China Tech News

Amazon China Z.cn announced that its official flagship store on Tmall.com has started trial operation and will be formally launched in April 2015.

This flagship store will initially provide Chinese netizens with directly procured imported products, including shoes, food, wine, kitchenware, and toys.

Products sold on Amazon's Tmall flagship store will be delivered via Amazon China's logistics system. At present, Amazon China's same-day delivery and next-day delivery services have reached over 1,400 districts and counties in China; meanwhile, the company has established more than 5,000 pick-up sites across the country, which offer flexible delivery options to consumers.
Niu Yinghua, vice president of Amazon China, said that Amazon aims to provide products from all over the world to Chinese consumers, no matter where they are.

With the entry of Amazon, Tmall will be able to learn from Amazon's global supply chain management model; at the same time, Amazon will bring more international products to the Tmall platform, which is owned by rival Alibaba.


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Chinese Internet tourism service provider Tuniu.com will acquire majority stakes in two travel agencies.

The two travel agencies are Hangzhou-headquartered Zhejiang Zhongshan International Travel Services and Tianjin-headquartered China Classical Holiday. No financial details was released about the transactions.

Both travel agencies reportedly have licenses for organizing tours to Taiwan. By acquiring the two companies, Tuniu.com will be able to expand its Taiwanese tourism market. In 2014, about four million Chinese mainland tourists visited Taiwan, representing a year-on-year increase of 39%%.

Zhejiang Zhongshan International Travel Services and China Classical Holiday have operated for 20 years and 17 years, respectively. In 2014, the two travel agencies' operating revenue from outbound packaged tours and Taiwan tours accounted for about 70% of their total revenue.

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Japanese electronics company Sony announced that their flagship video game console PlayStation 4 and handheld gaming device PlayStation Vita will be officially available in the Chinese mainland market on March 20, 2015.

Prior to this, Sony announced plans to provide the two products in China from January 11, 2015. However, due to various reasons, the debut launch was postponed.

Sony also revealed that by March 8, 2015, the company had sold 20 million PlayStation 4 consoles worldwide.
According to Sony, the retail price of PlayStation 4 in China will be CNY2,899 and the retail price of PlayStation Vita will be CNY1,299. The company said that with the launch of gaming consoles, Sony will also launch the first batch of game options for Chinese users, including Final Fantasy by Square Enix Holdings Co, Knack, and Rayman Legends.

As a major competitor of Sony's PlayStation 4, Microsoft's Xbox One already entered the Chinese mainland market.

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Chinese mobile game developer and publisher Linekong announced that the company has reached an agreement with 228.com.cn, an online ticket provider in China, to invest CNY23 million in the latter.

This is reportedly the first capital strategic layout of Linekong since its IPO in Hong Kong at the end of December 2014.
228.com.cn is a Chinese ticket provider in entertainment and sports sectors. The company claims to have ticket operating experience of over 50,000 cultural performances and sports activities, and it has established more than ten branches across China.

In addition, 228.com.cn has issued and invested in several movies. The company said they will further expand their businesses in the movies sector and will produce two more movies during the first half of 2015.

Statistics published by Linekong showed that by June 30, 2014, the company's operating revenue was about CNY363 million, a year-on-year increase of 53.2%. Of which, its mobile game operating revenue was about CNY314 million, accounting for 86.6% of its total revenue.

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Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi plans to open 100 experience stores in India in 2015.

According to Xiaomi, those experience stores will not sell any products. Instead, they will become channels for Indian consumers to experience Xiaomi products.

Xiaomi entered the Indian market in July 2014 and its products are mainly sold via the local e-commerce operator Flipkart.com. India is currently the third largest smartphone market in the world.

Manu Jain, Xiaomi's head of India operations, said that those service and experience stores will have areas between 500 square feet and 1,000 square feet. They are expected to be launched during the first week of April 2015 in Hyderabad, Chennai, and Bangalore.

Jain also said that though Xiaomi started selling the Hongmi Note via retail stores of Bharti Airtel, the largest carrier in India, from January 2015, the company has not yet discussed cooperation with any offline partners.

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Alibaba Group chief executive officer Lu Zhaoxi announced the appointment of Yu Yongfu, general manager of AutoNavi's Internet business, as new president of AutoNavi.

Effective from March 15, 2015, in this new role Yu will be responsible for the overall business of AutoNavi, which will continue to maintain its independent operation from Alibaba.

According to public files, UCWeb merged into Alibaba Group on June 11, 2014, and Alibaba's UC mobile business group was founded based on the company. At the same time, as former chairman and CEO of UCWeb, Yu was appointed president of UC mobile business group and joined Alibaba Group's strategic decision-making committee.

On July 18, 2014, Alibaba Group announced that AutoNavi, which was previously acquired by Alibaba, formally completed its privatization process and started full business integration with Alibaba Group. Following that, Yu took over AutoNavi's mobile Internet business unit.

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A Yahoo senior vice president reportedly announced via an internal email that they will close their research and development center in Beijing.

According to reports in Chinese local media, the shutdown of the Beijing R&D center is a part of the company's global layoff plan. An internal employee revealed that Yahoo will offer "N+4" compensations to employees; however, detailed compensations need to be discussed with their respective managers.

The Yahoo Beijing R&D center was established in June 2009. As an innovation engine of Yahoo worldwide, the Beijing R&D center was committed to providing innovative technologies, products, and development platforms to global businesses of Yahoo. It focused on four major R&D directions, including personalization, advertising, mobile and cloud computing.

Over recent years, Yahoo changed its CEO frequently and the company continued to cut employees around the world. From 2008 to 2012, Yahoo dismissed up to 6,000 employees. In Asia, the company cut 400 employees in Bangalore office in October 2014. However, Yahoo offered working opportunities in the U.S. to over 40% of those impacted employees.
Most importantly for the company's China tenure, Yahoo released private email account details to the Chinese government that resulted in the imprisonment of Chinese journalist Shi Tao in 2005. Yahoo ostensibly forfeited the information in exchange for maintaining a smooth business operation in China.

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Chinese B2B e-commerce platform Hc360.com has reached a purchase deal with Zol.com.cn, an information technology vertical portal website in China, worth CNY1.5 billion.

The acquisition deal covers several assets, including Zol.com.cn, Zol.com, and Ea3w.com. ZOL stands for Zhongguancun, which is the name for the area in Beijing rife with universities and technology companies. Zhongguancun is considered the Silicon Valley of China.
Hc360.com will pay 30% in cash and the remaining 70% will be realized via new stock issued by Hc360.com to the overseas sellers. As the largest shareholder of Zol.com.cn, Liu Xiaodong, who owns a 60% stake in the company, will gain CNY900 million from the deal.
At the same time, Zol.com.cn executives promised that the company will achieve post-tax net profit of CNY100 million, CNY130 million, and CNY170 million in the next three years.

At the beginning of 2015, Zol.com.cn was separated from CBSi Group and moved its office from E-wing Center to Dinghao Plaza in Beijing. Prior to this, rumor said JD.com would invest in Zol.com.cn; however, the news was denied by Liu Xiaodong.

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China's Lenovo Group announced that they will appoint Gianfranco Lanci, current chief operating officer of Lenovo Group, as new president of the group, effective April 1, 2015.

Meanwhile, Lanci will continue his role as chief operating officer.

Lanci joined Lenovo Group in 2012 as executive vice president and COO, leading and expanding global PC business; managing businesses, operating integration and strategic alliance in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia Pacific; and promoting the group's business review and operating process.

The report published by the group also stated that Lanci will continue to report to Yang Yuanqing, chief executive officer of Lenovo Group.

Lanci was born in Turin, Italy in 1954. He graduated from the Politecnico of Turin where he also earned his degree in civil engineering. He worked for Texas Instrumentals Italia in 1981. He was also a country manager for the printers division and portable computers in Italy, Africa, and the Middle East. In 1996, he was appointed president for Texas Instruments' productivity products division of EMEA. Gianfranco Lanci became the managing director of Acer Italy when TI's portable PC business merged with Acer in 1997.

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Chinese and Russian technology companies plan to jointly launch an e-commerce platform which aims to promote the cross-border trading between China and Russia.

Russian online payment system Yandex.Money will start handling payment services for China online payment platform TradeEase. This project is expected to be launched in summer of 2015 and its turnover is expected to reach USD830,000 within three months.

Russian media revealed that this e-commerce platform will be jointly launched by Chinese online payment platform TradeEase, Bank of China, Heilongjiang province, and the border city Suifenhe. At the same time, Yandex.Money revealed that at the initial stage, about ten sales representatives from Suifenhe and other cities in the southern part of Heilongjiang will join the platform. With the development of the platform, the number will increase to several hundred in a month and will reach over 1,000 by the end of 2015.

Survey results provided by Yandex Market and German research organizations showed that e-commerce platforms with many Chinese online stores are the most popular in Russia. Yandex Market is an Internet shopping website under the well-known Russian portal website Yandex.

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