China Tech News

LinkedIn, the U.S.-based social network for working professionals, announced that the company has signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Chinese human resources service organization China International Intellectech Cooperation.
Under the agreement, the two parties will join hands to provide global talent solutions to Chinese enterprises, especially large state-owned enterprises. To achieve their goals, they will implement several measures, including building a platform to attract overseas medium- and high-end talents and jointly release white papers for the human resources industry.
Meanwhile, LinkedIn and CIIC will work together in many other sectors, such as medium- and high-end talent recruitment, consulting services, employer brand improvement, and enterprise brand promotion.

CIIC currently has 126 branches in China and abroad, providing human resources and related services to state-owned enterprises and Fortune 500 enterprises which have operations in China.

Founded in 2003, LinkedIn is the world's leading professional network. The number of its users has reportedly reached over 400 million and its services cover more than 200 countries and regions around the world. It is one of the few large foreign social networks not blocked in China, largely because the company placates the Chinese government in censoring information on its website.

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Chinese Internet video company Letv.com published its annual financial report for 2015, stating that the company's total operating revenue in 2015 was about CNY13 billion, a year-on-year increase of 90.89%; and its net profit attributable to shareholders was CNY573 million, a year-on-year increase of 57.41%.

At the same time, the report revealed that Letv's advertising business revenue increased by 67.53% year-on-year to about CNY2.633 billion, accounting for 20.23% of its total operating revenue. Its terminal business revenue increased by 122.22% year-on-year to about CNY6.089 billion, accounting for 46.78% of its total operating revenue.

The company's membership and distribution business revenue increased by 56.17% year-on-year to CNY3.782 billion, accounting for 29.06% of its total operating revenue; and its technical service revenue was CNY151 million in 2015; and its other business revenue was CNY360 million, a year-on-year increase of 324.76%.

Letv predicted that its net profit attributable to shareholders is expected to reach between CNY104.921 million and CNY133.536 million, representing a year-on-year increase between 10% and 40% for the first quarter of 2016.
Letv's report stated that during the first quarter of 2016, its various main businesses maintained stable growth. In addition, due to the good sales performance of its super TV products, the company's operating revenue will achieve fast growth in the coming months.


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It probably hurts to be a manager at Lenovo today. Nearly all of the company's business groups face upheaval in a planned reshuffle to commence on April 1.

Lenovo Group's core strategy in 2016 is to accelerate the transformation from a product-oriented business model to user-oriented business model. Its newly positioned four major business groups will become official in the new financial year started from April 1, 2016.

According to the internal communications from Yang Yuanqing, chairman and chief executive officer of Lenovo Group, the existing enterprise business will be separated and become the Data Center Group. Gerry Smith will be the president of DCG and report directly to Yang.

Peter Hortensius will join DCG as chief technology officer and lead the strategy function; Zhou Qingtong will be chief financial officer of DCG and chief information officer of Lenovo; and Roderick Lappin will be promoted as senior vice president and lead DCG's global sales function.

Lenovo will enhance the leadership team of its Mobile Business Group and appoint Aymar de Lencquesaing and Chen Xudong as co-presidents of MBG, reporting directly to Yang. Chen will be responsible for the end-to-end product, sales, and marketing in the Chinese market; while Lencquesaing will lead MBG's businesses outside China, including research and development, product, supply chain, and the operations in Asia Pacific, North America, Latin America, and Europe, the Middle East and Africa. In addition, Rick Osterloh has decided to depart Lenovo and Osterloh's old team will report to Lencquesaing.

Lenovo will establish a PC and Smart Device business group, which is led by Lenovo Group's president and chief operating officer Gianfranco Lanci. This group will cover PCs, tablets, smart TVs, smart homes, and other Internet of Things devices.

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Chinese software provider Kingsoft published its unaudited performance for 2015, stating that its operating revenue reached CNY5.676 billion, a year-on-year increase of 69%; and its net profit was CNY369 million, a year-on-year decrease of 52%.

During 2015, the company stated 24% of revenue was from online games, 63% was from Cheetah Mobile, and 13% was from office software and other businesses. At the same time, the company's gross profit increased by 58% year-on-year to CNY4.356 billion.

Kingsoft's online game business achieved revenue of CNY1.369 billion in 2015, representing a year-on-year increase of 9%; Cheetah Mobile achieved revenue of CNY3.562 billion, a year-on-year increase of 113%; and its revenue from office software and other businesses was CNY745.6 million, a year-on-year increase of 76%.

At the same time, the report also revealed Kingsoft's performance for the fourth quarter of 2015. During the fourth quarter of 2015, Kingsoft's online game business revenue increased by 20% year-on-year to CNY415 million; Cheetah Mobile's revenue increased by 89% year-on-year to CNY1.1 billion; and its software and other businesses revenue increased by 83% year-on-year to CNY263.1 million. Kingsoft's combined operating revenue for the fourth quarter of 2015 reached CNY1.778 billion, a year-on-year increase of 66% and an increase of 18% compared with the previous quarter.

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China's previous capital city, Nanjing, is now home to a big Taiwanese semiconductor investment.
The Nanjing municipal government has inked a deal with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. to build a new 12-inch wafer factory and a design service center in the city in the future. According to TSMC, they will invest USD3 billion, which is nearly CNY20 billion, for the new projects in Nanjing.

Morris Chang, chairman of TSMC, said in a statement that in recent years, the Chinese mainland semiconductor market saw fast growth. By building 12-inch wafer factory and design service center in Nanjing, the company hopes to provide closer supports to clients, while further expanding business opportunities in mainland China.

The new factory will be located at Nanjing's Pukou Economic Development Zone. With a planned monthly production capacity of 20,000 12-inch wafers, the factory is expected to put into production in the second half of 2018.


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State-sponsored hacking is a hot topic, and security experts point to a few global actors as sources of the intrigue and exploits.
But how do you know if you've been hacked by someone in China? If you don't have access to server logs or honeypot data we've compiled five more ways to know if you've been hacked in China. By the way, the first five ways we detailed here.

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Apple's new 4-inch smartphone iPhone SE had received over 3.4 million orders in the Chinese market.
According to statistics provided by Chinese retailers, the gold iPhone SE is the most popular among Chinese consumers, followed by rose gold. The price of 16GB iPhone SE is USD399 and the 64GB edition is sold at USD499.

Emerging markets, including China, Brazil, Russia, and India, are reportedly the core markets for the iPhone SE, because it is the cheapest iPhone ever launched by Apple. Moreover, the iPhone SE may attract potential users who purchase smartphones for the first time or previously used low-end Android phones.

The iPhone SE previously started accepting orders in 13 countries and regions in North America, Europe, and Asia. Over the next few weeks, it will also be available in 47 other countries and regions.
The 4-inch iPhone SE adopts an A9 processor and an iSight camera with 12 million pixels. Its hardware configuration is basically the same as iPhone 6S, except for screen size.


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In December 2015, Alibaba's Executive Vice Chairman Joseph Tsai informed the world that Alibaba was going to take control of South China Morning Post and drop the website's online paywall.

At the time, media experts and arm-chair Sinologists fretted that the Chinese e-commerce's acquisition of the leading English-language daily newspaper in Hong Kong would end the paper's editorial independence and worsen the quality of the paper. Nobody we read mentioned the end of the paywall stated in Tsai's letter. Instead, everyone opined about the end of the great SCMP. Last night, the paywall came down.

Tammy Tam, Editor-in-Chief of the South China Morning Post, yesterday stated in a company release: "With the paywall removal, it paves the way for the SCMP to grow its readership globally. It is our firm belief that as China plays an increasingly critical role in world politics and the economy, a global community of China stakeholders will demand insightful and trusted news and commentaries from a within-the-region perspective."

And the end of the paywall is indeed what SCMP needs to make it a better paper. SCMP has lacked good in-depth business coverage of China, especially in the tech and alternative investment sector, and maybe increasing readership will spark investments in their ability to do a much better job of covering Chinese business sectors.

ChinaTechNews.com is now 16 years old, and SCMP has had its paywall up during most of that time. We have seen editorial coverage wax and wane for good China stories. This is not to diminish the good work of the writing staff at SCMP, but instead points to a lack of strong investment commitment from the previous SCMP owner.

Now that Alibaba owns SCMP, investment in the business will grow, and that's a good thing. Surely there will be an editorial slant, but fortunately those fights can take place in Hong Kong, outside the direct hands of the mainland government.

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China.com, the first big tech IPO from China and one-time darling of netizens of Beijing in the late 1990s before running into disarray for many years as it hopped to new management and buyers, has found a new owner.

According to reports in Chinese local media, Lander Sports Development will fully acquire China.com for no less than CNY150 million and the related trademark and China.com domain will continue to be used after the acquisition.
Lander Sports said that its multimedia networking platform will be based on China.com and will become the core platform of the media business sector of the company.

Lander Sports and GMG, the current owner, have reportedly signed a strategic cooperation framework agreement on China.com, which states that Lander Sports will invest CNY150 million to acquire GMG's subsidiaries, China.com (Hong Kong) and Huawang Huitong; meanwhile, Lander Sports will inherit the domain and trademark of China.com.
After getting listed on Nasdaq in 1999, the company experienced a bubble period in 2000; and with the severe competition among portal websites, the company finally filed for bankruptcy in October 2011, ending its ten-year suffering period. China.com was delisted on October 28, 2011.

After delisted, China.com continued its daily business, but continued to lose money. In 2013, the company was sold to GMG for CNY71.85 million.

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JD Worldwide, the cross-border online shopping platform of JD.com, reached a strategic cooperation agreement with Japanese daily commodity and cosmetics group Kao.

Kao's official flagship store owned by JD Worldwide will be formally launched in early May 2016 and all the products will be directly supplied by Kao Group. Full financial terms of the deal were not released.

Kao Group was founded in Japan in 1887 and it owns many products that top the market share in the Japanese market. Its well-known brands include Merries, Laurier, Attack, and Biore. JD and Kao China started cooperating in 2014 and the two parties established a direct supply partnership covering various categories, including maternal services, child products, personal care and cleaning products. Of those products, Kao's Merries-branded diapers are popular among Chinese consumers.

JD Worldwide said that after the launch of Kao flagship store, they will first start from the Merries-branded products to realize direct supply links from Japan. The flagship store will adopt the bonded stocking model and support JD's own distribution to offer safe and high-quality products to Chinese consumers.

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