Much is being written about Twitter’s upcoming IPO, including what the mega-offering by one of the world’s top social networking services (SNS) might mean for China. The early consensus seems to be that Twitter won’t find much business in China, where its site is currently blocked due to sensitive content. At the same time, leading Chinese web portal Sina (Nasdaq: SINA) is most likely following the IPO very cosely, as it could help to boost the valuation of its own Weibo service, often called the Twitter of China. Read Full Post…
I want to mark this week’s return to work for most of China with a look at 3 new foreign partnerships announced over the past week, 1 each involving home appliance maker Haier (Shanghai: 600690), the Twitter-like Sina (Nasdaq: SINA) Weibo and telecoms equipment maker ZTE (HKEx: 763; Shenzhen: 000063). All 3 of the tie-ups are different in nature, but they do look innovative and encouraging and should have positive implications for each company’s future development. Read Full Post…
Banking services have suddenly become the flavor of the day for China’s Internet firms, with e-commerce leader Alibaba forming a new tie-up with a major bank, as Suning (Shenzhen: 002024) moves closer to its aim of getting a formal banking license. This relatively sudden move by Internet firms into financial services comes as a slight surprise, since I haven’t really seen anything similar in the west. But that said, the financial services sector in most western markets is already well served by mature, market-oriented firms — a sharp contrast to China where the sector is dominated by less efficient state-run companies. Read Full Post…
There’s a small flurry of IPO news today, with word that Baidu-invested (Nasdaq: BIDU) online travel site Qunar has relaunched its plans for a New York public offering. At the same time, anyone who was hoping for a near-term listing for hot smartphone maker Xiaomi might have to wait a while, with word that the firm won’t make a public offering for at least the next 5 years. Lastly, no IPO story would be complete without the latest speculation on the multibillion-dollar planned listing by e-commerce leader Alibaba, as pundits speculate on its next move following a recent clash with Hong Kong stock regulators. Read Full Post…
It seems the word “imminent” can have several different meanings when it comes to M&A among Chinese Internet firms. In most cases, it means “very soon”, which seems to be the case with reports that a deal is imminent for e-commerce giant Alibaba to purchase video sharing site PPTV, also known as PPLive. Meantime, the word can also sometimes mean “a long time” or perhaps even “never”, which is the case for a deal that has seen reports appear several time for an imminent sale of Sogou, the search engine owned by web portal Sohu (Nasdaq: SOHU), to several different buyers. Read Full Post…
Internet leaders Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) and Alibaba are in a recent war to see who can win the most headlines for online M&A, which has suddenly accelerated in China after years of inactivity. In the last 24 hours alone, media are reporting that Alibaba has finalized a deal to team with Hunan Satellite Television to purchase PPTV, one of China’s top video sharing sites. Not to be outdone, Baidu was reported earlier this week to be in late-stage talks to buy group buying site Nuomi (previous post), and has just announced the finalization of its previously announced $1.9 billion plan to buy online app store 91Wireless. (company announcement) Read Full Post…
After a wait of more than 2 years, Sina’s (Nasdaq: SINA) hugely popular Weibo microblogging platform is finally realizing some of its potential, raising the possibility we could finally see an IPO for the Twitter-like service in the next year. People started buzzing about a Weibo IPO as early as late 2010, when the service first began its meteoric rise after Beijing blocked the original Twitter in 2009. But then investors quickly cooled to the idea of an IPO, as it became apparent that Sina Weibo might take a long time to become profitable and a separate series of accounting scandals rocked the broader sector of US-listed Chinese stocks.Read Full Post…
I don’t usually have many positive things to say about Unicom (HKEx: 762; NYSE: CHU), China’s second largest mobile carrier that has been in a state of management gridlock for most of the last 4 years after its formation through the merger of 2 smaller telcos. But I commended the company earlier this year for its stance on WeChat, the popular mobile messaging service operated by Internet giant Tencent (HKEx: 700), and am praising it once again for its new market-oriented tie-up with WeChat. At the same time, we’re seeing other interesting news on the WeChat front with word that Alibaba has recently stopped offering its e-commerce services over the popular social networking (SNS) platform. Read Full Post…
I’m a big fan of M&A, especially in China’s overcrowded Internet space where consolidation has been desperately needed for the last 6 or 7 years. But even I am getting a bit overwhelmed by the accelerating wave of deals we’re seeing this year, with the latest headlines pointing to new activity by leading e-commerce firm Alibaba and top search engine Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU). This sudden frantic wave of deals was refreshing at first, but it’s starting to take on irrational overtones as purchases become less logical and activity becomes overheated. That leads me to my next prediction, namely that we could soon see some serious M&A hangover for many of these acquirers, as they try to figure out how to run all of their new assets once the current buying wave subsides. Read Full Post…
After a false start earlier this year following their landmark equity tie-up, top web portal Sina (Nasdaq: SINA) and e-commerce leader Alibaba are reportedly preparing for a second bid to combine online shopping with social networking. This second initiative involves the roll-out of a completely new platform that will try to bring Alibaba’s e-commerce services to the more than 500 million registered users of Sina’s popular Weibo microblogging service, often called the Twitter of China. We’ll have to see the actual product before drawing any major conclusions, but I do think this approach looks better than other initial clumsy efforts after the pair announced their tie-up back in April Read Full Post…
China’s boom in online and mobile commerce is driving a new explosion in complementary financial services, with the latest offering coming through a tie-up between China Mobile (HKEx: 941; NYSE: CHL) and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank (SPD) (Shanghai: 600000). At the same time, media are reporting that leading web portal Sina (Nasdaq: SINA) is getting ready to roll out its own new online banking product, seeking to tap demand from the more than 500 million registered users for its popular Weibo microblogging service, often called the Twitter of China. Read Full Post…
