion in 2004, then 304.6 billion last year."

Comparison Tool: Google.cn (China) vs. Google.com

OpenNet Initiative comparison : Google.cn vs. Google.com

Sample search: Tiananmen Images

Related:
Google to Launch Censored China Service

China's Huawei and Nortel Join in Broadband Venture

From Light Reading:

"Nortel Networks Ltd. and Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. are forming a joint venture company to develop "ultra broadband access solutions" for the global service provider market, the duo announced today.

The new company, which will be based in Ottawa, will be majority-owned by Nortel and is expected to be in operation in the third quarter of 2006. Nortel is already marketing Huawei's broadband access gear to carriers, and the two firms have already started joint product development."

"The yet-to-be-named JV -- Norwei, Huatel? -- is to develop a next-generation multiservice access platform designed specifically to enable carriers to converge their voice, data, video, fixed wireless (such as WiMax), and, down the road, even mobile network traffic onto a single IP network, says Nortel's VP and general manager of broadband networks, Walt Megura. The resulting products will then be marketed by the two vendors around the world."