# China ICT (Info Communications Technology) Industry, Infra, Commerce, Exports: News & Discussions



## haidian

China internet, cloud, big data, etc.

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## theniubt

Charles Kao - Father of fiber optics communication

'Father of Fiber-Optics' Snags Nobel Physics Prize

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## Skies

Why China is not getting into the Hosting and Domain selling business like US?

Most of the websites in BD/world is hosted and domained in US. 

I would like to see China in this business with so many hosting and domain plans being offered.


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## northeast

China is one of the leading countries in 4G LTE technology.We are leading the TD-LTE technology.And our Huawei and ZTE make 4G system for many countries even including Europe and Japan.That's why USA government banned Huawei and ZTE in america.
I don't understand Why foolish Indian talk about such things like wireless is better than wired tech.What's the point to have a 4G desktop or laptop PC?


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## cirr

*China’s next-generation internet is a world-beater*
10 March 2013 by Hal Hodson

The net's new tiger, China, is creating a faster, more secure system that is way ahead of the West

THE net is getting creaky and old: it is rapidly running out of space and remains fundamentally insecure. And it turns out China is streets ahead of the West in doing anything about it.

A report published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society last week details China's advances in creating a next-generation internet that is on a national level and on a larger scale than anything in the West.

At the root of the problem are "two major gaps in the architecture of the internet", according to a report from the New England Complex Systems Institute, compiled in 2008 for the US Navy and released to the public this week. First up is the internet's inability to block malicious traffic as a whole. While malware can rapidly replicate and distribute itself across the net, organisations can only respond to individual instances of online aggression.

China is already coming up with better defences. One of the most important aspects of its next-generation backbone is a security feature known as Source Address Validation Architecture (SAVA). Many of the existing security problems stem from an inability to authenticate IP addresses of computers that try to connect to your network. SAVA fixes this by adding checkpoints across the network. These build up a database of trusted computers matched up with their IP addresses. Packets of data will be blocked if the computer and IP address don't match. Steve Wolff, one of the internet's early pioneers, calls it a "model that should be much more widely adopted".

Even setting security worries aside, the internet is running out of room. The current standard for assigning space to computers  known as Internet Protocol Version Four (IPv4)  uses a numbering system which has just under 4.3 billion possible spaces. Internet engineers have been working on the new standard for years. It is called IPv6 and will boost the number of available internet slots by a mind-boggling 80,000 trillion trillion times. But progress on IPv6 has been painfully slow, and time is running out. IPv4 slots are due to run out in multiple regions around the world this year.

But China has been planning for that day for a long time, under pressure from its massive population, all of whom want to be connected to the net. So says Donald Riley, an information systems specialist at the University of Maryland, who also chairs the Chinese American Network Symposium.

"China has a national internet backbone in place that operates under IPv6 as the native network protocol," says Riley. "We have nothing like that in the US."

China is already running next-generation services: internet service provider 3TNet provides television over IPv6, streaming programmes in high definition. It is the basis for a system that monitors and controls traffic flow over the internet and provides remote medical services  even long-distance, real-time violin lessons in high definition. All have the potential to reach more people at higher speeds than any equivalent service on the old internet.

"If you are thinking about the future of the internet, anyone that explores that territory and maps it out first has a definite competitive advantage," Riley says, "especially with the resources available to China."

This article appeared in print under the headline "The internet's new tigers"

China's next-generation internet is a world-beater - tech - 10 March 2013 - New Scientist

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## JSCh

China's new internet backbone explained: verified sources, IPv6 at the core


> While most of the world is still coming to grips with malware and weaning itself off of IPv4, we're just learning that China has been thinking further ahead. A newly publicized US Navy report reveals that China's new internet backbone revolves around an IPv6-based architecture that leans on Source Address Validation Architecture, or SAVA. *The technique creates a catalog of known good matches between computers and their IP addresses, and blocks traffic when there's a clear discrepancy. The method could curb attempts to spread malware through spoofing and tackle some outbreaks automatically -- and, perhaps not so coincidentally, complicate any leaps over the Great Firewall.* Even with the existence of that potential curb on civil liberties, the improved backbone could still keep network addresses and security under reasonable control when China expects that over 70 percent of its many, many homes will have broadband in the near future.


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## JSCh

China's Internet Architecture Gives the Rest of Us a Run for Our Money


> *
> "China has a national internet backbone in place that operates under IPv6 as the native network protocol. We have nothing like that in the US."
> 
> As easy as it is to dismiss China's Internet as closed and stifling, the reality of the situation is that its architecture is new and shiny compaired to the aging framework being used in much of the western world. And having that sturdier, more future-proof structure is going to put China at an advantage as we all trudge onward into the future. We've got some catching up to do, but we probably don't want to be too much like China.*


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## Audio

IPv6 is not some Chinese standard of internet. It is a new protocol for addressing and in ever more increasing use everywhere. I have streaming TV from mid 2011 on this standard.

Sample of the new addressing:



> Your IPv4 address on the public Internet appears to be 109.182.154.200
> Your IPv6 address on the public Internet appears to be 2002:6db6:9ac8::6db6:9ac8



In regards to 



cirr said:


> "China has a national internet backbone in place that operates under IPv6 as the native network protocol," says Riley. "We have nothing like that in the US."



None of the major Chinese sites are IPv6 compliant IPv6 Deployment Status Cn, to be honest they are down around 100th place when it comes to accesibility of sites under the new protocol.

Source: IPv6 Deployment Aggregated Status

Eric Vyncke is a Cisco engineer and an international expert on IPv6.

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## JSCh

The Chinese make some improvement in Internet structure and some tried to belittle it by making some moral/ethical judgement. Well, I do not think the Chinese would pay any attention to all that, they would just hunker down and move forward like they have always done.

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## kawaraj

What surprise me is the huge coming to the world of Chinese Internet firm such as Wechat, Baidu, Alibaba and the new superstar UCweb. 

I am a user of baidu.co.jp and UC browser, and this mobile browser is supercool.

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## JSCh

IPv6 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> *IPv6 was developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)* to deal with the long-anticipated problem of IPv4 address exhaustion.


Internet Engineering Task Force - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) develops and promotes Internet standards, cooperating closely with the W3C and ISO/IEC standards bodies and dealing in particular with standards of the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP).[1][2] *It is an open standards organization, with no formal membership or membership requirements.*
> 
> All participants and managers are volunteers, though their work is usually funded by their employers or sponsors; for instance, the current chairperson is funded by Verisign and the U.S. government's National Security Agency.[3]


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## JSCh

The internet is a collaborated effort, there is no existing international legal binding agreement governing the internet.
Internet - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> *The Internet has no centralized governance in either technological implementation or policies for access and usage; each constituent network sets its own policies.* Only the overreaching definitions of the two principal name spaces in the Internet, the Internet Protocol address space and the Domain Name System, are directed by a maintainer organization, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). The technical underpinning and standardization of the core protocols (IPv4 and IPv6) is an activity of the* Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), a non-profit organization of loosely affiliated international participants that anyone may associate with by contributing technical expertise.*


While it is true that the internet was first created by the american, but there is no denying the international contribution to the subsequent advancement of the internet.

IETF document statistics - Comparison of countries over the year


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## conworldus

This is a very important development. To effectively connect the entire Chinese population we need way more addresses than IPv4 can handle. If the architecture is in China we may also be able to control the core intellectual properties. This system will serve China for a long time to come. Forget the old system that has been extremely disadvantageous to China because of China's massive demand and the US's absolute monopoly.

The future looks brighter and brighter for China.


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## conworldus

You completely missed the point. It is not that China is ahead of IPv6 implementation. China is miles ahead in implementing SAVA, the source address validation architecture. This topic still largely under research in the US, far far from implementation.

SAVA will improve internet speed, security (less virus and malware attack on your computer). However, it also vastly improves censorship effectiveness. There is a strong motivation for China to be ahead of the rest of the world for both national security (giving the recent fuss about hacking) and censorship reasons.


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## JSCh

Infosecurity - China


> *At the root of the problem, says the New Scientist, are two major gaps in the architecture of the internet, according to a report from the New England Complex Systems Institute, compiled in 2008 for the US Navy and released to the public this week. Those gaps include firstly an inability to block malware as a whole rather than after recognizing individual instances, and secondly  although not made explicit in the article  the lack of IPv4 capacity for future internet expansion.*


And now, we found out that the Chinese actually has implemented in 2008 the solutions to the finding of that particular US Navy report that was done in 2008 but only released this week. 
When did the Chinese become so smart? Obviously they have hack the US Navy network and stolen that report. [\sarcasm]



> *The two technologies that are best suited to solve these problems are SAVA for malware and IPv6 for space  both of which are being implemented in Chinas next-generation internet project.* But SAVA is hardly new, nor its use by China unknown. In 2007 Jianping Wu at Chinas Beijing Tsinghua University published a paper, Source Address Validation: Architecture and Protocol Design, that explained, This architecture is deployed into the CNGI-CERNET2 infrastructure - a large-scale native IPv6 backbone network of the China Next Generation Internet project. We believe that the Source Address Validation Architecture will help the transition to a new, more secure and sustainable Internet.
> 
> Wu expanded on this in 2008, in Building a next generation Internet with source address validation architecture. In this he explains how SAVA can be implemented to make the internet more secure since every packet transmitted across the network will hold an authenticated source IP address. That address must be authorized, unique and traceable. The packets that do not hold an authenticated source address will not be forwarded in network. Therefore it is impossible to launch network attacks with spoofed source addresses, he wrote.
> 
> Other advantages he mentions include fine grained network management, where providers can easily bill users based on their end-to-end usage, as is the case with telephony; application authentication without the need for cryptography; and the acceleration of new internet applications. For the last, he notes, P2P applications and other large scale multimedia applications (for example, VoIP using SIP), can be accelerated in deployment and improved in performance by using globally unique authenticated IPv6 addresses.
> 
> *That last point is important. While SAVA is applicable for IPv4 networks it is designed for IPv6 networks, he continues. The fundamental reason for Chinas next-generation internet being more advanced than anything in the West is not some secret project but its more rapid deployment of IPv6, something the West is still struggling with. *The New Scientist quotes Donald Riley, an information systems specialist at the University of Maryland: If you are thinking about the future of the internet, anyone that explores that territory and maps it out first has a definite competitive advantage; especially with the resources available to China.


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## JSCh

*SAVA structure*​
There are three layers in SAVA structure, at the moment, the IETF are working on a proposed standard on the entry level "first hop source address validation". This proposed standard is called SAVI (Source Address Validation Improvement) RFC6620, and is proposed by authors from Cisco and UC3M. Tsinghua Univ promote and contribute to SAVI. SAVI is also implemented in China IPv6 network.
IETF - Source Address Validation Improvements (savi) - Charter

RFC 6620 - FCFS SAVI: First-Come, First-Served Source Address Validation Improvement for Locally Assigned IPv6 Addresses


> Abstract
> 
> This memo describes First-Come, First-Served Source Address
> Validation Improvement (FCFS SAVI), a mechanism that provides source
> address validation for IPv6 networks using the FCFS principle. The
> proposed mechanism is intended to complement ingress filtering
> techniques *to help detect and prevent source address spoofing.*



IP address spoofing - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> In computer networking, the term IP address spoofing or IP spoofing refers to the creation of *Internet Protocol (IP) packets with a forged source IP address, called spoofing,* with the purpose of concealing the identity of the sender or impersonating another computing system.[1]


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## JSCh

JSCh said:


> *SAVA structure*​
> There are three layers in SAVA structure, at the moment, the IETF are working on a proposed standard on the entry level "first hop source address validation". This proposed standard is called SAVI (Source Address Validation Improvement) RFC6620, and is proposed by authors from Cisco and UC3M. Tsinghua Univ promote and contribute to SAVI. SAVI is also implemented in China IPv6 network.
> IETF - Source Address Validation Improvements (savi) - Charter
> 
> RFC 6620 - FCFS SAVI: First-Come, First-Served Source Address Validation Improvement for Locally Assigned IPv6 Addresses
> 
> 
> IP address spoofing - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Once again, there is an IETF accepted standard proposed by Cisco and UC3M called SAVI currently work in progress. Tshinghua Univ. promoted, contributed and implemented SAVI in China.

From RFC 6620 - FCFS SAVI: First-Come, First-Served Source Address Validation Improvement for Locally Assigned IPv6 Addresses


> 4.3. Privacy Considerations
> 
> Personally identifying information MUST NOT be included in the FCFS
> SAVI DB with the MAC address as the canonical example, except when
> there is an attack attempt involved. Moreover, compliant
> implementations MUST NOT log binding anchor information except where
> there is an identified reason why that information is likely to be
> involved in detection, prevention, or tracing of actual source
> address spoofing. Information that is not logged MUST be deleted as
> soon as possible (i.e., as soon as the state for a given address is
> back to NO_BIND). Information about the majority of hosts that never
> spoof SHOULD NOT be logged.



The internet standard is a collaborated effort, and it does has a tradition. Privacy consideration is built into the protocol, governments can regulate/control the use of the protocol according to their local laws.


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## JSCh

Originally it wasn't the Chinese that went about trumpeting any achievement, they are just sharing what they learned by publishing a paper in 
Philosophical Transactions of The Royal Society - Recent progress in the study of the next generation Internet in China

It was the popular science publication "New Scientist" that said,


> *China's next-generation internet is a world-beater*
> 
> Updated 13:08 11 March 2013 by Hal Hodson
> Magazine issue 2907. Subscribe and save
> 
> The net's new tiger, China, is creating a faster, more secure system that is way ahead of the West
> 
> THE net is getting creaky and old: it is rapidly running out of space and remains fundamentally insecure. And it turns out China is streets ahead of the West in doing anything about it.
> 
> A report published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society last week details China's advances in creating a next-generation internet that is on a national level and on a larger scale than anything in the West.



Why would a western publication published in english for western audience do that? because,


> "If you are thinking about the future of the internet, anyone that explores that territory and maps it out first has a definite competitive advantage," Riley says, "especially with the resources available to China."



It doesn't matter whether SAVA is the best or not or the west is going or not going to adapt it.

The fact of the matter is, China has a national pure native IPv6 backbone network up and running that is more secure than anything in the west.

But it looks like it is falling on deaf ear.

I suspected this would suit the Chinese just fine, because of the teaching of the ancient Chinese proverb
*&#39556;&#20853;&#24517;&#36133;*

The equivalent in english, from the Bible, Book of Proverbs,
*Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall*


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## Sanchez

Sometimes ago US had money and tech
Now we have the money (in relative terms) and some tech
Can Viets and Indians guess what would be the next?


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## xhw1986

*Chinese internet population: 618 million*
28 February 2014






Media back President Xi Jinping's pledge to make China a strong internet power amid concerns over persistent cyber attacks.

During an official meeting on security, Mr Xi called for a "master strategy... and innovative development" while stressing the strategic importance of "internet security and informatisation" as it concerned the security and development of a nation, the People's Daily reports.

The term informatisation refers to the extent of information a society gets.

China is the world's largest internet market with about 618 million internet users and cyber-security has become a matter of prime concern after the country was hit by a large-scale attack in January.

A commentary in the Beijing Times says "having a huge number of internet users does not mean we are strong". China is "still far from becoming a cyber power".

"China is now the main victim of cyber attacks... we should speed up on strategising to ensure cyber-security and gain advantage in the international competition," it adds.

Echoing similar sentiments, a commentary in the Global Times Chinese edition urges China to "build a cyber defence mechanism in the shortest time".

"Cyber competition between China and the US will be the main focus of cyber strategy in the next 10 years. Currently, the US has an obvious advantage in the overall strength, industrial competitiveness and in its soft power... all these could not be attained overnight," the commentary adds.

"Becoming a strong cyber power is an important part of the China dream," exclaims another commentary on the China Central Television website.

"The whole country should speed up on the development. Only by doing so, we will then be able to catch up [with other countries] and bring about a great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation by spurring on the China dreams," it adds.

*Economic zones*

Meanwhile, media are also analysing Mr Xi's speech on building a "capital economic circle" in northern China by integrating development of the Beijing and Tianjin regions along with Hebei Province.

Mr Xi explained that the development should focus on optimising "regional industrial divisions and distributions", improving resource allocation, as well as making joint efforts to control air pollution, the People's Daily reports.

Describing Mr Xi's vision as an "important strategy of nation's development", the Liberation Daily adds that the three regions have a total area of 216,000 square kilometre (83,398 square miles) and are home to over 100 million people.

Wen Kui, former president of Capital University of Economics and Business, says there are difficulties in the development of this "circle" as compared with the economic zones of Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta, which are now the most developed areas in China.

He tells the Beijing Times that the two economic zones "have strong market forces" but for the three areas in northern China "each has a strong administrative role, which might hinder market integration, as all of them are focusing on doing their own work".

And finally, police have busted four massive baby trafficking rings, disguised as adoption centres, that were operating on internet chat-rooms.

A total of 1,094 suspects were arrested and 382 infants rescued during the crackdown, which involved police from 27 provincial areas, according to the China Police Daily.

BBC News - China media: Cyber power

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## cirr

PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 02 April, 2014, 4:26pm

UPDATED : Wednesday, 02 April, 2014, 4:27pm

*The five drivers of China’s Internet deal frenzy*

Jonathan Woetzel and Jeffrey Towson

*BIO*
Jeffrey Towson is Managing Partner of Towson Capital, advisory private equity firm. Jonathan Woetzel is a Director in McKinsey & Company’s Shanghai office, and the Director of the McKinsey Global Institute in Asia. They are Professors at Peking University’s Guanghua School of Management, and are the authors of The One Hour China Book, now available on amazon.com.





Martin Lau Chi-ping, President; and Pony Ma Huateng, Chairman and CEO, Tencent Holdings Limited, announce the company's 2013 fourth quarter and annual results. Photo: SCMP


You can’t go a week without hearing of a new acquisition by Baidu, Alibaba or Tencent. While China’s Internet giants have been doing acquisitions for years, the last three months can best be described as a frenzy.

Tencent’s recent announcements have been impressive – including:


They are buying 15% of Leju, an online property agency, for $180 million.
They are buying 15% of e-commerce website JD.com for $215 million.
They are buying 28% South Korean mobile game developer CJ Games for $500 million.
They have paid $448 million for 36% of search engine Sogou.
They have bought about 20% of review website Dianping.
And in the last few days, Chinese media has been reporting that Tencent is buying 20% of online video site Youku Tudou for approximately $300 million.

Alibaba’s recent moves have arguably been even more ambitious.


They invested $215 million in mobile messaging app-maker Tango, a competitor to WeChat.
They have announced plans to take control of China’s leading mobile mapping service, AutoNavi.
They are investing $804 million for a controlling stake in ChinaVision Media, which has a library of movies, TV shows and sports broadcasts including some Chinese rights for the English Premier League soccer. 
They have moved into Internet finance in a large way with Yu’e Bao.
They have launched an entertainment investment fund called Yu Le Bao which lets people invest small amounts of money in TV and movie productions.
They are investing $360M in a logistics joint venture with the Haier Group, China’s largest maker of appliances.
And they have an agreement with Midea Group to sell the first intelligent air conditioners on Tmall.com.
Baidu has also made recent announcements:


They are buying Chinese app distributor 91 Wireless for $1.9 billion.
They are buying majority ownership of group buying platform Nuomi.com for $160 million.
Overall, the recent deal frenzy is pretty impressive in its speed and scale. And there are lots of explanations floating around for what is going on. That this is because Internet use is moving from PCs to smartphones. That this is mostly about competition between Tencent and Alibaba. That this is mostly about all the cash sloshing around. And so on.

In fact, such surges in M&A are fairly common. And this surge of mostly-strategic deals is quite similar to the one that took place in the US in the 1990’s when the Internet first emerged. It is actually also quite similar to a strategic merger wave that occurred around 1900 as America’s industrial economy first emerged.

In all three situations (there are others), large existing businesses were confronted with a fundamental shift in the business environment. At the start of the industrial age. At the start of the Internet age. And now at the start of a new, but not yet named, age in China.

Then, like now, the leading companies are scrambling to find a new business model for a still changing landscape. And strategic mergers and acquisitions are how big companies evolve quickly when they need to. It is also how entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and investment bankers take advantage of the situation.
Per American M&A guru Bruce Wasserstein, such deal waves are typically driven by one or more of five drivers. In China today, it looks like all five are happening at once. They are:


Technological change
The need for scale
Fluctuations in the financial markets
Regulatory change
The role of leadership
*Technological change (#1) is the biggest driver here.*

There is an acute awareness that mobile phones and e-commerce are technological changes that are fundamentally changing the Chinese economic landscape. And not just in online business. It is also changing significant sections of China’s offline economy. Financial services, entertainment, retail, logistics, transportation and many other sectors are being changed. The Internet economy is both driving productivity and creating new markets. 

Against this technological change, the Internet giants are attempting to protect their current businesses from new threats – but are also rushing after the new opportunities. A lot of these deals are a “land grab” for the best new opportunities.

*The need for scale (#2) is the second big driver.*

Alibaba’s activity is driving Tencent to act and vice versa. If your competitor becomes twice your size in a service, you are likely at risk and growing organically will not be enough. So you need acquisitions. The race for size often leads to a competitive panic – and all this leads to deals.

*Fluctuations in the financial markets (#3)* also frequently lead to deal sprees (both financial and strategic). The emergence of junk bonds in the 1980’s and securitization of mortgages in the 2000’s gave rise to the LBO and mortgage deal frenzies of the same periods. Similarly, the new wealth of China’s Internet giants is enabling them to be big buyers. Cash rich Internet companies and the efficiency with which capital is deployed in China’s Internet sector are important parts of the current phenomenon.

*Regulatory change (#4) *also creates deal opportunities. For example, the creation and later ending of the Glass-Steagall Act started waves of divestiture and later consolidation.

In this case, there is an interesting contrast between the lack of regulation in China’s online businesses and the tight regulations of many offline industries. This has created a tempting situation where the Internet companies can operate with a regulatory advantage in many situations. It appears to be prompting entrances into more regulated industries, such as Alibaba’s move into Internet finance.

Finally there is the role of leadership (#5). This is the most interesting factor.

Deals are ultimately done by individuals. And some business leaders are more aggressive than others. Some people are empire-builders. Some are visionaries. Some are speculators. And the leaders of China’s Internet companies are a highly aggressive and highly competitive group. They are seasoned entrepreneurs and risk-takers in their primes.

So the current Internet deal spree has a lot to do with the individual personalities of Jack Ma, Martin Lau and Robin Li.

We are seeing all five drivers at once right now. It’s impressive. But it is also people are only logical to a point. Sometimes people just do deals to do deals – and frenzies can take on a life of their own.

Our take is that most Chinese companies today, Internet-based or not, have little idea how the new landscape will look in a few years. They mostly do not know what will be the winning business model. And they do not yet know what they need to be in order to survive and / or thrive.

What has happened in previous episodes of transformation (and frenzied deal-making) is that one or two companies figured it out first. They are later called the “Steve Jobs” of the situation for their prescience.

But most of the companies are just doing deals and trying to figure it out as they go. Everyone is running but only a few have a clear picture of the destination. It will be interesting to see in a few years who was actually pursuing the winning strategy and who is the Steve Jobs of this transformation.

The five drivers of China’s Internet deal frenzy | South China Morning Post


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## cirr

*Alibaba invests $692 mln in Chinese department store operator*

Mon Mar 31, 2014 9:41am IST


* Alibaba to buy $214 mln of Intime Retail shares, $478 mln in convertible bonds

* Purchase adds to more than $2.7 bln of deals from Alibaba in recent months

* Alibaba, Intime Retail to launch online-to-offline venture (Adds details of Alibaba investment, IPO plans, recent m&a activity)

By Elzio Barreto

HONG KONG, March 31 (Reuters) - China's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd agreed to invest $692 million in a Chinese department store operator as the e-commerce giant looks to bring the benefits and convenience of online shopping to customers who visit real bricks-and-mortar stores.

Alibaba, whose businesses will come under investor scrutiny ahead of the group's planned mega IPO in the United States this year, said it will buy $214 million worth of shares in Hong Kong-listed Intime Retail (Group) Co Ltd.

It also agreed to acquire $478 million of convertible bonds, which would give Alibaba a 26.1 percent stake in the department store operator once the bonds are converted into shares in three years.

In recent months Alibaba has gone on a shopping spree, spending more than $2.7 billion to expand into media, chat services and mapping technology.

The expansion has encroached on the turf of social networking giant Tencent Holdings Ltd, which has in turn made inroads into Alibaba's territory with its partnership with China's No.2 online retailer JD.com.

The purchases come as Alibaba starts its preparations for an initial public offering set to be the biggest-ever technology listing, surpassing Facebook Inc's $16 billion listing in 2012.

Intime will issue 220.54 million shares at HK$7.5335 each and HK$3.71 billion worth of convertible bonds to a unit of Alibaba, the department store operator said in a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange on Monday.

As part of the investment, Alibaba and Intime will form a joint venture to develop online-to-offline, or O2O, business in shopping malls, department stores and supermarkets in China. Alibaba will own about 80 percent of the venture, with Intime controlling the rest.

O2O businesses seek to benefit from the meteoric rise of smartphone use in China and can help turn a search into a shopping trip or meal based on the user's location.

Shares in Intime surged as much as 17 percent shortly after the market open on Monday, following a trend of Hong Kong-listed companies whose shares gained sharply after receiving investments from Alibaba.

The gains were short-lived, with Intime reversing course and losing as much as 11.4 percent by mid-morning as investors digested details of the purchase, in which Alibaba offered to buy the stock at a 13.7 percent discount to its last traded price on March 26.

Appliance maker Haier Electronics Group Ltd soared 20 percent in December after Alibaba unveiled plans to invest $361 million.

ChinaVision Media Group more than tripled earlier in March after Alibaba agreed to buy a controlling stake for $804 million to gain access to TV and movie content. ($1 = 7.7573 Hong Kong Dollars) (Additional reporting by Donny Kwok and Paul Carsten in Beijing; Editing by Christopher Cushing and Ryan Woo)

UPDATE 1-Alibaba invests $692 mln in Chinese department store operator| Reuters


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## cirr

*China Voice: More Internet companies should go abroad*

(Xinhua) 18:42, July 21, 2014

BEIJING, July 21 -- During his trip to Brazil last week, Chinese President Xi Jinping, together with his Brazilian counterpart Dilma Rousseff, witnessed the launch of the Portuguese version of China's Baidu search engine.

It is not the first time that a Chinese Internet company has launched a non-Chinese search engine, but it is the first time that a Chinese state leader has helped promote its services.

More Chinese Internet companies should compete internationally, as they now have the ability and can make the world's cyber environment more balanced and just.

Thanks to over three decades of rapid industrialization, China has become one of the biggest exporters, and its exports have upgraded from primary goods and light industrial products to mechanical and electrical products, and now high-speed railway systems and nuclear power plants.

During Xi's visit, China and Argentina agreed to build a heavy water reactor power station in the South American country. And earlier in Brazil, the two countries agreed to cooperate in high-speed railway construction.

But this time, Internet services are on the Chinese leader's marketing list. From products to services, it shows China's industrial structure is changing.

Recent years have witnessed rapid development in China's Internet sector and other high-tech emerging industries, which has pushed the number of Internet and mobile Internet users to over 600 million, the biggest number of netizens of any country. *Among the top 10 websites in 2012, only one website was based in China, but in 2013, four China-based websites entered the top-10 list.*

Not only Baidu.com, but also qq.com, sina.com and other websites, have won abundant users in China and other countries that are home to Chinese speakers. Alibaba.com and taobao.com are among the world's top B2B and B2C/C2C platforms in terms of trading volume and number of clients.

Chinese Internet companies are starting to get their voices heard worldwide, as they now have the capacity to provide services outside the country.

In addition, Chinese Internet service companies going abroad has strategic significance,as search engines are highly monopolized by a few websites and the international community is rightly concerned over cyber security after Edward Snowden's leaks about intelligence project PRISM.

Breaking the information monopoly and building a fairer and safer cyberspace have become the need and consensus of many countries, bringing new opportunities for Chinese Internet service providers.

However, these companies face a long journey to really internaationalize. They must study the preferences, customs and interests of Internet users overseas, and they also have to face established Internet giants' advantages in brands, technology and customer groups.

A small step for Chinese Internet companies going abroad will probably have a big impact on the computerized world, and also provide an opportunity for cooperation between newly emerging markets.

China Voice: More Internet companies should go abroad - People's Daily Online


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## TaiShang

No more messing with China and acting as trojan horses while making big money out of the Chinese consumer. Days foreigners rain free and go unaccounted for is coming to an end. 

*China's Internet regulator warns foreign firms *

A senior official with China's Internet regulator Wednesday warned that* foreign firms should not harm the country's interests and security while making big money from this market.*

The bottom line of the Chinese government concerning the management of Internet is *national interest and the interests of Chinese consumers*, said Lu Wei, director of the State Internet Information Office, at 2014 Summer Davos in the north Chinese city of Tianjin.

"We welcome all foreign companies to do business in China if they stick to this bottom line," Lu said at a sub-forum about the future of Internet business.

*"What we can not allow is that you undermine the country's interests while doing business in this market and profiting from it."*

When responding to a question about China's ongoing anti-trust probes, Lu said the probes do not target any specific company and China is always open to foreign firms.

"But *we also would like all foreign companies to understand that they should abide by Chinese laws,"* he said.

Lu stressed that the fast development of Internet businesses in China proved that the country's industrial policy is open, and domestic IT firms are also open to cooperation with foreign counterparts.

The creativity of Chinese IT firms and high-quality regulation of the Internet also contributed to the development, he added.

*China is conducting anti-monopoly investigations against Microsoft, Jaguar Land Rover, and Qualcomm. Paul E. Jacobs, executive chairman of Qualcomm Inc., attended the forum with Lu.*

The National Development and Reform Commission confirmed in February that it is conducting an antitrust investigation into the U.S. mobile chip maker.

Jacobs refused to comment about the anti-trust probe but stressed that the company's cooperation with Chinese firms is important, mutually beneficial and has great potential.

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## Beidou2020

Time to bring the hammer down hard on these foreign criminals.

Excellent work by Xi and the new government.

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## esolve

China has 871 million mobile Internet users, which means about 470 million ppl are not using mobile Internet. And I think babies and children and old ppl usually don't user mobile Internet.

According to the so-called world bank economist estimation, there are around 400 million ppl earn under $2/day (maybe they are old ppl and children?)

so in China, ppl who earn above $2/day, like $2.5/day, use mobile Internet

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

LG: Numbers are impressive in China. As we all know, China is set to surpass the US to become the world’s largest economy by the end of the year. Its middle-income population, now amounting to around half a billion people, is expected to grow steadily in the years to come. China is the leading market for a whole range of consumer categories. ICT is among the fastest growing fields and is considered as one of the strategic emerging sectors by China’s government. China’s Internet economy –as share of GDP– is already larger than that of US, France and Germany. *Fixed broadband penetrates 55% of Chinese households, while mobile Internet users amount to 871 million people, making China the country with the highest number of Internet users. * The market for mobile phone users is almost saturated, with close to 100% penetration rate. Such an incredible scale gives Chinese companies a huge competitive advantage. To give some examples, China Mobile has 800 million subscribers; China Telecom is the largest broadband operator in the world, serving 118 million households. The so-called BATs –Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent– are uncontested leaders in their respective field. Tencent’s Weixin (known outside China as Wechat), a social network product for smartphones, controls an active user base of 438 million people. The 16-year-old Internet giant is today the world’s 5th largest Internet company with a market cap of USD 152 billion, followed by Baidu, China’s most used search engine. Alibaba is now worth more than Facebook and Amazon at USD 278 billion, and has the ambition to serve more than half of the world’s countries by 2019. Europe is not far behind. Chinese phone makers Xiaomi and Huawei are competing fiercely to become the world’s third largest producer after Samsung and Apple. These companies have built their reputation in their home market, but are now intensively looking overseas for new opportunities.

A new platform between China and the EU will re-launch cooperation on Internet, Telecom and High Tech | Broadband4Europe

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## kankan326

I don't use my mobile phone very often. It still costs me $15/month.


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## esolve

rcrmj said:


> why you taking those inferior complex indians fart so serious? Taobao's monthly revenue can dwarf that pathetic slum's whole year's domestic consumption



NO, I'm targeting at the IMF report, which says about 400 million Chinese make/live on below $2 per day


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## Lure

esolve said:


> NO, I'm targeting at the IMF report, which says about 400 million Chinese make/live on below $2 per day



If you consider World Bank data published at 2011 you can see that 250 million Chinese people living under 2$(PPP)/day not 400 millions. And this is 2011 data. By the end of 2014 that percentage might have dropped down significantly. And don't forget the extremely messed up people as you've mentioned in my thread. Even in the richest countries there are people who live less then 1$/day.


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## TaiShang

*Tencent ready to launch China’s 1st private internet bank, WeBank*






Tencent today launched the website for what will likely be the first ever private internet bank in the People’s Republic of China. China began atrial program early this year that would allow five new private banks to be set up.

Web giants Alibaba and Tencent signed up, and the maker of WeChat looks to be first out of the gate. The new WeBank website reads (translation ours):

Are we a bank? Are we an internet company? We are an internet bank! 

For now, the domain just holds a placeholder site with a QR code. Scanning that QR code on a mobile phone leads the user to a presentation explaining some general information about WeBank. Forcing curious visitors to scan the QR code to learn more gives some indication about Tencent’s plans for the online bank – it will primarily be a mobile experience.






Tencent owns 30 percent of WeBank, while investment firms Baiyeyuan Investment and Liye Group each own 20 percent. Seven other shareholders make up the remaining 30 percent, and the entity as a whole has a registered capital of RMB 3 billion (US$482 million). The bank was approved in July and obtained all of its necessary licenses and permits by October 22.

Several internet giants have already taken a step into the finance realm by launching high-interest savings funds. Baidu, Tencent, and Alibaba each have their own, usually in cooperation with an existing bank. Alibaba’s has grown to be one of the biggest mutual funds in the world. Additionally, Alibaba and rival ecommerce company JD have set up small loan programs and credit systems for their merchants and customers, respectively.

Setting up their own banks means these internet companies will administer their own customers’ assets rather than just being the fresh face of an existing bank. That includes greater flexibility to hand out loans and set interest rates.

WeBank’s scope covers personal banking, corporate banking, and international banking. No date was given for when operations officially begin.

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## Chinese-Dragon

Great. 

This, together with the upcoming interest rate reforms, will solve the shadow banking problem, and bring all that economic activity back into the mainstream economy.

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## cirr

Now（the unlisted part of）Alibaba must hurry up to have Alibank operational as soon as possible。

And will we see a Mibank？

*Xiaomi confirms $1.1 billion funding, now valued at $45 billion*

Steven Millward

15 minutes ago

Xiaomi obliterated months of rumors and blind guesses today by confirming a new US$1.1 billion round of funding. Xiaomi co-founder Bin Lin posted a statement to Facebook describing the funding as “a new phase for the company” after “stellar results in the four years” since it was founded. Lin also teased a new “flagship device” coming next month.

The massive investment gives Xiaomi – which makes smartphones and a handful of smart gadgets, such as the Xiaomi TV and MiBand fitness tracker – a valuation of US$45 billion, the company added today. That’s more than compatriot rival Lenovo (US$14.4 billion).

Xiaomi last raised funds from VCs in August 2013, but that round was undisclosed. However, the company did reveal that it was effectively valued at US$10 billion at that time.

Here’s a timeline of Xiaomi’s funding:


US$41 million in December 2010 – that was before Xiaomi’s first phone was launched. At the time it was developing its Android-based MIUI OS.
US$90 million in December 2011 – this was shortly after the first Xiaomi phone hit the market in September of that year.
US$216 million in June 2012 – for a valuation of US$4 billion.
Undisclosed series D funding in August 2013 – for a valuation of US$10 billion.
US$1 billion bank loan in October 2014 – 29 overseas banks participated in a three-year loan.
US$1.1 billion in December 2014 – today’s newest round comes as Xiaomi has grown to become the world’s fourth largest phone brand.
Beijing-based Xiaomi is on course to sell 60 million smartphones this year. It currently ships to mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, India, and Indonesia. Xiaomi’s VP of international operations, Hugo Barra, recently confirmed that the first launch outside of Asia, into Brazil, is postponed until the first half of 2015.

Xiaomi’s newest funding comes from All-Stars Investment, DST, GIC, Hopu Fund, Yunfeng Capital, and other unnamed participants.

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## TaiShang

*'Just spend', Alipay tells shoppers*




_A salesperson scanning the quick response code from a customer's mobile phone at a retail outlet in Beijing. Alipay is launching a consumer financing service that allows shoppers to pay for online purchases the month after delivery. [China Daily]_


Alipay, the e-payment division of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, is launching a consumer financing service that allows shoppers to pay for online purchases the month after delivery.

*The service, called huabei (just spend), offers loans of 1,000 yuan ($161) to 30,000 yuan. It is intended to improve the experience of online shopping, said an Alipay statement on Monday.

Those who shop on the company's Taobao and Tmall platforms can use this service and repay their loans by the 10th of the month following delivery.*

The service is only open to a "limited number" of active Alipay users at this stage. Alipay said that the official launch has not been confirmed yet.

*Alipay said that all loans will be provided by its parent company Ant Financial Services Group, a financial affiliate of Alibaba Group.

A battle to offer loans to shoppers is underway among major domestic e-commerce companies. JD.com Inc, Alibaba's biggest e-commerce competitor, rolled out a service in February offering its registered users consumer loans up to 15,000 yuan.*

The Beijing-based JD.com said that the service has "significantly boosted" its sales. Those who use the loan service spent 58 percent more than the average shopper did six months earlier, the company said.

Beyond stimulating online consumption, e-commerce companies can easily expand into Internet finance by providing loans to consumers, said analysts.

Li Ye, an analyst at Internet consultancy Analysys International, said that the foundation of consumer financing service lies in risk control.

"Because e-commerce platforms have amassed a lot of data on consumers' finances, such as how much and how often they spend online and whether they pay on time for the goods they order online, they have natural advantages in developing consumer financing services," she said.

Consumer finance has a rosy future in China because of rising incomes and a consumer market unleashed by the growing appetite for high-quality goods, said consultancy iResearch Group.

It said that consumers in China borrowed 13 trillion yuan in 2013, up 24.7 percent year-on-year. The average growth of the market is expected to exceed 20 percent between 2014 and 2017.

Wang Weidong, an analyst with iResearch, said that with more e-commerce companies getting into consumer lending, the Internet-based consumer finance market is expected to surge from 6 billion yuan in 2013 to more than 100 billion yuan in 2017.

"Compared with developed Western countries, the penetration rate of consumer finance in China is still quite low. With transaction data and big data technology, e-commerce firms can make the whole process of getting a loan much easier, compared with traditional financial institutions," he said.

"E-commerce companies can act as a catalyst for the growth of consumer finance in China," Wang said.

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## cirr

Alibaba and other internet players are fast metamorphosizing into financial giants。

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## cirr

*The ‘Tesla Of China’? Leshi Internet To Build Electric Cars*





Trevor Collett | Jan 3, 2015

One of China’s biggest internet players has a vision to be the Republic’s answer to Tesla, with plans to build its own *electric vehicle*.

*Leshi Internet Information And Technology* is behind the move, seeking permission from Chinese authorities to build the car locally having spent 12 months developing it.

Similarities with Tesla don’t end with the EV focus either, as 41 year-old chairman and founder, *Jia Yueting *(pictured, top of page), is every bit China’s version of Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

Mr Jia's business (not his first business, incidentally) has just entered its 11th year, earning him billionaire status along the way. The CEO told _Bloomberg _he plans to use his experience “managing disruptive change” to get the project over the line.

‘Disrupting’ skills are another trait Jia and Musk share in common, with the latter named 'Top Disrupter’ by his peers in September last year.




Smog in China

It shouldn’t be hard for Leshi to obtain the necessary paperwork to build its EV, as the Chinese Government is looking to encourage non-carmakers into the industry to push development of ‘green’ technology.

China’s appalling air pollution is no secret, and the country announced a plan to scrap six million cars in May last year in response.

“This is our dream and passion,” Mr Jia said. “Look at China’s skies, all responsible corporate citizens want to do something about it - this is the truth.”

The Chinese Government is also looking to reduce dependence on foreign oil, and is fast-tracking plans to increase the country’s EV population in the process; including significant financial incentives to boost charging infrastructure.

*Leshi said its first-ever model would feature numerous touchscreens in place of ‘traditional’ interior controls, in a car that is internet-linked and “reasonably priced”.*

*The model will have a certain degree of autonomous operation, including self-parking.*




Coming to Australia? They're already here. This BYD electric bus is currently serving at Sydney International Airport

Upon entering the Chinese market, Leshi’s EV will go head-to-head in the sales race with the car that arguably inspired it; the Tesla Model S.

The Model S was launched in China in April, and Tesla plans to build the EV in China within the next three to four years.

China’s list of EV-makers could also include *Wanxiang* and BYD in the coming years with each looking to branch out from their current businesses.

Wanxiang is an auto parts supplier while BYD already has experience building battery-powered buses, EV taxis and the batteries themselves.

Combined all-electric and plug-in hybrid sales in China were up 120 percent at one stage during 2014, with some familiar names among the list of models sold.




Holden Volt

The BYD Qin (PHEV) and e6 (EV) are quite popular as is the Chery QQ (EV), but the Chevrolet Volt, Tesla Model S and rebadged versions of the Nissan Leaf are also finding homes.

In comparison, Holden Volt sales in Australia were down 41 percent for the year to the end of November and Leaf sales were down 9.4 percent. The Tesla Model S is new to the Australian market.

Can Leshi become a genuine alternative to Tesla? Will the new model get off the ground? And what will China’s growing EV market mean for the rest of the world?

TMR will be watching with interest.

The ‘Tesla Of China’? Leshi Internet To Build Electric Cars | The Motor Report

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## C130

if China can forgo the red tape and put electric cars on the fast track I see it being a great thing.
if Elon Musk was smart he would try to get in on the action on China's green push.
if it's successful no doubt people in the USA government and the average joe would be jealous and it would kickstart the push over here.

I hope nothing but the best for China. electric cars are the future.


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## SledgeHammer

Batteries need to be far more efficient and cheaper to make electric cars successful, this is the sole reason for very limited success of electric cars.


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## Yizhi

how far can this thing go with full battery? and price? how long it takes for charging?
personally prefer hybrids, pure electrical ones are risky...
BYD is huge here. can confirm.

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## cirr

Yizhi said:


> how far can this thing go with full battery? and price? how long it takes for charging?
> personally prefer hybrids, pure electrical ones are risky...
> BYD is huge here. can confirm.





_In September 2014, the world’s first large-scale public bus service powered by *wireless charging technology*, developed by ZTE and Dongfeng Automobile Co., entered service. The technology, based on electromagnetic induction, is the world’s most advanced wireless-charging solution, offering a new alternative for charging electrical vehicles, in addition to the current practices of plug-in charging and battery replacements._

河南新闻联播20141231宇通 中兴联手打造汽车无线充电技术未来—在线播放—优酷网，视频高清在线观看

It takes 5-8 mins to recharge the bus using ZTE’s wireless charging technology：

中兴通讯在成都建全球首条无线充电社区巴士[深视新闻]—在线播放—优酷网，视频高清在线观看

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## Yizhi

cirr said:


> _In September 2014, the world’s first large-scale public bus service powered by *wireless charging technology*, developed by ZTE and Dongfeng Automobile Co., entered service. The technology, based on electromagnetic induction, is the world’s most advanced wireless-charging solution, offering a new alternative for charging electrical vehicles, in addition to the current practices of plug-in charging and battery replacements._


charging is always the tricky part. glad to see new development.
they now have subsidies for electrical vehicles (BYD), 30000 from state and 30000 from local gov for each electrical or hybrid you buy making it quite affordable.

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## terranMarine

Wooden Electric car top speeds of 40 kilometers per hour, costs more than ten thousand yuan and can run for 20 kilometers after each recharge.


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## Aepsilons

terranMarine said:


> Wooden Electric car top speeds of 40 kilometers per hour, costs more than ten thousand yuan and can run for 20 kilometers after each recharge.




Lol. Don't drive that during Lunar New Year when firecrackers are going off .



Gong hei fa choi!!


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## terranMarine

Nihonjin1051 said:


> Lol. Don't drive that during Lunar New Year when firecrackers are going off .
> 
> 
> 
> Gong hei fa choi!!


 that's a nice one, i'm sure they wouldn't want this masterpiece to burn down.

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## Aepsilons

terranMarine said:


> that's a nice one, i'm sure they wouldn't want this masterpiece to burn down.



Hahaha. I'm literally giggling here at starbucks. Wooden electric car. Bad combo? Hahaha LOL


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## terranMarine

Nihonjin1051 said:


> Hahaha. I'm literally giggling here at starbucks. Wooden electric car. Bad combo? Hahaha LOL




wood and electric, better watch out driving under lightning circumstances lol still this is one cool environmental friendly car

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## Hamartia Antidote

terranMarine said:


> Wooden Electric car top speeds of 40 kilometers per hour, costs more than ten thousand yuan and can run for 20 kilometers after each recharge.



1909 electric car can do 160km

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## Aepsilons

terranMarine said:


> wood and electric, better watch out driving under lightning circumstances lol still this is one cool environmental friendly car
> 
> View attachment 181572
> View attachment 181573



I do admire it for its Eco friendly aspect. It's cute!


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## TaiShang

*Fifty Geely Englon TX4 cabs put into service in Shanghai*
Published: 2015-1-5

On October 11, fifty TX4 cabs under Geely Englon brand were delivered to Johnson & Johnson and went into services in Shanghai, adding a British style to the old Shanghai. 

Those who have been to London may be impressed by the black classic taxi shuttling through the streets. Known as Black Cab, it is regarded as one of the cultural symbols in London and enjoys a reputation on a par with the well-known brands including Rolls-Royce, Jaguar, Land Rover, Bentley and Morgan. The introduction of the TX4 cabs will add another British style scenery to the city. 

The first TX4 cabs are evolved from the classical black cabs in London streets. Compared with other taxi models, quite a few advantages of the cabs have been found by the test drivers. 

One of its highlight is huge space. The car has two rows of seats in the cage including three fixed seats in the back row and a folding seat in the front row, in which there is comfortable seating for four people in two opposed rows. In addition, a special place is left for the luggage and the space is large enough to accommodate the luggage of the largest size.

Another highlight of the model lies in its outstanding performance in ensuring the privacy of the passengers. A sound proof panel was adopted between the driving cab and the cage, which prevents from "the walls having ears" and effectively ensures the privacy of the passengers. While in order to ensure the communication between the driver and the passengers, an intercom device is also adopted.

Its user-friendly design also wins quite a few reputations for the Englon TX4. The custom-oriented cab takes the demands of the special groups including the old people, babies and disabled into consideration. Its acres of space can accommodate the wheelchair and the pram and a wheelchair ramp is also adopted for the convenience of the special groups. Its user-friendly design also makes the cab unique among the taxies in the present market.

Despite of its large size, its 3.8-meter turning radius constitutes another advantage of the cab, which can help the cab effectively cope with the traffic jam. The first batch of the cabs will accept both reservation and hailing after its launch. In the future, more user-friendly and better cabs will land on the Shanghai market.

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## ito

BEIJING—China announced sweeping new regulations requiring users of an array of Internet services to register with their real names and avoid spreading content that challenges national interests.

Internet users will also be punished for adopting misleading handles such as “Putin,” “Obama” or “People’s Daily,” state media said Wednesday of the new rules, which could hurt some of the country’s biggest Internet companies.

The requirements apply to users of blogs, microblogs, instant-messaging services, online discussion forums, news comment sections and related services, said the Cyberspace Administration of China, the country’s Internet regulator, in a statement posted on its website.

Internet users will still be allowed to select their own usernames and avatars as long as they don’t involve “illegal or unhealthy” content.

“Username chaos” had become a serious problem on the Chinese Internet, the state-run China News Service said in a report on the new regulations, citing an unidentified representative of the regulator. Fake accounts, it said, had “polluted the Internet ecology, harmed the interests of the masses, and seriously violated core socialist values.”

The Internet regulator didn’t immediately respond to requests to comment. According to the China News Service, Internet companies will be required to devote staff to implement the requirements.

The new regulations, to be enforced starting March 1, ban nine categories of usernames, including anything that harms national security, involves national secrets, incites ethnic discrimination or hatred, or harms national unity. Names that promote pornography, gambling, violence, terror, superstition and rumors are also banned, according to the statement.

Users will also be required to agree to respect the law, the socialist political system, social morality and truth before being allowed to use a given service.

Chinese Internet companies and users have pushed back against efforts to implement real-name registration in the past. The current drive, however, comes amid an unusually intense period of ideological and political tightening that has included warnings about the infiltration of “Western ideas” in higher education and demands that artists producework that is more patriotic.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has been determined to quash dissent and frank in portraying the Internet as an ideological battleground the Communist Party must dominate. He has created a new high-level committee on Internet security and put himself at its helm. He has also presided over efforts to replace Western-made computer chips with local alternatives and force foreign tech companies to submit their products to security reviews
In January, regulators shut down dozens of social-media accounts for offenses ranging from spreading pornography to distorting history. Earlier this week, authorities accused Netease, a U.S.-listed Internet portal known for its relatively light censorship, of having “serious orientation problems,” saying it was helping spread rumors and smut. Netease didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The new rules, if strictly implemented, could have ripple effects throughout the Chinese Internet, analysts said.

Besides limiting speech, the real-name requirement could hurt popular products likeTencent Holdings Ltd. ’s QQ instant messaging service, Baidu Inc. ’s Tieba discussion forums and the Weibo microblogging platform, all of which are crawling with duplicate or “zombie” accounts.

“In a one-person, one-account situation, you’re going to see a lot of water flow out of the system,” said Zhu Wei, an expert in media law at the Chinese University of Political Science and Law, referring to artificially inflated user counts.

Baidu declined to comment. Tencent didn’t respond to a request to comment. In a statement posted online, Weibo vowed to abide by the new regulations and to “improve its management of information related to nicknames, avatars and personal descriptions.”

In addition to decreased user numbers, Chinese Internet companies face significant added operational costs associated with identifying users, verifying their information and tracking their activities, analysts said. With regulators offering few details about implementation, it is possible companies will again try to resist, though analysts said the government was not likely to give up on real-name registration.

“To maintain the stability of society and national security has always been at the top of the list for the Chinese government, and it is continuously revising the regulations to make sure it has the necessary coverage,” said Charlie Dai, an Internet analyst with Forrester Research.

There are multiple levels of identity validation and the government is likely to negotiate with individual Internet companies over which level they needed to implement, Mr. Dai said. Users might be unhappy, but they have few other choices, he added. “Some will leave, but finally most of them will accept it,” he said.

Chinese Internet companies would probably benefit from the added requirements in the long run because of the increased credibility they would bring, according to Mr. Zhu. In any case, he said, the companies didn’t have much choice.

“These rules aren’t the end. They’re not even the beginning of the end,” he said, pointing to a proposal for a unified tracking system—managed by the Public Security Bureau—that would allow users to register for any Internet service using a digital ID based on their government-issued ID card. “This isn’t far in the future,” he said. “It’s going to be in the near future.”

China to Enforce Real-Name Registration for Internet Users - WSJ

*I am posting this important news item for the benefit of Chinese members. Look if any of you are violating CCP diktats and risk being punished. *


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## xunzi

Why are you making a big deal when we did something that the West already did? Such as Facebook and pretty much every credible media that require real name to create account and post.

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## Edison Chen

Today...facebook asked me to upload real identity with real photo, birthday to verify. Everyone should be responsible for his comments and acts.

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## Steakhouse

xunzi said:


> Why are you making a big deal when we did something that the West already did? Such as Facebook and pretty much every credible media that require real name to create account and post.







Some require you to use your cell phone numbers but other require your email only.


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## xunzi

Steakhouse said:


> In China require you to use real name to register, PDF don't require your real name except your email. Just make sure you know the different.


For non-profit or community website, you don't need real name to register. However for business or corporate profit platform, then you need real name to register. The same as Facebook. Microblog will be the same.

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## Steakhouse

xunzi said:


> For non-profit or community website, you don't need real name to register. However for business or corporate profit platform, then you need real name to register. The same as Facebook. Microblog will be the same.





Nope I can register with Facebook with my google id.

Why would you want to use you real id on the net.


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## xunzi

Steakhouse said:


> Some require you to use your cell phone numbers but other require your email only.


I have no problem with sites asking for cell phone as it is for my protection as well as them if that website is a profit-driven. Now I have serious problem if a community website like PDF asking for my cell phone number to register because there is no purpose for that.



Steakhouse said:


> Nope I can register with Facebook with my google id.
> 
> Why would you want to use you real id on the net.


Your Google ID is already embed with personal information, am I correct?

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## ito

xunzi said:


> Why are you making a big deal when we did something that the West already did? Such as Facebook and pretty much every credible media that require real name to create account and post.



I don't use my real name or profile on anything on net. Since when Facebook require real name or profile?



Edison Chen said:


> Today...facebook asked me to upload real identity with real photo, birthday to verify. Everyone should be responsible for his comments and acts.



So this is your photo. Am I right?


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## Steakhouse

xunzi said:


> I have no problem with sites asking for cell phone as it is for my protection as well as them if that website is a profit-driven. Now I have serious problem if a community website like PDF asking for my cell phone number to register because there is no purpose for that.
> 
> 
> Your Google ID is already embed with personal information, am I correct?






Nope, fake name, birthdate, no personal information.

I no longer register with yahoo after I forgot my yahoo password, now yahoo require my cell phone number, I won't need yahoo ID and give away my personal infor.


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## Edison Chen

ito said:


> I don't use my real name or profile on anything on net. Since when Facebook require real name or profile?
> 
> 
> 
> So this is your photo. Am I right?



Yes, this is me. What do you think.

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## xunzi

ito said:


> I don't use my real name or profile on anything on net. Since when Facebook require real name or profile?


Like I said, depending on the platform.. serious website will need real name identification while others don't. Facebook change this policy a long time ago when they started to implement real-name identification system. 

Facebook 'real name' policy stirs questions around identity - CNN.com

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## Steakhouse

xunzi said:


> Like I said, depending on the platform.. serious website will need real name identification while others don't. Facebook change this policy a long time ago when they started to implement real-name identification system.
> 
> Facebook 'real name' policy stirs questions around identity - CNN.com





I don't even use Facebook.


----------



## xunzi

Steakhouse said:


> Nope, fake name, birthdate, no personal information.
> 
> I no longer register with yahoo after I forgot my yahoo password, now yahoo require my cell phone number, I won't need yahoo ID and give away my personal infor.


You must have register before the real name policy took shape. As I remembered, I have a facebook/youtube/google+/etc that I used fake account. Then the change took effect and they asked me to provide real name. Indeed you can fake your real name. There is multiple ways to bypass that and there is no way they know. However they make your registration harder if you provide fake name because they will ask for verification of your identification through ID or telephone number. Anyhow, we are NOT the first country to adopt real-name identification for serious platform. South Korea did that a long time ago but nobody make a shit out of it. Why now when we do it?

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## ito

Edison Chen said:


> Yes, this is me. What do you think.



You look good and neat.



xunzi said:


> Like I said, depending on the platform.. serious website will need real name identification while others don't. Facebook change this policy a long time ago when they started to implement real-name identification system.
> 
> Facebook 'real name' policy stirs questions around identity - CNN.com



No, I don't use my real name on Facebook, nor do lot of people I know. Facebook is not an government authority to issue such diktats.


----------



## Steakhouse

xunzi said:


> You must have register before the real name policy took shape. As I remembered, I have a facebook/youtube/google+/etc that I used fake account. Then the change took effect and they asked me to provide real name. Indeed you can fake your real name. There is multiple ways to bypass that and there is no way they know. However they make your registration harder if you provide fake name because they will ask for verification of your identification through ID or telephone number. Anyhow, we are NOT the first country to adopt real-name identification for serious platform. South Korea did that a long time ago but nobody make a shit out of it. Why now when we do it?






I just create my google account recently in bout 5 months with my fake ID. I don't want government or anyone to know and track me on my internet usage. I rather not register any website if require my real ID.

You can use free wifi for the internet and no one know who you are.


----------



## RescueRanger

Why are people obsessed with what China want's it's citizens to comply with? The Chinese are trying to maintain security, at least they are transparent enough to demand you provide the information, rather than just stealing it from "front" companies like "FaceFu**" and "Googli".


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## KAL-EL

Edison Chen said:


> Yes, this is me. What do you think.



From that angle, You somewhat resemble a person on youtube who does a lot of headphone reviews.


----------



## esolve

China accounts for more than a quarter of global machine-to-machine (M2M) connections, according to a report by the GSMA association of mobile operators. With more than 50 million connections, the country's at the head of the pack when it comes to Internet of Things adoption. China's lead is thanks to strong government support - the country plans to invest more than $600 billion in IoT through the year 2020. The fact that China's top mobile operators are cooperating with the government to deploy M2M solutions across several fields doesn't hurt, either.

As growth in mobile network subscribers has slowed in China, operators are looking elsewhere to make money. And thanks to government support, China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom have developed IoT services that will find use cases in healthcare, transportation, education and beyond. As the GSMA notes, "regulatory uncertainty" has held back the growth of large-scale connected devices. Asia alone accounts for 40 percent of the world's machine-to-machine connections, with the United States leading the market outside of Asia.

China is the global leader in Internet of Things thanks to government support

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## TaiShang

*China's First "Internet car" to be Unveiled in 2016*
2015-03-12 







[Photo: auto.163.com]

SAIC Motors and Alibaba have announced the creation of an Internet-vehicle-fund worth one billion yuan, about 160 million US dollars.

The country's largest auto group on the Chinese A-share stock market and the biggest e-commerce giant signed an agreement last year on building China's first "Internet car" and developing related applications to launch a new motor ecosystem.

The Internet of vehicles is a huge interaction network, made up of information of vehicles' position, speed, and routes.

Alibaba says the first "Internet car" will be unveiled in 2016. Drivers using the service will be able to find the closest free parking, and information to avoid traffic jams among other useful information.

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## Jazzbot

TaiShang said:


> The Internet of vehicles is a huge interaction network, made up of information of vehicles' position, speed, and routes.
> 
> Alibaba says the first "Internet car" will be unveiled in 2016. Drivers using the service will be able to find the closest free parking, and information to avoid traffic jams among other useful information.




Isn't this already being done using GPS navigation devices in cars? What will be the key differences?


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## TaiShang

Jazzbot said:


> Isn't this already being done using GPS navigation devices in cars? What will be the key differences?



Obviously foreign tech giants have already made some inroads. This, however, will be the first to be built domestically in China by China's own companies.

*China's SAIC Motor, Alibaba to invest $160 million in Internet-connected cars*
Thu Mar 12, 2015 4:47am EDT






(Reuters) - Chinese auto maker SAIC Motor Corp Ltd said on Thursday it would join forces with e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd to invest 1 billion yuan ($160 million) in a fund to develop Internet-connected cars.

The pair will establish a joint venture and aim to launch their first car in 2016, SAIC said in a statement. The 50-50 JV will be opened to other investors in future, according to a spokeswoman for the automaker.

SAIC shares rose 9.8 percent to a more than two-month high on news of the partnership, before shedding some of the gains to close up 4.8 percent.

Chinese internet companies and auto makers have been quick to team up to start developing partly self-driving and Internet-connected cars, following a path already trodden by U.S. tech giants Google Inc and Apple Inc.

Internet giant Baidu Inc, which leads China's search market and competes with Alibaba in some areas, is developing cars that are shifting parts of driving towards automation, working with companies like Germany's BMW AG.

In an emailed statement, Alibaba said its partnership with SAIC would include developing new technologies and services using cloud computing.

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## AndrewJin

Oh man, Alibaba is everywhere. Could Jack Ma just give others some room?!

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## TaiShang

AndrewJin said:


> Oh man, Alibaba is everywhere. Could Jack Ma just give others some room?!



 It is good to have national champions. Let them thrive first. Then, maybe some action will be taken by the regulators.

*Alibaba invests $200M in Snapchat*

Alibaba’s spending spree continues! The Chinese ecommerce behemoth has just given American chat startup Snapchat a US$200 million cash infusion, a source familiar with the deal told _Tech in Asia_. This latest investment values the American company at around US$15 billion. Neither company has officially announced the investment yet.

This is just the latest in a long line of mega-investments from the Chinese company. Earlier this month, Alibaba earmarked US$315 million to invest in Taiwanese startups. In February, it sank nearly US$600 million into Chinese smartphone startup Meizu and took a big stake in Indian payments service Paytm. Those are just a few of Alibaba’s other big investments so far this year, and in 2014 the company went on a spending spree that saw it invest big in everything from Chinese film companies to American ridesharing startups.

This actually isn’t Alibaba’s first big investment into an American chat app either. The company put US$280 million into American messaging app Tango last year. It remains unclear what Alibaba hopes to gain from its investments in these US-based startups, or whether it hopes to integrate their technologies into any of its own products. But American investments are in line with Alibaba’s broader strategy of expanding its global reach and attracting more overseas customers this year in its quest to become the world’s most dominant ecommerce player.

Alibaba isn’t the first company in China’s tech scene to show an interest in Snapchat, though. Tencent actually invested in the American startup back in 2013 during a US$60 million round of fundraising, although it’s not clear how much of that sum the Chinese company contributed.

***

And there are so many successful startups that fail to make headlines. 

*China’s Dianping soon to complete $850M funding round: report*






Dianping, a Chinese amalgamation of Yelp and Groupon, will soon complete a US$850 million funding round, according to QQ Tech.

Dianping refused to comment on the deal in a phone call with _Tech in Asia_. We have reached out to some of the investors listed in QQ Tech’s article for comment.

QQ Tech reports the investors include Singapore’s Temasek Holdings, Chinese property giant Wanda Group, and Hina Group, along with some of the company’s previous investors.

Dianping is China’s most popular site for reviews of restaurants and other local businesses. It generates revenue largely from its group buying ecommerce site and app.

Here’s a rundown of the company’s previous funding rounds:


January 2006, US$2 million series A round from Sequoia Capital
May 2007, US$25 million series B round from Google Ventures and Sequoia Capital
April 2011, US$100 million series C round from Sequoia Capital, Qiming Venture Partners, and Lightspeed Ventures
August 2012, US$64 million series D round from Sequoia Capital, Capital Today, and EZ Capital
Last year, Chinese web giant Tencent took a 20 percent stake in Dianping. The terms of that deal were not disclosed, but estimates are in the US$500 million range. Dianping was soon after incorporated in Tencent’s WeChat, the most popular messaging app in the country with468 million monthly active users.

QQ Tech states that sources told it Dianping originally only planned to raise about US$300 million. But after it’s chief competitor, Meituan,raised US$700 million, it felt it had to keep pace. According to aniResearch report from 2013, Alibaba’s Juhuasuan is China’s top daily deals site, followed by Meituan and then Dianping.

***

*Xiaomi MiPad and budget Redmi 2 set to launch in India on March 24*






At an event this morning in Delhi, Chinese gadget maker Xiaomi revealed that its tablet, the MiPad, and the updated version of its cheapest phone, the Redmi 2, are set to launch in India on March 24.

The budget-oriented Redmi 2 first launched in China in January, while theMiPad dates back to May 2014.

Xiaomi’s MiPad, which comes with a 7.9-inch 1080p HD screen, will cost INR 12,999 (US$207), while the Redmi 2 (with a 4.7-inch 720p HD screen) is pegged at INR 6,999 (US$112). Although both those gadgets are offered in a variety of colors in China, Indian consumers only get the white versions, according to a liveblog on Xiaomi India’s Facebook page.






Xiaomi first launched in India in July 2014. The company only sells phones online in India in partnership with homegrown ecommerce titan Flipkart.

The Redmi 2 requires pre-registration on Flipkart, starting today at 6pm Delhi time. However, the MiPad will be available on launch day without pre-ordering.

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## Martian2

ComradeNam said:


> Gone to space, yes the Vietnamese did. The first Asian in space was Vietnamese.
> 
> Build super computer, no. Not needed. They woud better build roads that is what the Vietnamese needed.
> 
> Yes they did. Do google search, viet is also building the most modern space facility in SEA soon will complete in 2020
> 
> They did launch sattelite.
> 
> I could go on. But the point here is not what Viet can do. The point is your chinese boast too much, make it like world greatest invention, everywhere i see chinese they boast the same thing, the same Xiao Mi crap.
> 
> Your xiao mi is cheap compare with apple and samsung, not consider high end, copy apple and samsung, your xiao mi sale most in China where there are billions chinese. Ur xiao mi use android from google. Nothing to boast about. Its chinese make it like evolution.
> 
> I dont see any american here talk about ibm whatson though it is incredible achievment.
> 
> Did not chinese culture teach to be humble.? I see boasting chinese everywhere i go.
> 
> Vietnam plans to launch a nano satellite into orbit in 2016
> 
> If vietnamese have money they can make anything. It is money that matter to vietnam consider the size of vietnam and the economic current.
> 
> Last but least we dont boast like chinese do for their achievement.



You're delusional. Vietnam can't even send a potato into space.

I will show you a video of a Chinese manned launch. I demand you provide video proof of your claimed Vietnamese launch into space. You Vietnamese don't even have a space launch facility.

From the Discovery Channel documentary video, China's Yang Liwei heads into space on Shenzhou 5 in 2003.

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## esolve

ComradeNam said:


> I think you Chinese need to do more research before boasting your achievment. What are you doing, the U.S is way ahead. Take super computer for example, while you chinese can only increase the processing speed, the U.S is way ahead developing computer with human cpability. Do search for IBM watson and true north.
> 
> Everything you Chinese do up till now is not really evolution rather than copy the existing technology and modified to fit your needs. Xiao mi or Alibab all are just copy idea from apple, samsung and ebay.
> 
> While many of you chinese make it like the world are paying attention. But not really. The Japan sucessed developed fuel cell car which will change the industry, and industry robot like Asimo like human. The U.S is developed war robot called petman, and laser weapon already.



according to your logic, Samsung is also a copycat, coz it is not the first android phone
even google is a copycat, coz it is not the first search engine

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## ComradeNam

Samsung used to perceived as Iphone copycat. It takes them alot innovation to build its brand awareness today.

The word copy cat and inspired build on top of existing technology is different things. Windows copy UI designs from Mac. Now not anymore its considered copy cat from mac.

Xiao mi at this point is just copy cat of Iphone even in icons designs. Wonder why it cant launch in U.S.

After all one U.S copy of another U.S is not the point. The point is you chinese boasting like your xiaomi world greatest invention from china when in fact its just blame copy from U.S., nothing uniqued except its cheaper like everything come from china anyway. 

Cheap is ok, copy is ok but boasting for cheap and copy cat stuff is look like crap. Almost every country can make smart phone nowday. What innovative xiao mi offer? A qualcom snap dragon or an android os?


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## Keel

A vast majority of postings are news on China's progress in everything like transport, trading, science, social lives, politics ..etc
When you are friends of China, you will see China's development as your great opportunities
When your are enemies, then heaps over heaps of sour grapes, self-pitying, endless vilification, slander, belitlement, bad-mouthing, malignity ... are drivelling from the China haters on the board





Painting of 长江 Chang Jiang, oil on canvas

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## ComradeNam

Sharing country achievment is nothing to talk about. But boasting is relevant to many chinese. What most common i hear from chinese is praise their local made stuffs like greatest invention and about to take over the world. See how chinese boast about their super computer superior than U.S . Please do me favor do more research before boasting.

I hear the same crap howe wonderful xiaomi compare with iphone and will over take iphone again and again in where there are chinese. Be humble little bit with that crap.


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## Place Of Space

ComradeNam said:


> Samsung used to perceived as Iphone copycat. It takes them alot innovation to build its brand awareness today.
> 
> The word copy cat and inspired build on top of existing technology is different things. Windows copy UI designs from Mac. Now not anymore its considered copy cat from mac.
> 
> Xiao mi at this point is just copy cat of Iphone even in icons designs. Wonder why it cant launch in U.S.
> 
> After all one U.S copy of another U.S is not the point. The point is you chinese boasting like your xiaomi world greatest invention from china when in fact its just blame copy from U.S., nothing uniqued except its cheaper like everything come from china anyway.
> 
> Cheap is ok, copy is ok but boasting for cheap and copy cat stuff is look like crap. Almost every country can make smart phone nowday. What innovative xiao mi offer? A qualcom snap dragon or an android os?



Mi provide service, for example, you want an kind of app, they will design it. When you give advice to improve the application, they will listen to you and make changes. This is one point of Mi service.

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## Beast

Jazzbot said:


> Isn't this already being done using GPS navigation devices in cars? What will be the key differences?


This car will also help you find the best goodies nearby like shopping and dining based on your location from alibaba database.

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## Martian2

I think it is inappropriate for any primitive Vietnamese to give unsolicited advice to technologically-advanced Chinese. Vietnam was near the bottom of the world list in USPTO patents with a negligible 10 patents.
----------
*China passes France and U.K. for 7th place in USPTO patents*

The four largest exporters in the world (e.g. #1 China by using Greater China patents, #2 U.S., #3 Germany, and #4 Japan) are also the four largest USPTO patent holders.

Greater China comprises mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.
-----

PATENT COUNTS BY ORIGIN AND TYPE, CALENDAR YEAR 2013 | U.S. PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE

Patents granted by the United States for the year 2013.

1. U.S. 147,652 patents
2. Japan 54,170
(Greater China 19,471)
3. Germany 16,605
4. South Korea 15,745
5. Taiwan 12,118
6. Canada 7,272
*7. China 6,597*
8. France 6,555
9. U.K. 6,551
10. Israel 3,152
11. Italy 2,930
...
India 2,474
Singapore 857
Hong Kong 756 (Patent office counts Hong Kong as a separate entity)
Russian Federation 432
Brazil 286
Malaysia 230

These countries are sometimes mentioned by the media as the "next China":

Mexico 204
South Africa 181
Poland 113
Thailand 104
Turkey 83
Argentina 80
Greece 70
Chile 57
Ukraine 38
Egypt 34
Philippines 34
Indonesia 15
*Vietnam 10*

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## VelocuR

It will increase more accidents and distraction, I feel it is just bad concepts. Why everyone need internet now in car, washroom, refrigeration, underwear, bicycle and what not?


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## Keel

ComradeNam said:


> Sharing country achievment is nothing to talk about. But boasting is relevant to many chinese. What most common i hear from chinese is praise their local made stuffs like greatest invention and about to take over the world. See how chinese boast about their super computer superior than U.S . Please do me favor do more research before boasting.



The superccomputer list is published by "Top500" semi-annually and foreign professionals are there to check the validity of the computer functions It is a reputable list of achievement. If they have confirmed a computer to be the no 1 fastest in the world and if a Chinese member posts the news, how can this be a bragging? Or you immense jealousy has surged to the surface again!

You need to educate yourself before continuation of your hatred on our progress!

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## Beast

VelocuR said:


> It will increase more accidents and distraction, I feel it is just bad concepts. Why everyone need internet now in car, washroom, refrigeration, underwear, bicycle and what not?


Using smartphone to do talking and try finding info while driving is even more dangerous.

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## Place Of Space

VelocuR said:


> It will increase more accidents and distraction, I feel it is just bad concepts. Why everyone need internet now in car, washroom, refrigeration, underwear, bicycle and what not?



I guess it depends on market. If people don't need, it will disappear sooner or later.

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## bobsm

ComradeNam said:


> What most common i hear from chinese is praise their local made stuffs like greatest invention and about to take over the world..



Well, they have every reason to be proud of their numerous achievements. Below is something that has never been done, until now.
Two quantum properties teleported together for first time - physicsworld.com

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## rcrmj

ComradeNam said:


> I think you Chinese need to do more research before boasting your achievment. What are you doing, the U.S is way ahead. Take super computer for example, while you chinese can only increase the processing speed, the U.S is way ahead developing computer with human cpability. Do search for IBM watson and true north.
> 
> Everything you Chinese do up till now is not really evolution rather than copy the existing technology and modified to fit your needs. Xiao mi or Alibab all are just copy idea from apple, samsung and ebay.
> 
> While many of you chinese make it like the world are paying attention. But not really. The Japan sucessed developed fuel cell car which will change the industry, and industry robot like Asimo like human. The U.S is developed war robot called petman, and laser weapon already.


i think the viets contribution to the humankind is for us human to understand the odd behavior of primitive primate``isnt it?``get lot you filthy viets

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## hans

I guess it will be pure electric driving or at least hybrid.
Full intelligence connection to smartphone, control your car through smartphone from anywhere. 
Human voice interface. 
smart programming of map, probably self-driving without a driver
Just like today`s smartphones, phone calls are no longer the main function.
Internet cars may focus on internet and information, rather than cars itself..




Jazzbot said:


> Isn't this already being done using GPS navigation devices in cars? What will be the key differences?

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## cirr

Lots lots of people have made huge huge amounts of money investing in countless number of fast growing Chinese high-tech companies.

But......

*There is so much more yet to come*。

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## rott

VelocuR said:


> It will increase more accidents and distraction, I feel it is just bad concepts. Why everyone need internet now in car, washroom, refrigeration, underwear, bicycle and what not?


The same can be said in just about everything. You just need to keep an open mind.
One fine example would be, let's ban all advertisement hoardings, they are also a distraction to drivers when they reveal a semi naked woman in a lingerie advertisement.

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## Jlaw

Martian2 said:


> You're delusional. Vietnam can't even send a potato into space.
> 
> I will show you a video of a Chinese manned launch. I demand you provide video proof of your claimed Vietnamese launch into space. You Vietnamese don't even have a space launch facility.
> 
> From the Discovery Channel documentary video, China's Yang Liwei heads into space on Shenzhou 5 in 2003.


Comrade nam is saying a Vietnamese-Chinese American (most likely an anti-VCP 華僑) hitched a ride in an American space shuttle in the 80s.



Martian2 said:


> I think it is inappropriate for any primitive Vietnamese to give unsolicited advice to technologically-advanced Chinese. *Vietnam was near the bottom of the world list in USPTO patents with a negligible 10 patents.*
> ----------
> *China passes France and U.K. for 7th place in USPTO patents*


Again, most likely filed by 華僑 living in Vietnam

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## VALKRYIE

hans said:


> I guess it will be pure electric driving or at least hybrid.
> Full intelligence connection to smartphone, control your car through smartphone from anywhere.
> Human voice interface.
> smart programming of map, probably self-driving without a driver
> Just like today`s smartphones, phone calls are no longer the main function.
> Internet cars may focus on internet and information, rather than cars itself..



I found it funny that China would call it a "Internet Car" since it has the same functions as a smartphone . I guess they can't call it a smart car since the name is already taken.







Martian2 said:


> You're delusional. Vietnam can't even send a potato into space.
> 
> I will show you a video of a Chinese manned launch. I demand you provide video proof of your claimed Vietnamese launch into space. You Vietnamese don't even have a space launch facility.
> 
> From the Discovery Channel documentary video, China's Yang Liwei heads into space on Shenzhou 5 in 2003.



Are some people this close minded and ignorant...





Phạm Tuân (born February 14, 1947) is a retired Vietnam Air Force aviator. He became the first Vietnamese citizen and the first Asian in space when he flew aboard the Soyuz 37 mission as an Intercosmos Research Cosmonaut.











Launch of VINASAT 2


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## hans

Only because China consider intelligence stuff as internet stuff, all information connected.
And it has nothing to do with Smart
Just a language issue



VALKRYIE said:


> I found it funny that China would call it a "Internet Car" since it has the same functions as a smartphone . I guess they can't call it a smart car since the name is already taken
> Are some people this close minded and ignorant...
> 
> Phạm Tuân (born February 14, 1947) is a retired Vietnam Air Force aviator. He became the first Vietnamese citizen and the first Asian in space when he flew aboard the Soyuz 37 mission as an Intercosmos Research Cosmonaut.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Launch of VINASAT 2

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## cirr

hans said:


> Only because China consider intelligence stuff as internet stuff, all information connected.
> And it has nothing to do with Smart
> Just a language issue



There is absolutely no point in replying to people who still belong up the trees。

*HiSilicon to launch new Cortex-A72 architecture-based processors*

OFweek | Posted: 13 Mar 2015, 11:33

Share: OFweek) - In addition to Qualcomm, Samsung and other manufacturers that have involved in the development of independent architecture processor, Huawei has also decided to develop it based on its own HiSilicon Technologies' "Kirin" series of processor.

At the MWC 2015, Huawei revealed that the company will launch its processor Kirin 930 this year, and now the company is setting out to make ARM Cortex-A72 architecture-based processors Kirin 940 and Kirin 950 that are expected to be released in the second half of 2015.

As for the specifications of Huawei's new processors, please look at the following table:

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## jamahir

TaiShang said:


> Alibaba says the first "Internet car" will be unveiled in 2016. Drivers using the service will be able to find the closest free parking, and information to avoid traffic jams among other useful information.



such information will actually lead to another traffic jam.


----------



## ih8viet

ComradeNam said:


> I think you Chinese need to do more research before boasting your achievment. What are you doing, the U.S is way ahead. Take super computer for example, while you chinese can only increase the processing speed, the U.S is way ahead developing computer with human cpability. Do search for IBM watson and true north.
> 
> Everything you Chinese do up till now is not really evolution rather than copy the existing technology and modified to fit your needs. Xiao mi or Alibab all are just copy idea from apple, samsung and ebay.
> 
> While many of you chinese make it like the world are paying attention. But not really. The Japan sucessed developed fuel cell car which will change the industry, and industry robot like Asimo like human. The U.S is developed war robot called petman, and laser weapon already.



Jealous primitive jungle bunny. Angry at Chinese achievements? Classic Viet mentality speaking on others achievements to make oneself feel superior. Your kind have contributed nothing great to mankind besides mail order brides. lol



Keel said:


> A vast majority of postings are news on China's progress in everything like transport, trading, science, social lives, politics ..etc
> When you are friends of China, you will see China's development as your great opportunities
> When your are enemies, then heaps over heaps of sour grapes, self-pitying, endless vilification, slander, belitlement, bad-mouthing, malignity ... are drivelling from the China haters on the board
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Painting of 长江 Chang Jiang, oil on canvas




Amen. China haters indeed. 

The ungrateful neighbor needs to be spanked again.

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## TaiShang

jamahir said:


> such information will actually lead to another traffic jam.



You will never know unless you try.

***

After Huawei created a storm with its smart watch that dwarfed the later-launched and bulky and ugly apple watch, Xiaomi is speculated to develop its own.

*Will Xiaomi ever release a smartwatch?*

Mar 10, 2015

2015 is turning out to be a great year for Xiaomi, they have launched their flagship, Mi Note and also is now launching Redmi 2 in India and Indonesia(Soon in Indonesia). Right now almost every company has stepped into Android Wear including Huawei and Oppo. Xiaomi always focuses on Price to Performance ratio and they are pretty good at it. With the release of Apple watch some might be thinking that they can not even think of a smartwatch. Xiaomi is always in the market, they Launch products which are necessary and is required for a Normal Strata Person. Xiaomi also makes Premium devices keeping in mind Price to Performance ratio.




A Concept for Xiaomi Watch

After Huawei and Oppo smartwatch, we think it’s time for Xiaomi, The Android wear market has got a lot of choices but all have some great problems, majority of them can’t last more than 8 hours, and the one’s which can last does not fit well in the pocket. Xiaomi would be going to launch Mi5 in Q4 this year. If it also launches its Smartwatch then it would be a icing in top. Xiaomi already has it’s fitness band, Mi band, Mi band tracks steps and major the sleep. In a nutshel it takes care of the daily routine.

If Xiaomi releases its Smartwatch, it would be one of the best smartwatch, it would be running android wear, with a MIUI6 flavor in it at a very reasonable price.

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## jamahir

TaiShang said:


> You will never know unless you try.



well, in many cities the local fm radio stations are allowed to broadcast info about traffic jams... drivers who take advise from the fm stations and divert, in turn create more jams.


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## cirr

*Qihoo 360 to Build Smart Home System*

2015-03-12 09:20:06 

Xinhua/Shanghai Daily Web Editor: Luo





A Chinese Internet user browses the website of qihoo in Shaoyang city, central Chinas Hunan province, 16 November 2006. [Photo: Imagine China]


*Chinese Internet security firm Qihoo 360 has announced plans to invest more than 1.6 billion U.S. dollars to create a smart-home eco-system.*

The company is teaming up with home appliance vendors *Haier* and *AUX* to create a smart-home system through cameras and smart routers.

Smart-home technology allows home-owners to manage security and other home appliances through cloud-computing technology.

This will allow people to do things like turn on their lights, air conditioners and other home-appliances through their smart-phones.

It also lets people monitor their homes through video streams via their mobile devices.

Qihoo 360 to Build Smart Home System

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## Beast

VALKRYIE said:


> Are some people this close minded and ignorant...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Phạm Tuân (born February 14, 1947) is a retired Vietnam Air Force aviator. He became the first Vietnamese citizen and the first Asian in space when he flew aboard the Soyuz 37 mission as an Intercosmos Research Cosmonaut.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Launch of VINASAT 2



 trying to compare a vietnam space tourist to China using its own mean and rocket to send man to space as equal or superior? 

I pay some money and I can go to space too, right?

What is there to be proud of ?

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## xunzi

ComradeNam said:


> Samsung used to perceived as Iphone copycat. It takes them alot innovation to build its brand awareness today.
> 
> The word copy cat and inspired build on top of existing technology is different things. Windows copy UI designs from Mac. Now not anymore its considered copy cat from mac.
> 
> Xiao mi at this point is just copy cat of Iphone even in icons designs. Wonder why it cant launch in U.S.
> 
> After all one U.S copy of another U.S is not the point. The point is you chinese boasting like your xiaomi world greatest invention from china when in fact its just blame copy from U.S., nothing uniqued except its cheaper like everything come from china anyway.
> 
> Cheap is ok, copy is ok but boasting for cheap and copy cat stuff is look like crap. Almost every country can make smart phone nowday. What innovative xiao mi offer? A qualcom snap dragon or an android os?


You sound like a sour grape, RELAX FRIEND. LOL Boasting is not in our blood.

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## esolve

ComradeNam said:


> Samsung used to perceived as Iphone copycat. It takes them alot innovation to build its brand awareness today.
> 
> The word copy cat and inspired build on top of existing technology is different things. Windows copy UI designs from Mac. Now not anymore its considered copy cat from mac.
> 
> Xiao mi at this point is just copy cat of Iphone even in icons designs. Wonder why it cant launch in U.S.
> 
> After all one U.S copy of another U.S is not the point. The point is you chinese boasting like your xiaomi world greatest invention from china when in fact its just blame copy from U.S., nothing uniqued except its cheaper like everything come from china anyway.
> 
> Cheap is ok, copy is ok but boasting for cheap and copy cat stuff is look like crap. Almost every country can make smart phone nowday. What innovative xiao mi offer? A qualcom snap dragon or an android os?



ridiculous argument.
so Samsung did innovation?
then Huawei didn't?
Xiaomi didn't?

tell the difference between them, please!
Samsung is successful in marketing, that is because it started internationalization earlier, it is not because of innovation.

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## Misay

The Vietnamese think America is his dad.haha

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## TaiShang

Vietnamese are darn genius. They take pride in US and Japanese success.

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## cirr

Misay said:


> The Vietnamese think America is his dad.haha



More than that，some Vietnameses think that Americans ARE their granddads。



TaiShang said:


> Vietnamese are darn genius. They take pride in US and Japanese success.



These shameless people have lost their souls and behave like walking corpses。

They take pride in licking others‘ asses，asses of those who happaned to have butchered millions of Vienameses during WW II and the Vietnam War。

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## Martian2

VALKRYIE said:


> Are some people this close minded and ignorant...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Phạm Tuân (born February 14, 1947) is a retired Vietnam Air Force aviator. He became the first Vietnamese citizen and the first Asian in space when he flew aboard the Soyuz 37 mission as an Intercosmos Research Cosmonaut.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Launch of VINASAT 2


*A monkey hitched a ride into space before the Viet*

The Russians sent a monkey into space before the Viet. That doesn't make monkeys a technological space power, does it?

If the monkey isn't a space power, why does that make Vietnam a space power?

It only proves that Russia is a space power.

The Viet, like the monkey, merely hitched a ride on a Russian rocket.

In the end, Vietnam (like the monkey) is still primitive and lack any space technologies and capabilities.

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## CHN Bamboo

I can't understand those Vietnamese.
no more words

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## sinaloa

ComradeNam said:


> Sharing country achievment is nothing to talk about. But boasting is relevant to many chinese. What most common i hear from chinese is praise their local made stuffs like greatest invention and about to take over the world. See how chinese boast about their super computer superior than U.S . Please do me favor do more research before boasting.
> 
> I hear the same crap howe wonderful xiaomi compare with iphone and will over take iphone again and again in where there are chinese. Be humble little bit with that crap.


dear Nam, can your Dai Nam make it to space for just one more time without hitchhiking your soviet bff's Soyuz?
just curious.

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## ComradeNam

cirr said:


> There is absolutely no point in replying to people who still belong up the trees。
> 
> 
> 
> sinaloa said:
> 
> 
> 
> dear Nam, can your Dai Nam make it to space for just one more time without hitchhiking your soviet bff's Soyuz?
> just curious.
Click to expand...

See the point? This is typical Chinese bragging about their achievement. If some how, some day they did pass the U.S. and Japan, you will see load of Chinese on internet spamming similar posts "Yeh I am top of the world, you westerners decline, inferior...etc."

What funny these Chinese never think, when they compare Vietnam with China? One country with limited fund and one country with massive fund, tax of 1.3 billions people. What Vietnam lack of is fund. If I am Chinese I will be shame of my country of 1.3 billions people and tax but far behind Japan a country of 90 million, and U.S. 300 millions peopole.

See we Viet ever compare us with Cambodia? a country with 16 millions? No, we strike to be like Japan we compare ourself with Japan and see how lag us behind. We don't do monkey jump up and down on internet whenever something come out of country. Sure we might share our achievement but we don't do "monkey comparison" like many Chinese does, boasting, bragging, make it like world greatest invention and that so superior, other inferior. 

And here how we answer to your "greatest invention". That is only use by Chinese. So keep doing good job boasting. To this point all your tech are just copy cat and use widely by 1.3 billion Chinese, nothing break through yet.

For Chinese tech companies overseas, China is a toxic brand

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## Martian2

ComradeNam said:


> See the point? This is typical Chinese bragging about their achievement. If some how, some day they did pass the U.S. and Japan, you will see load of Chinese on internet spamming similar posts "Yeh I am top of the world, you westerners decline, inferior...etc."
> 
> What funny these Chinese never think, when they compare Vietnam with China? One country with limited fund and one country with massive fund, tax of 1.3 billions people. What Vietnam lack of is fund. If I am Chinese I will be shame of my country of 1.3 billions people and tax but far behind Japan a country of 90 million, and U.S. 300 millions peopole.
> 
> See we Viet ever compare us with Cambodia? a country with 16 millions? No, we strike to be like Japan we compare ourself with Japan and see how lag us behind. We don't do monkey jump up and down on internet whenever something come out of country. Sure we might share our achievement but we don't do "monkey comparison" like many Chinese does, boasting, bragging, make it like world greatest invention and that so superior, other inferior.
> 
> And here how we answer to your "greatest invention". That is only use by Chinese. So keep doing good job boasting. To this point all your tech are just copy cat and use widely by 1.3 billion Chinese, nothing break through yet.
> 
> For Chinese tech companies overseas, China is a toxic brand


Tell me, how many of China's technological milestones (see below) can Vietnam match? Since you Viets are living in the Stone Age, why should any Chinese here care about the opinion of a primitive Viet? You Viets are not a technological people. You Viets are merely a bunch of non-industrialized backward primitives with big mouths.
----------

*China's Military Technological Milestones - includes China's JY-26 counter-stealth radar*

210 B.C. (2,200 years ago): China invents chrome-plating technology during Qin Dynasty under emperor Qin Shihuang.

1964: China detonated a 22-kiloton atomic bomb on October 16, 1964.
1967: China detonated a 3.3-megaton thermonuclear bomb on June 17, 1967.

1970: China successfully sends its first satellite into space - the Dong Fang Hong I
1971: China successfully launched its first DF-5 ICBM with 12,000-15,000km range and capable of carrying a five-megaton "city buster" thermonuclear warhead.
1972: China builds its first atomic clock at Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (SHAO).

1984: China built its first cryogenic YF-73 rocket engine.
1986: China built an indigenous DD3 nickel-based single-crystal superalloy. (Earliest English article citation is year 1995. However, the first published Chinese research paper on DD3 discovery was in 1986.)
1988: China test-detonates a 1- to 20-kiloton Neutron Bomb on September 29, 1988.
1988: Julang 1 (JL-1) SLBM is fully operational with the successful test firing from a submerged Xia SSBN in September 1988.

1998: Chinese J-10 Vigorous Dragon had its first flight. Officially unveiled in 2007.
1998: "At the 1998 Zhuhai Air Show, the [Chinese] Seek Optics Company displayed information of its stealth coating and software for stealth shaping.[63]"
1999: Chinese JSTARS Tu-154M/D Electronic Intelligence Aircraft in service (e.g. Careless B-4138).

2000: China successfully sends its first GPS satellite (Beidou) into space.
2001: Chinese Type 99 Main Battle Tank in service.
2002: China's Type 093 Shang-class nuclear attack submarine (SSN) is launched.
2003: China sends its first taikonaut Yang Liwei into space.
2003: China's KJ-2000 AWACS with domestic AESA radar has its first flight.
2003*: DD6 is China's indigenous second-generation nickel-based single-crystal superalloy (Earliest English article citation is year 2003. However, actual DD6 discovery was probably closer to year 2000.)
2005: China's Type 052C Lanzhou-class AESA-equipped destroyer entered service.
2006: China's WS-10A turbofan engine certified for production.
2006: First static test of the WS-13 turbofan engine with single-crystal turbine blades.
2007: China clones world's first rabbit.
2007: Chinese direct-ascent ASAT shoots down orbiting satellite.
2007: Chinese DF-31A MIRVed ICBM in service.
2008: China conducts its first spacewalk with taikonaut Zhai Zhigang.
2008: China orbits its first data tracking and relay communications satellite - Tianlian I
2009: Public disclosure of China's 5,000km "Underground Great Wall"

2010: China builds world's-fastest supercomputer Tianhe-1A.
2010: Chinese GBI (i.e. ground based interceptor) shoots down a ballistic missile during mid-course phase.
2010: Chinese WZ-10 Attack Helicopter in service.
2010: Chinese Type 094 Jin-class nuclear missile ballistic submarine (SSBN) in service.
2010: Chinese Yaogan 9 NOSS (Naval Ocean Surveillance System) satellite trio in orbit.
2011: Chengdu J-20 stealth superfighter has first flight on January 11, 2011.
2012: China sends its first woman taikonaut Liu Yang into space on a 10-day mission.
2012: Chinese Jialong manned submersible completes world record-breaking 7,000 meter dive.
2012: First sighting of next-generation AESA radar for Type 052C destroyer.
2012: DF-41 10-MIRV-capable ICBM with 12,000-15,000km range had first flight on July 24, 2012.
2012: Chinese Type 056 corvette enters service.
2012: New Chinese thermonuclear-capable IRBM with 4,000km range (to potentially strike Guam).
2012: China's Beidou System successfully covers all of China and the surrounding region.
2012: Shenyang J-31 medium-range stealth fighter has first flight on October 31, 2012.
2012: China builds its first optical clock (which is more precise than an atomic clock).
2012: China's SOSUS became operational.
2013: China's Y-20 heavy-lift military transport conducts first flight on January 26, 2013.
2013: "The Chinese military has deployed its new anti-ship ballistic missile [ASBM or "carrier killer"] along its southern coast facing Taiwan, the Pentagon’s top military intelligence officer said today."
2013: "After a round of successful testing in 2012, the JL-2 appears ready to reach initial operational capability in 2013." (Source [p. 39, Pentagon 2013 report on Chinese Military Power])
2013: China has deployed H-6K "God of War" bomber that is capable of carrying thermonuclear-capable CJ-10 cruise missiles.
2013: Bill Gertz reports China is building 1,240 miles of special tracks for rail-mobile ICBMs.
2013: China deploys advanced SRBM with MARV (maneuverable reentry vehicle) thermonuclear-capable warhead
2013: China's "Lijian stealth UAV from Hongdu has made its first flight on Nov. 21 at 13:00 local time. The flight was 20 minutes."
2013: China's Yutu rover separates from Chang'e-3 Moon Lander on December 14, 2013.
2013: China's Z-20 military medium-lift 10-ton utility helicopter has its first flight on December 23, 2013
2014: China conducts its first HGV (hypersonic glide vehicle) flight on January 9, 2014.
2014: China conducts first flight test of its WS-20 large turbofan high-bypass engine.
2014: Deagel reports China's YJ-18 AEGIS KILLER has reached IOC (ie. initial operational capability) and it is currently an exclusive offensive weapon on the Chinese Type 052D destroyer
*2014: China unveils the JY-26 counter-stealth radar at the Zhuhai Airshow. UK radar-expert John Wise says the JY-26 round radomes could be designed to take advantage of circular polarization.* (Source: China's Anti-Stealth Radar Comes to Fruition | Defense News | defensenews.com )

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## cirr

*Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 940 And Kirin 950 SoC Specifications Surface *

Published on March 12, 2015 by Kristijan Lucic





Huawei has been all over the news lately, not only did they announce their first Android Wear-powered smartwatch at MWC in Barcelona, but this company is also rumored as the possible manufacturer of the next *Nexus* device. Anyhow, Huawei is one of those smartphone manufacturers who also manufacture their own processors. Huawei’s SoCs aren’t nearly as well-known as Qualcomm’s, Samsung’s or MediaTek’s chips, but this China-based company is making really solid mobile SoCs.

That being said, some info surfaced regarding Huawei’s upcoming chips for 2015. Huwaei’s HiSilicon Kirin 930 octa-core chip is currently powering on the company’s flagships, and this leak brings us some info regarding the upcoming Kirin 940 and 950 chips. The Kirin 940 SoC is expected to arrive in Q3 2015, while the Kirin 950 will follow in the fourth quarter this year. Both of these chips are octa-core processors (quad-core Cortex A53 + quad-core Cortex A72), their clock rates are different though. Both of these chips come with support for a dual-channel LPDDR4 RAM (25.6GB/s) memory, will support 4K video encoding and will come with Tensicilica HiFi 4 DSP. As far as sensor hubs go, both of these chips will come with i7 co-processor (sensor hub + connectivity + security). The Kirin 940 will ship with ARM’s Mali T860 GPU, while the higher-end, Kirin 950, will come with ARM’s Mali T880 GPU. Dual-SIM category 7 LTE connectivity will be supported by the Kirin 940, while the Kirin 950 will come with support for dual-SIM cat.10 LTE connectivity.

There are plenty more information provided in the table down below, this is kind of an extensive leak, and the information seems quite credible. Huawei means business this year, the company is expected to launch a bunch of devices this year, starting with Huawei P8 which will arrive next month. We probably won’t see these two chips power on any of Huawei’s devices this year, but you can expect Kirin 940 and Kirin 950-powered Huawei-branded handset to launch in early 2015. That’s just a guess though, we’ll see. Let us know what are your thoughts here, are you looking forward to the announcement of any specific Huawei smartphone this year?





Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 940 And Kirin 950 SoC Specifications Surface | Androidheadlines.com

*Nexus 6 Successor Likely To Utilise Huawei Kirin 930 Processor, Says Chinese Source*

By Pavithra Rathinavel on March 11 2015 1:09 PM

Earlier rumours pointed out that Google has struck a deal with Huawei for the unnamed Nexus 6 successor. However, there was no information provided on what kind of partnership would that be. But now, a fresh report from a Chinese source states that the upcoming Nexus smartphone will be powered by Huawei’s own processor.

According to Gizmo China, the next Nexus smartphone will reportedly be powered by Huawei Kirin 930 processor. It is worth noting that, the Kirin 930 is the processor powering the Huawei Mediapad X2 smartphone. And it is not surprising because a vast majority of the Huawei handsets apparently house the company-built processors. In any case, housing a Huawei processor in Google Nexus line-up is quite a new story.

But why would Google agree to a Huawei processor in the upcoming Nexus smartphone? The Hisilicon-built Huawei Kirin 930 processor has reportedly elevated itself over a period of time and it is in a position to take the market leaders like Qualcomm (Snapdragon SoC), Samsung (Exynos SoC) and Mediatek. For those uninitiated, HiSilicon is the semiconductor company based out of Shenzhen, China, which is fully owned by Huawei. And moreover, Hisilicon was reportedly founded in 2004 and has generated more than $1.4 billion in revenues specific to 2013. Plus, this company is ranked as number one among IC design companies in China, notes Gizmo China.

Also it is worth noting that, the latest Hisilicon Kirin 930 is apparently a very advanced processor. Technically speaking, it is reportedly built on the smaller 16 nm process, which is relatively better than the 20 nm process employed by the latest and powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 SoC. To top it off, the Hisilicon Kirin 930 is a 64-bit, octa-core processor that runs at 2.0 GHz and importantly, this SoC is based on ARM’s big.LITTLE architecture, known to save power in mobile devices. Adding a cherry on top, this killer processor is reportedly wired to support up to 32 MP camera sensors.

Furthermore, *Huawei/Hisilicon is reportedly gearing up to sell chips to OEMs and other companies in order to improve the market share（about time，about time）*. It is not surprising that the best way to get prominent is to provide chip for the upcoming Nexus smartphone, notes the same site. In any case, readers should note that, Google and Huawei have not confirmed the Nexus 6 successor related information thus far.

Nexus 6 Successor Likely To Utilise Huawei Kirin 930 Processor, Says Chinese Source

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## Keel

@ComradeNam
*
Toxic brands?
In your face, troll!*

Huawei Technologies sells more overseas than in China in 2005 | Macauhub English
Huawei's smartphones shipments rise on international sales | PCWorld
Huawei this year to sell 100 million mobile phones in overseas markets will contribute Liu Cheng - Technology News

Xiaomi Sells 100K Phones in First Overseas Flash Sale
China's Xiaomi sells 10,000 phones in 10 minutes in first overseas flash sale

How Lenovo Built a Chinese Tech Giant - WSJ
Chinese industry: From guard shack to global giant | The Economist
Huawei, ZTE and Lenovo Moved Into The Top 5 Global Smartphone Vendors In Q4, Says Canalys | TechCrunch
China's smartphone makers catching up with western rivals | Business | The Guardian

China Food and Drug Regulatory Information Network
Chinese seek greater share of satellite market|Top Stories|chinadaily.com.cn
Thailand first overseas client of China's 'GPS' system | ZDNet
China launches CBERS-4 satellite on Long March rockets' 200th mission - China - Chinadaily.com.cn
Nuclear company signs landmark technology agreement with Argentina|Companies|chinadaily.com.cn
UK government paves way for Chinese nuclear plant
Next Big Future: China wants to export nuclear power plants to Brazil, UK, South Africa and other countries
Airshow - China to Export 20 Y-12 Aircraft to the U.S.
Chinese developer buys two London tower developments | Online News | Building
China in joint deal to build Piraeus container terminal - FT.com
U.S. Bridges, Roads Being Built by Chinese Firms Video - ABC News
New San Francisco bridge built in China to be shipped to US - Telegraph

*




*
Fineset Chinese porcelain tea set

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## xunzi

cirr said:


> *Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 940 And Kirin 950 SoC Specifications Surface *
> 
> Published on March 12, 2015 by Kristijan Lucic
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Huawei has been all over the news lately, not only did they announce their first Android Wear-powered smartwatch at MWC in Barcelona, but this company is also rumored as the possible manufacturer of the next *Nexus* device. Anyhow, Huawei is one of those smartphone manufacturers who also manufacture their own processors. Huawei’s SoCs aren’t nearly as well-known as Qualcomm’s, Samsung’s or MediaTek’s chips, but this China-based company is making really solid mobile SoCs.
> 
> That being said, some info surfaced regarding Huawei’s upcoming chips for 2015. Huwaei’s HiSilicon Kirin 930 octa-core chip is currently powering on the company’s flagships, and this leak brings us some info regarding the upcoming Kirin 940 and 950 chips. The Kirin 940 SoC is expected to arrive in Q3 2015, while the Kirin 950 will follow in the fourth quarter this year. Both of these chips are octa-core processors (quad-core Cortex A53 + quad-core Cortex A72), their clock rates are different though. Both of these chips come with support for a dual-channel LPDDR4 RAM (25.6GB/s) memory, will support 4K video encoding and will come with Tensicilica HiFi 4 DSP. As far as sensor hubs go, both of these chips will come with i7 co-processor (sensor hub + connectivity + security). The Kirin 940 will ship with ARM’s Mali T860 GPU, while the higher-end, Kirin 950, will come with ARM’s Mali T880 GPU. Dual-SIM category 7 LTE connectivity will be supported by the Kirin 940, while the Kirin 950 will come with support for dual-SIM cat.10 LTE connectivity.
> 
> There are plenty more information provided in the table down below, this is kind of an extensive leak, and the information seems quite credible. Huawei means business this year, the company is expected to launch a bunch of devices this year, starting with Huawei P8 which will arrive next month. We probably won’t see these two chips power on any of Huawei’s devices this year, but you can expect Kirin 940 and Kirin 950-powered Huawei-branded handset to launch in early 2015. That’s just a guess though, we’ll see. Let us know what are your thoughts here, are you looking forward to the announcement of any specific Huawei smartphone this year?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 940 And Kirin 950 SoC Specifications Surface | Androidheadlines.com
> 
> *Nexus 6 Successor Likely To Utilise Huawei Kirin 930 Processor, Says Chinese Source*
> 
> By Pavithra Rathinavel on March 11 2015 1:09 PM
> 
> Earlier rumours pointed out that Google has struck a deal with Huawei for the unnamed Nexus 6 successor. However, there was no information provided on what kind of partnership would that be. But now, a fresh report from a Chinese source states that the upcoming Nexus smartphone will be powered by Huawei’s own processor.
> 
> According to Gizmo China, the next Nexus smartphone will reportedly be powered by Huawei Kirin 930 processor. It is worth noting that, the Kirin 930 is the processor powering the Huawei Mediapad X2 smartphone. And it is not surprising because a vast majority of the Huawei handsets apparently house the company-built processors. In any case, housing a Huawei processor in Google Nexus line-up is quite a new story.
> 
> But why would Google agree to a Huawei processor in the upcoming Nexus smartphone? The Hisilicon-built Huawei Kirin 930 processor has reportedly elevated itself over a period of time and it is in a position to take the market leaders like Qualcomm (Snapdragon SoC), Samsung (Exynos SoC) and Mediatek. For those uninitiated, HiSilicon is the semiconductor company based out of Shenzhen, China, which is fully owned by Huawei. And moreover, Hisilicon was reportedly founded in 2004 and has generated more than $1.4 billion in revenues specific to 2013. Plus, this company is ranked as number one among IC design companies in China, notes Gizmo China.
> 
> Also it is worth noting that, the latest Hisilicon Kirin 930 is apparently a very advanced processor. Technically speaking, it is reportedly built on the smaller 16 nm process, which is relatively better than the 20 nm process employed by the latest and powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 SoC. To top it off, the Hisilicon Kirin 930 is a 64-bit, octa-core processor that runs at 2.0 GHz and importantly, this SoC is based on ARM’s big.LITTLE architecture, known to save power in mobile devices. Adding a cherry on top, this killer processor is reportedly wired to support up to 32 MP camera sensors.
> 
> Furthermore, *Huawei/Hisilicon is reportedly gearing up to sell chips to OEMs and other companies in order to improve the market share（about time，about time）*. It is not surprising that the best way to get prominent is to provide chip for the upcoming Nexus smartphone, notes the same site. In any case, readers should note that, Google and Huawei have not confirmed the Nexus 6 successor related information thus far.
> 
> Nexus 6 Successor Likely To Utilise Huawei Kirin 930 Processor, Says Chinese Source


If this is true, I'm buying Nexus. Google pure Android with Kirin 930, SWEETTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT!

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## rott

Misay said:


> The Vietnamese think America is his dad.haha


They don't think, they "know" America is their daddy. 



xunzi said:


> If this is true, I'm buying Nexus. Google pure Android with Kirin 930, SWEETTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT!


You could simply buy a Huawei phone instead. Lol

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## xunzi

rott said:


> They don't think, they "know" America is their daddy.
> 
> 
> You could simply buy a Huawei phone instead. Lol


If Huawei provided pure android, then that would be perfect. Right now, only Google offer pure Android experience.


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## rott

Huawei phones are really built like a tank. My old phone ascend mate is given to my 5 year old and she throws it around like a toy and still the phone works like a charm. The only Gripe I have is their gpu. It's pretty slow in gaming. Hope Huawei fixes the issue ASAP.



xunzi said:


> If Huawei provided pure android, then that would be perfect. Right now, only Google offer pure Android experience.


Oh okay, you're looking for stock android. Thought you were talking about Huawei's processor.

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## TaiShang

Keel said:


> @ComradeNam
> *
> Toxic brands?
> In your face, troll!*
> 
> Huawei Technologies sells more overseas than in China in 2005 | Macauhub English
> Huawei's smartphones shipments rise on international sales | PCWorld
> Huawei this year to sell 100 million mobile phones in overseas markets will contribute Liu Cheng - Technology News
> 
> Xiaomi Sells 100K Phones in First Overseas Flash Sale
> China's Xiaomi sells 10,000 phones in 10 minutes in first overseas flash sale
> 
> How Lenovo Built a Chinese Tech Giant - WSJ
> Chinese industry: From guard shack to global giant | The Economist
> Huawei, ZTE and Lenovo Moved Into The Top 5 Global Smartphone Vendors In Q4, Says Canalys | TechCrunch
> China's smartphone makers catching up with western rivals | Business | The Guardian
> 
> China Food and Drug Regulatory Information Network
> Chinese seek greater share of satellite market|Top Stories|chinadaily.com.cn
> Thailand first overseas client of China's 'GPS' system | ZDNet
> China launches CBERS-4 satellite on Long March rockets' 200th mission - China - Chinadaily.com.cn
> Nuclear company signs landmark technology agreement with Argentina|Companies|chinadaily.com.cn
> UK government paves way for Chinese nuclear plant
> Next Big Future: China wants to export nuclear power plants to Brazil, UK, South Africa and other countries
> Airshow - China to Export 20 Y-12 Aircraft to the U.S.
> Chinese developer buys two London tower developments | Online News | Building
> China in joint deal to build Piraeus container terminal - FT.com
> U.S. Bridges, Roads Being Built by Chinese Firms Video - ABC News
> New San Francisco bridge built in China to be shipped to US - Telegraph
> 
> *
> 
> 
> 
> *
> Fineset Chinese porcelain tea set



That was brutal, bro.

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## esolve

ComradeNam said:


> See the point? This is typical Chinese bragging about their achievement. If some how, some day they did pass the U.S. and Japan, you will see load of Chinese on internet spamming similar posts "Yeh I am top of the world, you westerners decline, inferior...etc."
> 
> What funny these Chinese never think, when they compare Vietnam with China? One country with limited fund and one country with massive fund, tax of 1.3 billions people. What Vietnam lack of is fund. If I am Chinese I will be shame of my country of 1.3 billions people and tax but far behind Japan a country of 90 million, and U.S. 300 millions peopole.
> 
> See we Viet ever compare us with Cambodia? a country with 16 millions? No, we strike to be like Japan we compare ourself with Japan and see how lag us behind. We don't do monkey jump up and down on internet whenever something come out of country. Sure we might share our achievement but we don't do "monkey comparison" like many Chinese does, boasting, bragging, make it like world greatest invention and that so superior, other inferior.
> 
> And here how we answer to your "greatest invention". That is only use by Chinese. So keep doing good job boasting. To this point all your tech are just copy cat and use widely by 1.3 billion Chinese, nothing break through yet.
> 
> For Chinese tech companies overseas, China is a toxic brand




we are comparing India with vietnam, not China with vietnam
where do you get the illusion that we compare with you?
vietnam should be ashamed that China is 14 times population of vietnam while our GDP per capita is nearly 4 times that of yours

BTW, YOU STILL DIDN'T ANSWER ME
so Samsung did innovation?
then Huawei didn't?
Xiaomi didn't?

tell the difference between them, please!
Samsung is successful in marketing, that is because it started internationalization earlier, it is not because of innovation.

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## Keel

TaiShang said:


> That was brutal, bro.



Well just to eradicate the systemic China-bashing and baseless accusations of the haters if I can
Nothing personal





Oil on canvas painting 长江 Chang Jiang
Painter：孙洪书 Sun Hongshu

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## sinaloa

ComradeNam said:


> See the point? This is typical Chinese bragging about their achievement. If some how, some day they did pass the U.S. and Japan, you will see load of Chinese on internet spamming similar posts "Yeh I am top of the world, you westerners decline, inferior...etc."
> 
> What funny these Chinese never think, when they compare Vietnam with China? One country with limited fund and one country with massive fund, tax of 1.3 billions people. What Vietnam lack of is fund. If I am Chinese I will be shame of my country of 1.3 billions people and tax but far behind Japan a country of 90 million, and U.S. 300 millions peopole.
> 
> See we Viet ever compare us with Cambodia? a country with 16 millions? No, we strike to be like Japan we compare ourself with Japan and see how lag us behind. We don't do monkey jump up and down on internet whenever something come out of country. Sure we might share our achievement but we don't do "monkey comparison" like many Chinese does, boasting, bragging, make it like world greatest invention and that so superior, other inferior.
> 
> And here how we answer to your "greatest invention". That is only use by Chinese. So keep doing good job boasting. To this point all your tech are just copy cat and use widely by 1.3 billion Chinese, nothing break through yet.
> 
> For Chinese tech companies overseas, China is a toxic brand



too bad dear Nam dismissed my genuine curiosity. 
I'd really love to see Dai Nam and its Nams who're well known for their creativity, other than talking down to neighbors and indulging in peeves, try a little bit harder to being creative and honest. Making solid plans and get things done, better yet, launching more Nam-made satellites and astro-Nams into orbit, you know, some real triumphs that you can bragging about, and earned you Dai Nam a welcome acknowledgment from Nihon and Murica that Dai Nam is no longer just a pawn in their proxy games but a player of their own rank.
Until then, I think it’s better for you Dai Nam Nams to look up to your neighbors and learn from them, and of course, you Nams are always welcome to compare and project yourselves to your capitalist bffs as you like, as if the only prerequisite for becoming top dog was making comparison and projection.

While we’re still on the IT topic, and for your info in case our trivial breakthrough escapes our well informed China specialist Nam, Yes, XiaoMi might has been accused for being an copycat but check this out.

*“World’s first batch of mass-produced graphene mobile phones debuts in Chongqing”*
please just google it cause I still can't post any links. 

See the point? We don’t have to go all the way to rocket science and quantum communications to point out that there’s still some innovations and original ideas pop up in your neighbourhood.

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## ComradeNam

Whatever


esolve said:


> we are comparing India with vietnam, not China with vietnam
> where do you get the illusion that we compare with you?
> vietnam should be ashamed that China is 14 times population of vietnam while our GDP per capita is nearly 4 times that of yours
> 
> 
> Xiaomi didn't?
> 
> tell the difference between them, please!
> Samsung is successful in marketing, that is because it started internationalization earlier, it is not because of innovation.


What Xiao Mi innovation? Snap Dragon? or Android OS? Your Xiao Mi copied a lot from Iphone you know that right? What famoust Xiao Mi outside of China? True Xiao Mi can out sale Samsung and Iphone but with low cost and within China domain. In other word, Xiao Mi is not considered as high end phone instead it is considered as cheap copy cat from Iphone and sale well in China since it is localize to Chinese anyway.

Perhaps you should look outside of your Chinese media to see how others see your Xiao Mi. Let not disappointing you, none of your phone success in Vietnam, don't bother talk about Japan or U.S. or Korea. They see your Xiao Mi as crap. Only popular among Chiense.

Instead of reading from Chinese media and think that the world is worship your Xiao Mi. You may look at out side which more important.

Cult of Android - Apple copycat doesn't like being copied

Cult of Android - 7 things copycat Xioami blatantly ripped off from Apple

Xiaomi faces copycat charge from Japanese company over new air purifier | PCWorld

China's Xiaomi unveils copycat 'Mi Pad' in bid to take on Apple's iPad

I can pull of hundred similar article. Is that you Chinese being proud of ? being called a clone and copy cat  see how western think of your superior Xiao Mi gonna take over the world.

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## esolve

ComradeNam said:


> Whatever
> 
> What Xiao Mi innovation? Snap Dragon? or Android OS? Your Xiao Mi copied a lot from Iphone you know that right? What famoust Xiao Mi outside of China? True Xiao Mi can out sale Samsung and Iphone but with low cost and within China domain. In other word, Xiao Mi is not considered as high end phone instead it is considered as cheap copy cat from Iphone and sale well in China since it is localize to Chinese anyway.
> 
> Perhaps you should look outside of your Chinese media to see how others see your Xiao Mi. Let not disappointing you, none of your phone success in Vietnam, don't bother talk about Japan or U.S. or Korea. They see your Xiao Mi as crap. Only popular among Chiense.
> 
> Instead of reading from Chinese media and think that the world is worship your Xiao Mi. You may look at out side which more important.
> 
> Cult of Android - Apple copycat doesn't like being copied
> 
> Cult of Android - 7 things copycat Xioami blatantly ripped off from Apple
> 
> Xiaomi faces copycat charge from Japanese company over new air purifier | PCWorld
> 
> China's Xiaomi unveils copycat 'Mi Pad' in bid to take on Apple's iPad
> 
> I can pull of hundred similar article. Is that you Chinese being proud of ? being called a clone and copy cat  see how western think of your superior Xiao Mi gonna take over the world.



you are so ridiculous.

we are talking about innovation, why do you change to the marketing issue? Price is due to brand-building, samsung has a long history, and thus has a sound brand. But here, we are talking about innovation. It is you who started the innovation/technology topic, why turn to marketing?

I ask you again: what are the differences between Oppo/Xiaomi/Huawei and Samsung in terms of innovation?
China of course have high-end products, Huawei's telecom infrastructure equipments are high-end now, DJI drone is also high-end.

Our CSR company also unveiled world's first 100% supercapacitor-powered low-floor tram.

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## ComradeNam

esolve said:


> you are so ridiculous.
> 
> we are talking about innovation, why do you change to the marketing issue? Price is due to brand-building, samsung has a long history, and thus has a sound brand. But here, we are talking about innovation. It is you who started the innovation/technology topic, why turn to marketing?
> 
> I ask you again: what are the differences between Oppo/Xiaomi/Huawei and Samsung in terms of innovation?
> China of course have high-end products, Huawei's telecom infrastructure equipments are high-end now, DJI drone is also high-end.
> 
> Our CSR company also unveiled world's first 100% supercapacitor-powered low-floor tram.


What innovation Xiao Mia bring to the table? You mean the service? The service do help boost sale but it is not considered as technology innovation. Apple has their own unique sale strategy as well, such as apple stores...etc. did your Xiao Mi copied apple store on top of cheap sale service. That is NOT technology innovation.

Eventually you will come with innovation sometime in the future, but for now your Xiao Mi is nothing but perceived as copycat in western. Or I would say, the Chinese brands perceived as Toxic brand in Westerns and developed countries.

It is funny when see your Chinese bragging about it. It has always been Chinese mark itself as world laughing stocks.

And for your technology invention, before boasting, do more research. Better inventions out there under development from U.S. has not heard yet. Until your invention reached the mass then that may be talk.

In case you dont know, Japan success developed fuel cell cars which will be a changing automobile industry, and will be release this year 2015. Other invention is sun electric without wire.

Your invention is nothing break through but rather built on top of existing one. For the developed countries are not something they are interested.

Speaking about invention, innovations, every country has their own, but which one reach the mass does matter otherwise it is worthless.

Vietnamese invented too.
The world’s best-known inventions of Vietnamese people - News VietNamNet

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## opruh

ComradeNam said:


> See the point? This is typical Chinese bragging about their achievement. If some how, some day they did pass the U.S. and Japan, you will see load of Chinese on internet spamming similar posts "Yeh I am top of the world, you westerners decline, inferior...etc."
> 
> What funny these Chinese never think, when they compare Vietnam with China? One country with limited fund and one country with massive fund, tax of 1.3 billions people. What Vietnam lack of is fund. If I am Chinese I will be shame of my country of 1.3 billions people and tax but far behind Japan a country of 90 million, and U.S. 300 millions peopole.
> 
> See we Viet ever compare us with Cambodia? a country with 16 millions? No, we strike to be like Japan we compare ourself with Japan and see how lag us behind. We don't do monkey jump up and down on internet whenever something come out of country. Sure we might share our achievement but we don't do "monkey comparison" like many Chinese does, boasting, bragging, make it like world greatest invention and that so superior, other inferior.
> 
> And here how we answer to your "greatest invention". That is only use by Chinese. So keep doing good job boasting. To this point all your tech are just copy cat and use widely by 1.3 billion Chinese, nothing break through yet.
> 
> For Chinese tech companies overseas, China is a toxic brand


Vietnam is just not capable of having an achievement.
It's not China's fault that Vietnam can't brag at least a single thing.

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## sinaloa

ComradeNam said:


> What innovation Xiao Mia bring to the table? You mean the service? The service do help boost sale but it is not considered as technology innovation. Apple has their own unique sale strategy as well, such as apple stores...etc. did your Xiao Mi copied apple store on top of cheap sale service. That is NOT technology innovation.
> 
> Eventually you will come with innovation sometime in the future, but for now your Xiao Mi is nothing but perceived as copycat in western. Or I would say, the Chinese brands perceived as Toxic brand in Westerns and developed countries.
> 
> It is funny when see your Chinese bragging about it. It has always been Chinese mark itself as world laughing stocks.
> 
> And for your technology invention, before boasting, do more research. Better inventions out there under development from U.S. has not heard yet. Until your invention reached the mass then that may be talk.
> 
> In case you dont know, Japan success developed fuel cell cars which will be a changing automobile industry, and will be release this year 2015. Other invention is sun electric without wire.
> 
> Your invention is nothing break through but rather built on top of existing one. For the developed countries are not something they are interested.
> 
> Speaking about invention, innovations, every country has their own, but which one reach the mass does matter otherwise it is worthless.
> 
> Vietnamese invented too.
> The world’s best-known inventions of Vietnamese people - News VietNamNet



maybe our comrade Nam can be a good salesNam and introduce us some world's major electronics makers from Dai Nam, preferably registered with pure and exotic Dai Nam brand, and enlighten us about Nams' inspiring innovations, that "Do Duc Cuon father of ATM" story doesn't count cause I always do my homework when it comes to your Dai Nam boasting.

oh and thanks for bringing "reach the mass" cause talking about popularity (and perhaps importance) of inventions, Joseph Needham made a good point in his works years ago. dear comradeNam can also be a good investigatorNam and see if his argument is right.

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## TaiShang

*World's first batch of mass-produced graphene mobile phones debuts in Chongqing*

*2015-03-04 09:49:31 *







On March 2nd, in the Chongqing Wudu Hotel, staff was spotted displaying one of the world's first batch of mass-produced graphene mobile phones as well as its flexible graphene touch screen.






The world's first batch of mass-produced graphene mobile phones.

CHONGQING (CQNEWS) -- On March 2nd, Chongqing Mexi Technology Co. Ltd and Shenzhen Jialepai Technology Co. Ltd jointly released 30,000 sets of the world's first batch of graphene mobile phones in Chongqing, whilst its core technology were jointly developed by the Chongqing Institute of Green and Intelligent Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology & Engineering of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

With its 5.5-inch display screen, the graphene product may seem indifferent from a traditional smart phone. However, since it adopts graphene as its main component, or otherwise known as the "thinnest and lightest nano material in the world", it will not only convene better touch performance but also display a longer stand-by time as well as additional improvements to it’s heat-conducting functions.

As of now, the 4G graphene smart phones are readily made available by reservation only on the public "Galaxy Digital" We-Chat e-platform at the newly released price of 2,499 yuan. (Translated by Tang Zhiqiang, Fathom Language Limited)

***

*China's Silicon Valley sparking 49 tech startups a day*
BLOOMBERG NEWS

Published Wednesday, Mar. 11 2015, 8:52 AM EDT

China’s answer to Silicon Valley is experiencing a surge in new technology companies as the world’s most populous nation reduces its reliance on manufacturing.

Beijing’s Zhongguancun district birthed 49 startups daily last year as innovation takes root in the country, Wan Gang, the nation’s minister of science and technology, said Wednesday at a briefing for the National People’s Congress in Beijing. China now has more than 1,600 technology incubators, Wan said.

Zhongguancun is home to a raft of established Chinese technology companies, from PC maker Lenovo Group Ltd. to search engine operator Baidu Inc. Xiaomi Corp., the nation’s biggest smartphone vendor, was established in the district five years ago and has reached a valuation of $45-billion to become the world’s most valuable startup.

“As innovation and entrepreneurship gain popularity, many high tech, small-and-medium-sized enterprises and micro enterprises are writing the wonderful story of Chinese innovation,” Wan said. “Entrepreneurship has gradually become the spark that started a prairie fire.”

The country now has more than 1,000 organizations investing in startups with capital exceeding 350 billion yuan ($56-billion), Wan said.

*Along with the new companies, China is also experiencing a surge in technological innovation. The country had more than 660,000 effective invention patents last year, up 12 per cent from a year earlier, Wan said. *

Xiaomi has already backed 27 startups and plans to fund as many as 100 new companies, Chief Executive Officer Lei Jun said March 6.

New Disruption The investments are designed to help Xiaomi expand from smartphones and tablet computers into smart home products from cameras to security systems and air purifiers, Lei said.

Traditional businesses in China are ripe for disruption by innovative startups, Baidu’s Chief Executive Officer Robin Li said in a briefing earlier Wednesday. Internet finance is a “very hot” area for development, as services including banking, insurance and consumer credit can all be improved online, Li said.

“The market economy in China is only a few decades old so it is not very mature and not particularly efficient,” Li said. “Using the Internet to do it all over again, we can see that there are many chances.”

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## esolve

ComradeNam said:


> What innovation Xiao Mia bring to the table? You mean the service? The service do help boost sale but it is not considered as technology innovation. Apple has their own unique sale strategy as well, such as apple stores...etc. did your Xiao Mi copied apple store on top of cheap sale service. That is NOT technology innovation.
> 
> Eventually you will come with innovation sometime in the future, but for now your Xiao Mi is nothing but perceived as copycat in western. Or I would say, the Chinese brands perceived as Toxic brand in Westerns and developed countries.
> 
> It is funny when see your Chinese bragging about it. It has always been Chinese mark itself as world laughing stocks.
> 
> And for your technology invention, before boasting, do more research. Better inventions out there under development from U.S. has not heard yet. Until your invention reached the mass then that may be talk.
> 
> In case you dont know, Japan success developed fuel cell cars which will be a changing automobile industry, and will be release this year 2015. Other invention is sun electric without wire.
> 
> Your invention is nothing break through but rather built on top of existing one. For the developed countries are not something they are interested.
> 
> Speaking about invention, innovations, every country has their own, but which one reach the mass does matter otherwise it is worthless.
> 
> Vietnamese invented too.
> The world’s best-known inventions of Vietnamese people - News VietNamNet




let me repeat again, what innovation/technologies do Samsung smartphones provide, compared to Huawei/Xiaomi? if you think huawei/xiaomi are copycat, then is samsung copycat? why do you always avoid this question?
and why China's DJI drone is so popular all over the world although it is expensive?

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## esolve

ComradeNam said:


> What innovation Xiao Mia bring to the table? You mean the service? The service do help boost sale but it is not considered as technology innovation. Apple has their own unique sale strategy as well, such as apple stores...etc. did your Xiao Mi copied apple store on top of cheap sale service. That is NOT technology innovation.
> 
> Eventually you will come with innovation sometime in the future, but for now your Xiao Mi is nothing but perceived as copycat in western. Or I would say, the Chinese brands perceived as Toxic brand in Westerns and developed countries.
> 
> It is funny when see your Chinese bragging about it. It has always been Chinese mark itself as world laughing stocks.
> 
> And for your technology invention, before boasting, do more research. Better inventions out there under development from U.S. has not heard yet. Until your invention reached the mass then that may be talk.
> 
> In case you dont know, Japan success developed fuel cell cars which will be a changing automobile industry, and will be release this year 2015. Other invention is sun electric without wire.
> 
> Your invention is nothing break through but rather built on top of existing one. For the developed countries are not something they are interested.
> 
> Speaking about invention, innovations, every country has their own, but which one reach the mass does matter otherwise it is worthless.
> 
> Vietnamese invented too.
> The world’s best-known inventions of Vietnamese people - News VietNamNet




let me repeat again, what innovation/technologies do Samsung smartphones provide, compared to Huawei/Xiaomi? if you think huawei/xiaomi are copycat, then is samsung copycat? why do you always avoid this question?
and why China's DJI drone is so popular all over the world although it is expensive?

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## TaiShang

**

*DJI Phantom FC40: World’s Best-Rated Drone Cam With Wi-Fi*

There’s something spectacular about drones and drone cams. And with a cool drone like the DJI Phantom FC40, we’re looking at some really awesome videography from the skies. DJI Phantom FC40 is a HD drone cam that you can use to record spectacular videos of baseball games, fireworks, or just routine landscape seen from a very different angle.

We’re writing this today because you can grab the DJI Phantom FC40 for just $499. You can even get an additional $35 discount with the code *PHANTOM35*. Here’s more about this fabulous drone.






The DJI Phantom features the HD FC40 cam. It can do 720p videos at 30fps – which clearly results in high-def videos of whatever stuff you’re recording. That’s not all though. You can replace this with any other cam setup you’ve got (including GoPro).

*More features:*


4G Wi-Fi gives a live relay of what the camera is seeing on your iPhone/Android smartphone. (free app)
700mAh Li-ion battery: up to 15 minutes of flying time
auto-hover feature makes sure the drone doesn’t drop once you let go of the controls. It’s a “soft” lander.
Live relay up to 100meters
8G remote control transmitter
Vibration dampeners to stabilize the camera unit

DJI’s products are usually made of high-grade material and the drone is no different. The drone is made for instant flight: you can grab it and get started “asap”. Powerful rotors give you a very stable control over the drone.


What’s not very impressive but understandable due to the limitations is that you can’t independently control the camera’s viewing angle. To shift the camera’s angle, you have to move the drone.

The DJI Phantom FC40 sells for $649 but on iGB deals, you can grab this for just $499. If you order now and use the code *PHANTOM35* on the checkout page, you can get an additional $35 off (that brings it to a total of $464). And shipping within the continental US is free so that’s about all you pay.

For a drone that’s rated world’s #1, not bad I’d say!



esolve said:


> let me repeat again, what innovation/technologies do Samsung smartphones provide, compared to Huawei/Xiaomi? if you think huawei/xiaomi are copycat, then is samsung copycat? why do you always avoid this question?
> and why China's DJI drone is so popular all over the world although it is expensive?



I guess our Communist Comrade got banned.


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## Kyle Sun

ComradeNam said:


> I think you Chinese need to do more research before boasting your achievment. What are you doing, the U.S is way ahead. Take super computer for example, while you chinese can only increase the processing speed, the U.S is way ahead developing computer with human cpability. Do search for IBM watson and true north.
> 
> Everything you Chinese do up till now is not really evolution rather than copy the existing technology and modified to fit your needs. Xiao mi or Alibab all are just copy idea from apple, samsung and ebay.
> 
> While many of you chinese make it like the world are paying attention. But not really. The Japan sucessed developed fuel cell car which will change the industry, and industry robot like Asimo like human. The U.S is developed war robot called petman, and laser weapon already.


I am not TOP1 ,so I can not talk about my achievement or progress ? 
Your wired logic.


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## cirr

*China develops downtime tool called the Great Cannon*

by Dave Neal

14 Apr 2015






Security researchers have warned that the Chinese government has enhanced its 'Great Firewall' powers with a precisely targeted downtime tool called the Great Cannon.

A report on the Great Cannon by researchers at the University of Toronto said that it is linked to the Chinese government firewall and can be used to disrupt websites and services.

The report has tracked the tool to recent attacks on GitHub, Greatfire.org and _The New York Times_.

The researchers dispute suggestions that the Great Firewall of China was used in the attacks and that the method employed was the injection of bad JavaScript in Baidu sessions. Rather, they say, the cannon was used to 'blast away' traffic in motion.

"While the attack infrastructure is co-located with the Great Firewall, the attack was carried out by a separate offensive system, with different capabilities and design, that we term the ‘Great Cannon'," said the report.

"The Great Cannon is not simply an extension of the Great Firewall, but a distinct attack tool that hijacks traffic to, or presumably from, individual IP addresses, and can arbitrarily replace unencrypted content as a man-in-the-middle.

"The operational deployment of the Great Cannon represents a significant escalation in state-level information control: the normalisation of widespread use of an attack tool to enforce censorship by weaponising users."

China is often cited as the biggest online threat to computer systems in terms of government-sanctioned hacks, but the Canadian researchers suggested that the cannon is closer to a US creation called Quantum employed by the National Security Agency (NSA).

"While employed for a highly visible attack in this case, the Great Cannon clearly has the capability for use in a manner similar to the NSA's Quantum system, affording China the opportunity to deliver exploits targeting any foreign computer that communicates with any China-based website not fully utilising HTTPS."

The researchers are certain that Chinese agents were behind the cannon attacks, and that they were so well backed that they can only have come with official government approval.

They also suggested that the assaults were a show of strength by the Chinese government.

As venerable security commentator Bruce Schneier said: "*It's kind of hard for the US to complain about this kind of thing, since we do it too*."

This week the US government banned Intel from providing chips to the Chinese for a supercomputer amid fears it would be used for nuclear research.

China develops downtime tool called the Great Cannon - IT News from V3.co.uk

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## TaiShang

Any hacking capability US has, China should have twice as much. 

Hail to the "Great NSA"


----------



## Jlaw

大炮

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## TaiShang

Jlaw said:


> 大炮



LOL. They are indeed innovative to find quick label to demonize.

I guess Obama needs a greater budget for his under-performing troll army.

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## terranMarine

Chinese censors have new cyberweapon

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## TaiShang

*China's accelerating 'Internet revolution'*
By John Ross
June 7, 2015



'E' irresistible [By Jiao Haiyang/China.org.cn]



China is further speeding up its "Internet revolution." Premier Li Keqiang has launched the concept of "Internet Plus," which emphasizes integrating the mobile Internet, cloud computing, big data and the Internet of Things with manufacturing and e-commerce. To further boost Internet use, the premier recently urged China's telecommunications operators to enhance Internet speeds and cut prices.

China's increasing emphasis on the Internet is even more impressive when viewed within the context of the existing volume of Internet use in the country. China already has the world's greatest number of Internet users by far, 642 million in 2014, compared to the United States' 280 million and India's 243 million. From a global perspective, 21 percent of the world's Internet users are in China, compared to only 9 percent in the U.S.

Equally striking is the buildup of China's investment in information and communications technology, the core of which is Internet technology. Over the last two decades, China's investment in ICT has already generated 1 percent of total GDP growth a year out of an average 8.8 percent annual expansion rate. As Table 1 shows, over the last 20 years, China's annual GDP growth created by ICT investment was already significantly higher than any other major industrial or BRIC economy. For example, it was two-thirds higher than that of the U.S., over twice that of Germany and three times that of Japan.


But even given this high level of achievement, China's further push into the Internet sector is vital to economic strategy. The Internet has now expanded far beyond its original application in computers to become the most rapidly growing sector of telecommunications, retailing and advanced manufacturing, hence the key idea of "Internet Plus."

But because China is a developing economy, despite its high number of Internet users, the percentage of China's population that is using the Internet is lower not only than rate of Internet use seen in the U.S. or Europe but also lower than that seen in developed Asian countries. In 2014 46 percent of China's population were Internet users, whereas this figure stood at 87 percent for the U.S., 86 percent in Japan and 92 percent in South Korea. In China, lowering the price of Internet connectivity is key to further expanding Internet use, hence the premier's drive to reduce Internet usage costs.

Because the Internet is crucial for the development of a modern economy, there have been numerous international studies of the Internet's development. These have arrived at clear conclusions showing why expanding Internet use and ICT investment are inextricably interlinked.

From a fundamental economic perspective, it is important to understand that the pure technology of the Internet and ICT does not increase productivity and economic growth by itself. Winner of the Nobel Prize in economics Robert Solow noted in 1987, six years after the beginning of the mass introduction of personal computers into the economy, that computer technology was not speeding up U.S. productivity growth."You see the computer age everywhere but in the productivity statistics," he explained.

This has not changed. As Figure 1 shows, in 1980, the year before the introduction of the modern personal computer, U.S. annual productivity growth was 1.2 percent over a five-year average that removes the effects of short-term business cycle fluctuations. By 2014 U.S. productivity growth was still only 1.2 percent. Therefore, 34 years of revolutionary technological developments in the Internet and ICT have led to no increase in U.S. productivity!

Indeed, the latest U.S. figures are even worse. In May Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen admitted that the U.S. was experiencing "relatively weak productivity growth." In 2014 despite publicity about iPhones, Apple Watches, Google, e-tailing and other Internet-centric products and services, U.S. productivity increased by only a snail-like 0.5 percent.

The data therefore clearly shows that technological advances in the Internet and ICT sector alone do not lead to productivity increases.




As can be seen in Figure 1, however, there was one phase during the past 34 years of the Internet and ICT revolution when U.S. economic efficiency sharply increased. In the period leading up to 2003, U.S. annual productivity growth reached its highest level in half a century, 3.6 percent. This was explained by a huge surge in ICT focused on fixed investment. U.S. investment rose from 19.8 percent of GDP in 1991 to 23.1 percent of GDP in 2000, fell slightly after the dot-com bubble's collapse, and then reached 22.9 percent in 2005.The majority of this investment was in ICT. Afterward, this U.S. investment fell, leading to the sharp slowdown in productivity.

It was therefore not purely the ideas or technology of the Internet that led to rapid economic efficiency growth. Growth in efficiency could rather be attributed to the embodiment of these in a massive wave of investment focused on ICT. This is the unambiguous lesson of the U.S., and therefore a key one for China to study as it seeks to cut costs and boost speeds in order to accelerate its own "Internet revolution."

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## cirr

Hundreds of billions of USD are being ploughed into the Internet Plus Project，the successful implementation of which will make China one of the world's most-connected country in the forseeable future。

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## TaiShang

* China Pursues "Internet Plus" Strategy*

China is pursuing an "Internet Plus" action plan that seeks to drive economic growth by integration of Internet technologies with manufacturing and business, according to a government work report issued at the National People's Congress.

Speaking at the March 5 opening meeting of the National People's Congress, Premier Li Keqiang spoke of the "Internet Plus" concept in his *2015 Government Work Report*. According to Premier Li's report, "Internet Plus" entails integration of mobile Internet, cloud computing, big data and Internet of Things with modern manufacturing, fostering new industries and business development, including e-commerce, industrial Internet and Internet finance. 

*The aim of the plan is to promote innovation-driven development and upgrade China from being a "big industrial country" to a "powerful industrial country", a goal often seen in recent Chinese government policy pronouncements. In his report, Premier Li also mentioned the policy goals of three network convergence, accelerating fiber optic network construction, improving broadband speed and promoting information consumption.*

The 2015 National People's Congress Session in Beijing is being held from March 5-15. This year's Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference runs from March 3-13.



TaiShang said:


> over the last 20 years, China's annual GDP growth created by ICT investment was already significantly higher than any other major industrial or BRIC economy. For example, it was two-thirds higher than that of the U.S., over twice that of Germany and three times that of Japan.



****

*Board for startup technology firms ready to open*
Shanghai Daily, June 8, 2015

A new board for startup high-tech firms will debut on the Shanghai Equity Exchange on June 26, the city's latest move to support entrepreneurship and innovation, Shanghai Daily has learned.

More than 50 firms, including many based in Zhangjiang High-Tech Park in the Pudong New Area, are expected to be the first group of companies on the Tech Innovation Board, industry sources from Zhangjiang park told Shanghai Daily.

Usually such boards allow unlisted high-tech firms to trade assets, including shares, through the exchange. It helps such firms receive funding, which can be difficult through banks and other traditional channels.

The Tech Innovation Board is expected to encourage entrepreneurs and talents to develop their ideas.

The board was given the go-ahead after Shanghai Financial Service Office, the city's top finance regulator, signed an agreement with the Pudong government last month.

The entry criteria of the new board includes net assets of more than 3 million yuan (US$484,000), a sustainable business model and a clear share structure, Zhangjiang officials said.

The A-share main boards on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges require much higher standards, including having a net profit for three straight years. The profit over this period needs to be at least 30 million yuan. Such requirements are difficult for startup firms to meet.

"Shanghai is establishing itself as a global technology and innovation center. The new board will fuel the high-tech development and economy," said Zheng Yang, head of Shanghai Financial Service Office.

Analysts said Shanghai is often regarded as having a lack of entrepreneurship compared with Beijing and Shenzhen. The Tech Innovation Board is expected to change it, they said.

Meanwhile, Zhangjiang High-Tech Park aims to double a government-backed angel investment fund to 200 million yuan annually, probably beginning next year, said Jin Ying, deputy director of the Zhangjiang Innopark Administrative Committee.

Other methods to boost innovation in the park include flexible policies to attract high-end talents from home and abroad.

Expatriates working in Zhangjiang will be allowed to start their own business and leave and enter the Chinese mainland more easily.

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## cirr

*China unveils "Internet Plus" action plan to fuel growth
*
English.news.cn 2015-07-04

BEIJING, July 4 (Xinhua) -- China on Saturday unveiled its "Internet Plus" action plan, aiming to integrate the Internet with traditional industries, and fuel economic growth.

The Internet Plus concept was first presented by Premier Li Keqiang in March this year when delivering the government work report.

*The action plan will integrate mobile Internet, cloud computing, big data and the Internet of Things with modern manufacturing, to encourage the healthy development of e-commerce, industrial networks, and Internet banking, and to help Internet companies increase their international presence*, Li said.

The campaign will be very important to creating a new engine for economic growth, said Premier Li.

According to the action plan, China will push forward the integration of the Internet and traditional industries, fueling its expansion from consumption industries to manufacturing.

The action plan maps development targets and supportive measures for key sectors, which the government hopes can establish new industrial modes, including *mass entrepreneurship and innovation, manufacturing, agriculture, energy, finance, public services, logistics, e-commerce, traffic, biology and artificial intelligence*.

"The government aims to further deepen the integration of the Internet with the economic and social sectors, making new industrial modes a main driving force of growth by 2018," according to the action plan.

By 2025, Internet Plus will become a new economic model and an important driving force for economic and social innovation and development.

To this end, "China will solidify its development basis by promoting Internet technology, infrastructure, [while] tackling the technological bottlenecks of industries and strengthening risk control."

The government will add impetus to innovation. Enterprises will be encouraged to set up platforms and weaving networks for innovation. Industrial standards will be formulated for the integration of Internet and industries, while intellectual property rights will be protected.

China will clear barriers and lower limits for the market entry of Internet Plus-related products, optimize the credit system, draft a big data strategy and promote legal services.

Taking advantage of the China-proposed Belt and Road initiative, the government will encourage more Internet companies to increase their presence in the global market.

To meet the need of "Internet Plus" development, China will train, and make a better use of local and foreign talent, according to the action plan.

The government will provide finance support and tax references to key projects related to the Internet Plus plan, and encourage local governments to follow suit, while welcoming investors from home and abroad.

A ministerial joint conference system will be introduced in order to address important problems in implementing the action plan.

The cabinet also vowed to launch more pilot zones and encourage innovation demonstration zones such as Zhongguancun, the Chinese version of Silicon Valley.

Local governments were urged to come up with their own action plans.

"The favorable wind of Internet Plus is set to push the Chinese economy to a higher level," Li said earlier this year.

The action plan comes as China enters a crucial period for deepening reform and restructuring after the economy registered a growth rate of 7.4 percent in 2014, its lowest pace in 24 years.

China has the most Internet and cell phone users in the world. The country had 649 million Internet users by the end of 2014, and some 557 million used cell phones to access the Internet, according to the China Internet Network Information Center data.

Internet Plus should mean smarter lives|Business|chinadaily.com.cn

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## Economic superpower

Lets just hope all these reform plans are actually implemented. Too many plans and not enough implementation.

All plans about liberalising interest rates and letting factor prices be set by the market have yet to be realised.


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## cirr

*Internet Plus should mean smarter lives*

*Updated: 2015-07-03 08:14
*
*By Ma Zhiping(China Daily USA)*

The nation's "*Internet Plus*" initiative has developers and Internet companies rushing to tie the knot. Industry observers say these "marriages" will create *a smart-cities, smart-communities and smart-homes market worth trillions of yuan*.

In one recent commercial move, Beijing-based developer Huayuan Property Co Ltd got hitched to Internet security software provider Qihoo 360 Technology Co Ltd, and together they plan to use Qihoo's smart-home systems in communities built by Huayuan.

All the parties involved in these pairings believe that the "Internet Plus" strategy has huge potential to create smart communities that will sit on smart furnishings, and be protected by smart community security systems. Community entertainment facilities, medical and education services and community-based e-finance and e-commerce networks will be smarter and more efficient than ever before.

In the future, many more middle-class city dwellers will be yearning for better living conditions, and will expect their homes and communities to not only be safe and convenient, but also be smart to live in.

And the building and construction industries and the Internet sector are all promising their own blueprints for this, and much more.

But many of the so-called smart communities that already exist have weak security, poor communication services and lax management.

A friend who bought a so-called smart home in eastern Beijing in 2007 told me recently she was worried that the entry controls for her community and her own apartment building kept breaking. The gates were often left open, leaving any stranger free rein.

She complained that the security devices on her windows, even the smoke alarm in the kitchen, had never been tested, although many of the residents had complained to the management office to get the systems working.

The intercom system on her door was mostly "decoration", she continued, adding that when she needed things fixed, she had to resort to endless calls.

I don't think her trials are unique. But I hope that, through the "Internet Plus" strategy, the government can help solve these kinds of problems.

Developing smart communities is complicated, and involves almost every aspect of life, and so government planning and guidance is crucial.

The government should adopt an Internet mindset and provide top-level design, detailed planning and guidance in the development of genuinely smart communities - which will become the link between smart cities and smart homes.

The Ministry of Construction actually introduced the concept of smart communities at the turn of the century and drafted a plan in 2001.

That plan specified that a smart community should have an automated computer management center that offers information and communication services, collects utility payments and manages security systems, among other tasks.

But although Shanghai, Guangzhou and Chongqing are reported to have developed some world-class smart communities, most have often ended up being barely clever.

Many key elements of smart communities, such as security monitoring, are often there just for show. In many cases they have never been connected or used, because the management companies at many communities consider fee collection more of a priority.

Some leading industry insiders have put forward serious recommendations to improve the situation, and their comments need to be taken seriously by government, homebuilders and Internet companies.

The key point that many make is that merely installing so-called smart systems is pointless unless they are used, maintained and managed wisely.

With vast fortunes being spent on buying their very own smart homes, too often purchasers are being left disappointed when they realize they simply have an expensive property, rather than a smart one.

Successful implementation of the "Internet Plus" strategy means everything concerned should be fully and thoroughly connected.

While piloting the strategy in the housing construction sector, the government must ensure the necessary levels of supervision and administration, so that plans for smart communities are actually implemented, and then studiously managed to serve their customers.

Would-be smart-home owners have to keep an eye out for fatal flaws in the model, too. Sorting out realty management services, or community services, for instance, can cause a huge bottleneck.

There is also a pressing need for talented people who know the Internet, and who can meet the expectations of residents in smart communities, to be employed to run them.

Smart living will require high-quality Internet systems and good, trustworthy, smart realty management teams able to get the job done.

Homebuilders and Internet companies must remember that everything in a smart community has to be functional, sustainable, reliable, economic, suitable and practical to operate.

The government, meanwhile, should ensure that these "Internet Plus" marriages give birth to genuinely smart communities, and more of the residents can enjoy the benefits.

Internet Plus should mean smarter lives|Business|chinadaily.com.cn

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## cirr

jung41 said:


> Don't it attract more cyber espionage



This, when fully implemented, will make China one of the most advanced economies in the world.

*Across China: Internet boosts tourism management*

ZHENGZHOU, Jun 18, 2015 (Xinhua via COMTEX) --

Gong Hua, a Beijing resident, is planning a trip. He will visit Longmen Grottoes, a world cultural heritage site in central Henan Province this weekend, a three-day holiday.

He has booked everything via apps on his phone.

In April, Longmen Grottoes signed a deal with Tencent to develop Internet services including ticket sales, guidance and management. Longmen hosted more than 3 million tourists last year.

Now, Gong can preview the grottoes through WeChat, Tencent's instant messenger.

"Internet plus is a very good tool," said Yu Ying, head of the Longmen Grottoes Scenic Area Administration Commission.

"Internet Plus" was put forward by Premier Li Keqiang in March, meaning the integration of the Internet and traditional industries through online platforms and IT technology.

It is reshaping traditional industries, including manufacturing and tourism.

"Travels and the ways Chinese tourists can get information are changing. Destinations are responding to the change," said Xie Chaowu, a tourism researcher at Huaqiao University in Fujian Province.

In an era of mass tourism, traditional tourist spots cannot offer a good service to everyone, while Internet makes many services available to tourists, said Xie.

Internet plus tourism is gaining momentum in other provinces such as the southwestern Sichuan, and eastern Anhui and Shandong provinces.

The integration of Internet into traditional tourism will enhance the management efficiency and service quality of tourist spots, said Yuan Yanhong, general manager of the Chongdugou scenic area in Henan.

As tourism booms, insufficient staff and services in many scenic spots cannot meet the demands of visitors, said Yuan.

The Chongdugou area began to sell tickets online in 2009. More than 60 out of 300 farmers' restaurants have found tour group reservations through websites providing services for tourists.

Internet service will also help managers control the number of visitors and protect facilities, according to Yuan.

The Palace Museum in Beijing, also known as the Forbidden City, began to cap the number of visitors at 80,000 per day on Saturday.

The museum also now requires all travel agencies book tickets online and demands the use of ID cards when purchasing tickets.

Individual.com

*Internet-Plus Poised To Transform China’s Film Business Models*

June 13, 2015 | 09:36PM PT

Patrick Frater

Asia Bureau Chief

Self-confidence overflowed as Chinese film and Internet executives pitched a new business model that may be on the way to transforming the fortunes of local studios and rolling back the influence of Hollywood in China.

At a high-powered seminar on Sunday at the Shanghai film festival, the plutocrat bosses of Bona Film Group and Enlight Media lifted the curtain on new slates of local pictures that each number more than 20, and are fuelled by big data, Internet-generated intellectual property and new media marketing.

Executives from Youzu Interactive and Alibaba Digital Entertainment were there to egg them on with further talk of transactional content platforms and massive crowd funding.

The term ‘Internet Plus’ is attributed to China’s premier Li Keqiang and is a reference to the ability of the Internet to enable new things.

“We have been through 12 years of initial reform. Now we need Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent to help us increase our competitiveness versus Hollywood. Already in the past year we have growth of online sales and fan bases,” said Yu Dong, chairman and CEO of producer-distributor Bona Film Group. He then went on to trail the announcement of a new 26 film slate that he said has a box office target of RMB10 billion ($1.6 billion).

Enlight Media chairman Wang Chengtian said that his firm, which he described as a “generation 1.5 film company,” is lining up a slate of 20 movies.

Wang predicted that a Netflix like, subscription video, company will succeed in China. “But it may not be one of the existing players,” he said.

Liu Chunning, head of Alibaba Digital Entertainment, said that Alibaba’s ‘T-Mall Box Office’ which will launched in the coming months, intends to be that newcomer. He described it as China’s largest household cinema and said that it will not be free of charge, unlike China’s currently dominant online streaming services which are advertising supported. Building a widely-used transactional platform he described as being “a catalyst for the whole film industry.”

Wang similarly predicted that such new ancillary platforms would transform the revenue models of Chinese film companies. “We can see that box office will be less than half of what we earn in future, with the majority coming from other media and IP sales,” he said. Currently, the Chinese film business sees some 85% of its income coming from theatrical box office. The country suffers from poorly developed ancillary markets, low TV syndication fees and piracy.

While the executives’ focus was largely on fulfilling the needs of their massive domestic market, they saw themselves as building world-beating businesses from China. In a two hour talk there was no talk of regulation or censorship, only of opportunity, making tons of money and beating fuddy-duddy Hollywood.

“Hollywood is stubborn, old-fashioned and inefficient,” said one speaker. “Japan and Europe are lagging behind,” said Youzu’s Lin.

At several points the discussion turned to whether Chinese movie companies are being swamped by the country’s Internet giants. But a consensus appeared to emerge that content remains king.

“In two recent meetings with [Alibaba founder] Jack Ma, he has told me that he wants wider dissemination of film, more involvement in ticket sales and merchandise. He convinced me of the need for quality content from which these things flow,” said Enlight’s Wang. “We are not working for Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent, but rather for the Chinese audience.”

Alibaba Digital Entertainment’s Liu said: “We will leverage our assets to create an entertainment ecosystem that is open to all producers. Liu said that Alibaba’s structured version of crowd funding, called Yue Le Bao, has held some 13 funding rounds, raised over RMB560 million ($91 million) and made investments into 20 movies and TV series to date.

Yu said that Bona’s 26 film slate is likely to contain several Internet-generated properties and TV shows, one feature to be directed by Zhang Muye the author of the hit novel series “Ghost Blows Out The Light” (which is being adapted by Wanda, Enlight and Huayi Brothers as December blockbuster “The Ghouls”) and a TV series based on a subsequent novel series “Ghost Never Speaks.” Yu also revealed that Bona is working with China Film Group on a third film in CFG’s revolutionary propaganda film series.

Yu spoke of his Friday announcement of plans to take NASDAQ-listed Bona Film private. Already speculation is running high that the company will be relisted on a Chinese stock market. “My audience is in China. Coming home is the wish of all investors and partners,” he said.

Internet-Plus Transforming China’s Film Business | Variety


*Evergrande Health launches internet-based community hospital*

Evergrande Health Industry Group, a subsidiary of China's leading property developer Evergrande Group, has opened a internet community hospital in Guangzhou, adding one more division to its healthcare platform, reports the Guangdong-based 21st ...

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## Beidou2020

*




*
A signboard of 4G is seen at a branch of China Mobile in Shanghai, Dec 28, 2013. [Photo/IC]

*New 4G network base stations covering the whole country, 100 megabyte fiber-optic connectivity and 30Mbps average broadband speed are some of the plans announced to boost Internet speed and cut costs *by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) on Friday, said CCTV.

*According to the ministry, new 4G network base stations will be built to cover the entire nation by the end of 2017, households in prefecture-level cities will have the ability to accesses 100 megabyte fiber-optic connectivity, the average broadband speed will reach 30Mbps in municipalities and provincial capitals and 20Mbps in other cities around the Chinese mainland.*

*Moreover, the average cost of broadband and mobile phones' high-speed data will be significantly reduced*, it said.

The MIIT asked the three domestic carries, China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, to provide the cost-cutting plans on Thursday and the details are expected to be released today, said Beijng News, citing people from one of the carries familiar with the matter.

According to an earlier report by Xinhua News Agency, the MIIT issued a guideline to extend broadband usage in China last Friday.

*Over 600,000 new 4G network base stations will be built to cover more townships and villages. More than 40 million households will have access to fiber-optic broadband, and over 200 million mobile phone users will become 4G network users by the end of this year*, according to the guideline.

*About 60 million more people signed up to 4G accounts in the first quarter, meaning that 162 million people in China are 4G customers*, according to government statistics.

According to China Daily, Wednesday's executive meeting of the State Council, presided over by Premier Li Keqiang, *asked companies to roll over the value of unused data in fixed price plans to the next period or allow customers to transfer unused data to others.*

*Li said optical fiber and fourth-generation telecom networks should be laid more quickly, and it set a goal of achieving investment worth more than 1 trillion yuan ($160 billion) in the Internet this year.*

An open market, fair competition and more financial support will help to upgrade broadband services in rural areas. The meeting decided to narrow the digital gap between urban and rural areas by increasing financial support for the improvement of facilities in the countryside. In addition, 14,000 more villages will be connected to the Internet.

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## Indus Falcon

Glad to hear this

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## Alpha BeeTee

Indus Falcon said:


> Glad to hear this


What is our benifit in this ?
Idhar you yay halaat hen k from 15 days our PTCL is down due to blast in the local dabbi.Hence no intnet.
And they couldn't fix it half a month has passed..


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## nForce

Indus Falcon said:


> Glad to hear this


O Bhai...tu kyun khush ho rha hai ?


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## dravidianhero

nForce said:


> O Bhai...tu kyun khush ho rha hai ?


Hahaha


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## Place Of Space

Is this news? They have stated it many times, but no actual operation yet.


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## Spectre

nForce said:


> O Bhai...tu kyun khush ho rha hai ?



Off- Topic: It is indeed interesting that many Pakistan consider China's interest same as theirs. I have rarely seen such appreciation of a country by another, however unrequited it might be on the other side. Even US and UK relationship is much more balanced relatively.

May be the lesson here is that Pakistanis can be fiercely loyal or is China being the sole source of "un-conditonal support" when Pakistan is on wicket internationally is reason for such love


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## EAsian

Place Of Space said:


> Is this news? They have stated it many times, but no actual operation yet.


My *broadband speed had been increased from 20MB/S to 50MB/S.*


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## Place Of Space

Spectre said:


> Off- Topic: It is indeed interesting that many Pakistan consider China's interest same as theirs. I have rarely seen such appreciation of a country by another, however unrequited it might be on the other side. Even US and UK relationship is much more balanced relatively.
> 
> May be the lesson here is that Pakistanis can be fiercely loyal or is China being the sole source of "un-conditonal support" when Pakistan is on wicket internationally is reason for such love



You don't know many Pakistani travel, do business or live in China.

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## Spectre

Place Of Space said:


> You don't know many Pakistani travel, do business or live in China.



You might be aware of India - China or Japan - China or US - China bilateral trade and the number of them visiting/living China, it dwarfs Pakistan.

None of that matters to geo-politics.


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## Place Of Space

EAsian said:


> My *broadband speed had been increased from 20MB/S to 50MB/S.*



Nah, I signed an one-year contract. Can the speed increase automatically? lol


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## Indus Falcon

Alpha BeeTee said:


> What is our benifit in this ?
> Idhar you yay halaat hen k from 15 days our PTCL is down due to blast in the local dabbi.Hence no intnet.
> And they couldn't fix it half a month has passed..





nForce said:


> O Bhai...tu kyun khush ho rha hai ?





dravidianhero said:


> Hahaha



Sorry to see you gentlemen suffering from myopic vision! My heartfelt sympathies!

The following is my *personal belief:*

1) When someone succeeds, no matter how small, be happy and pray for them to succeed more. It wan't your decision that they succeed, it was the Almighty's decision. Secondly, when you pray for them to succeed more, Angels reply "*for you also"*

2) Success in life is NOT money and riches, but inner peace.

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## Place Of Space

Spectre said:


> You might be aware of India - China or Japan - China or US - China bilateral trade and the number of them visiting/living China, it dwarfs Pakistan.
> 
> None of that matters to geo-politics.



It's you shift the topic to geo-politics. If he live in China, the news of course benefits to him. Less payment, higher speed is a good thing to everyone.


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## Indus Falcon

Spectre said:


> Off- Topic: It is indeed interesting that many Pakistan consider China's interest same as theirs. I have rarely seen such appreciation of a country by another, however unrequited it might be on the other side. Even US and UK relationship is much more balanced relatively.
> 
> May be the lesson here is that Pakistanis can be fiercely loyal or is China being the sole source of "un-conditonal support" when Pakistan is on wicket internationally is reason for such love



Maybe it's because, China has not only supported us politically but militarily as well. In 1965 they transferred aircrafts from their existing squadrons, plus a lot more.

The recent hostilities, China was the first one to call Gen.Raheel, followed by three other countries, (not to wish him Happy Birthday but) to tell him, that in the event of any attack, (no matter how small, or big), Pakistan can rely on them, diplomatically as well as militarily.

*They have earned our #Respect *

*Note:* All four had the same message: Unconditional Diplomatic and Military Support.

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## nForce

Indus Falcon said:


> Sorry to see you gentlemen suffering from myopic vision! My heartfelt sympathies!
> 
> The following is my *personal belief:*
> 
> 1) When someone succeeds, no matter how small, be happy and pray for them to succeed more. It wan't your decision that they succeed, it was the Almighty's decision. Secondly, when you pray for them to succeed more, Angels reply "*for you also"*
> 
> 2) Success in life is NOT money and riches, but inner peace.


correct word for it is - happy for you.


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## Edison Chen

I just signed 1 year contract with China Telecom, 20M speed, which cost me about 230 U.S.Dollars. I wish they could upgrade it to 100M.

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## Tresbon

China is set to spend USD 22.1 billion to upgrade its Internet infrastructure and the development of its logistics industry in 50,000 villages as part of the government's efforts to encourage online shopping among rural residents. 

The telecommunication upgrade will involve investment of at least 140 billion yuan (USD 22.1 billion), official media reported. 

An executive meeting of the central cabinet presided over by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang decided to allocate more central government funds to building Internet infrastructure and also advocated funding from local governments and social organisations. 

A circular issued after the meeting said the government plans to invest up to 140 billion yuan in the sector by 2020 to provide at least 50,000 villages with Internet access. 

By then, about 98 per cent of the nation's rural areas will be hooked up to the Net. 

The government also promised to improve Internet speed and expand wireless broadband coverage in areas with access to the Net. 

Estimates of China's rural population range from 600 million to 800 million. 

The meeting yesterday also pledged to expand e-commerce apps in rural areas, especially in promoting agricultural products and trips to the countryside. 

The government will also open up the delivery industry to social investors, encourage mergers and acquisitions, and streamline customs procedures for cross-border deliveries. 

Zeng Chen, an e-commerce expert at the Ministry of Commerce, said online shopping revenues topped 9.8 trillion yuan (USD 1.6 billion) from January to August, a year-on-year rise of 24.7 per cent. 

"There is a large market for e-commerce in rural areas and small and medium-sized cities in western China, where residents need the same goods as their urban counterparts but have limited access to such products. 

"E-commerce revenues in third-and fourth-tier cities have shown stronger momentum than in big coastal cities, and we expect increased growth in these areas when local logistics are improved," Zeng has been quoted by the state-run Xinhua news agency. 

Cross-border e-commerce and shopping conducted via mobile devices are the new growth points for the industry. 

Chinese spent about 90 billion yuan (USD 15 billion) last year on mobile phones and other mobile devices, comprising one third of the total they spent online. 

More than 80 per cent of export and import companies in China have opened online businesses.

China to spend $22.1 bln to upgrade internet in rural areas | Business Standard News

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## Dungeness

Tresbon said:


> China is set to spend USD 22.1 billion to upgrade its Internet infrastructure and the development of its logistics industry in 50,000 villages as part of the government's efforts to encourage online shopping among rural residents.
> 
> The telecommunication upgrade will involve investment of at least 140 billion yuan (USD 22.1 billion), official media reported.
> 
> An executive meeting of the central cabinet presided over by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang decided to allocate more central government funds to building Internet infrastructure and also advocated funding from local governments and social organisations.
> 
> A circular issued after the meeting said the government plans to invest up to 140 billion yuan in the sector by 2020 to provide at least 50,000 villages with Internet access.
> 
> By then, about 98 per cent of the nation's rural areas will be hooked up to the Net.
> 
> The government also promised to improve Internet speed and expand wireless broadband coverage in areas with access to the Net.
> 
> Estimates of China's rural population range from 600 million to 800 million.
> 
> The meeting yesterday also pledged to expand e-commerce apps in rural areas, especially in promoting agricultural products and trips to the countryside.
> 
> The government will also open up the delivery industry to social investors, encourage mergers and acquisitions, and streamline customs procedures for cross-border deliveries.
> 
> Zeng Chen, an e-commerce expert at the Ministry of Commerce, said online shopping revenues topped 9.8 trillion yuan (USD 1.6 billion) from January to August, a year-on-year rise of 24.7 per cent.
> 
> "There is a large market for e-commerce in rural areas and small and medium-sized cities in western China, where residents need the same goods as their urban counterparts but have limited access to such products.
> 
> "E-commerce revenues in third-and fourth-tier cities have shown stronger momentum than in big coastal cities, and we expect increased growth in these areas when local logistics are improved," Zeng has been quoted by the state-run Xinhua news agency.
> 
> Cross-border e-commerce and shopping conducted via mobile devices are the new growth points for the industry.
> 
> Chinese spent about 90 billion yuan (USD 15 billion) last year on mobile phones and other mobile devices, comprising one third of the total they spent online.
> 
> More than 80 per cent of export and import companies in China have opened online businesses.
> 
> China to spend $22.1 bln to upgrade internet in rural areas | Business Standard News



That is what all responsible governments in the world should do.

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## Shotgunner51

Tresbon said:


> Estimates of China's rural population range from 600 million to 800 million.



Back in 2012, the rural population was 649.83 million (see below), about 48% of total pop.
By 2015~2016 I suppose the rural pop will further drop, let's wait for updates.

PovcalNet
Country; Population (m)
*China*; 1,350.7m*
China-Urban; 700.86m
China-Rural; 649.83m​


Tresbon said:


> A circular issued after the meeting said the government plans to invest up to 140 billion yuan in the sector by 2020 to provide at least 50,000 villages with Internet access.
> By then, about 98 per cent of the nation's rural areas will be hooked up to the Net.



Good news!

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## TaiShang

Dungeness said:


> That is what all responsible governments in the world should do.



This will help reinforce internal consumption. 

In a sense, China's virtual high-speed rail.

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## Shotgunner51

TaiShang said:


> This will help reinforce internal consumption.
> 
> In a sense, China's virtual high-speed rail.



As infrastructure investment matures in urban China, the next wave of construction shall concentrate in rural China where there are still 40+% pop now (lower in the long run, urbanisation remains the main theme). Just as in the cities, infrastructure will catalyze economic activities in rural China and build them wealth.

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## Jlaw

cyrusthevirus said:


> First let there be freedom of information.


@Hu Songshan please ban this banned Indian as he has been trolling in Chinese threads

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## ahojunk

This is good news for the disadvantaged rural and remote folks.
Alibaba needs to do more work in all the "light blue areas" where the participation is minimal.

-------------------
*Taobao village clusters spreading reach*
By Meng Jing (China Daily)
Updated: 2015-12-26 08:00







There are now 780 so-called "Taobao villages" in China, a 268 percent increase over the past year, according to the latest research.

The term refers to village-based online business clusters that each has an annual e-commerce transactions worth in excess of 10 million yuan ($1.55 million), involving more than 100 active online stores representing at least 10 percent of a village's households doing business online.

The figures were released by AliResearch, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's research institute, and showed those 780 sites played host to more than 200,000 active online stores, which officials said prove just how fast the Internet is transforming the rural economy.

They also show customers from 832 of China's poorest counties spent 100.9 billion yuan on Alibaba's online platforms during 2014, and users sold products worth 11.93 billion yuan.

AliResearch claims doing business online is fast becoming one of the most effective ways of eliminating rural poverty, particularly for those selling farm produces, who can reach many more markets and also sell their produce at a fraction of the cost of using more traditional sales channels.

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## Edison Chen

Taobao really makes Chinese people's living much more convenient than ever. These taobao villiages also provides a lot of job opportunities to the unemployement group.

It reminds me of Jingdong that offers home delivery services of many kinds of goods and services. Just sitting in the house, you will enjoy home delievery of shopping market stuff (grocery like meat, vegetable, fruite, drinks, wines and snacks ), food from restuaruant, medicines of common illness, home cleaning services (including electrical home appliances maintenance, call the cook to your home, car maintenance, babysitter), laundry service（shoes, clothes, blanket and bags）, and even massage and haircut! LOL！

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## LowPost

*This is How Chinese Internet Companies are Leading the Way in Monetizing Traffic

Internet companies in China have led the way in spurring innovation with the creation of uniquely Chinese business models, including ways to monetize online businesses such as social media and games.*


Tencent, China’s leading Internet service, has developed a wide range of revenue streams to monetize traffic to its sites. It developed these different streams in part because advertising is a much smaller industry in China than in places such as the United States, so depending heavily on ads, as US companies such as Facebook and Google do, was not a viable option.

Tencent generates 90 percent of its revenue from non-advertising sources such as sales of virtual items to gamers on social platforms, e‑commerce, and online payments. Facebook, by contrast, derives 93 percent of revenue from advertising; its revenue per user was $9 in 2014, compared with $16 per user for Tencent.

Similarly, YY.com, a video-based Chinese social communication platform, also has several revenue streams, including a virtual currency. In 2014, YY generated 57 percent of its revenue through sales of virtual goods that viewers on entertainment and music sites purchase to give to performers they like.

Top performers on YY can earn more than 20,000 RMB ($3,300) a month, seven times what the average factory worker earns.

In many areas, Chinese online services have become leaders in business model innovation. WeChat, a social media platform, has added e‑commerce, allowing users to shop for everything from stickers and games to groceries. WeChat members can also book taxis and flights. WeChat added mobile payments in 2013. Facebook announced plans for an online payments system in March 2015.

WeChat allowed subscribers to set up online stores in 2014; in July 2015, Facebook announced a test of a new feature to allow retailers to sell from their Facebook pages.

This chart from our recent report on innovation in China illustrates how far ahead Chinese internet players are relative to their US counterparts:






This is How Chinese Internet Companies are Leading the Way in Monetizing Traffic | Erik Roth | LinkedIn

@Shotgunner51 @Martian2

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## ahojunk

Alibaba is leveling the playing field for those in rural areas and generating employment. Good job!

---------
Online titan not just about e-commerce anymore
WATARU KODAKA, Nikkei staff writer
December 21, 2015 7:00 am JST






_Wang Qin, manager of a Taobao Village shop in Zhejiang Province, purchases goods online for elderly residents. The picture was taken in October._

SHANGHAI -- Alibaba Group Holding is branching out into the real world, opening shops in villages and pushing its online payment service in urban areas. 

These are the two prongs of the Chinese e-commerce giant's strategy to expand its "online economic zone." 

In a Zhejiang Province mountain village of 2,000 people, many of whom are elderly, there is a shop with a signboard that reads "Taobao Village." The store is part of Alibaba's new "1,000 counties and 10,000 villages program."

Wang Qin, 28, manages the shop. Villagers go there to get their daily necessities. Farmers go for seeds and other agricultural products. Wang keeps the store stocked by buying stuff via Taobao, earning a 1% commission.

Taobao is an Alibaba-operated e-tailer. The plan is to open Taobao Village shops in thousands of rural communities across China, where more than 600 million potential new customers live.

*Moving into the real world*

Zhejiang-based Alibaba is also venturing into the urban jungle with an aggressive marketing campaign for Alipay, which allows shoppers to pay for purchases via their smartphones. The service essentially does the job credit cards and cash already do.

Smartphone users can also use Alibaba chat, social network and other apps to discover popular restaurants and other businesses. Then they can choose to pay for their purchases with Alipay. For participating restaurants and other merchants, the online payment platform could help them bring in new customers.

With these new rural and urban advances, Alibaba is planting itself more firmly in China's brick-and-mortar economy, where more than $4 trillion worth of transactions take place every year -- worth nearly 10 times more than those made in China's online economy.

Alibaba well knows the online marketplace. In fact, Singles Day -- an online shopping extravaganza every Nov. 11 -- was an Alibaba brainchild. This past November, Singles Day sales reached 91.2 billion yuan ($14.07 billion), up 60% from the same day in 2014.

Singles Day is not a mere sales promotion campaign. It is designed to showcase the use of big data, cloud computing and mobile innovations, according to Daniel Zhang, Alibaba's chief executive.

The 91.2 billion yuan total was about 14 times more than what Alibaba brings in on an average day and required Alipay to process as many as 85,900 transactions per second during peak hours.

In a way, Singles Day has been an experiment to help Alibaba learn to cope with the large numbers of transactions it expects to be placed at any instant now that it is expanding its footprint into villages and pushing Alipay hard in cities.

*Linking 1.3 billion wallets*

Alibaba was launched in an apartment in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, in 1999. Starting with Alibaba.com, a business-to-business e-commerce site, the company then began Taobao, a consumer-to-consumer platform, and TMall, a business-to-consumer e-tailer. It has also developed other e-commerce platforms in China. Nearly 400 million people now shop via Alibaba, spending $400 billion a year. 







Alipay, launched in 2004, is Alibaba's biggest strength; it was devised when China had no online payment system.

The platform connects consumers' "wallets" via the Internet. A 31-year-old female company employee in Shanghai said she uses Alipay "almost every day" to buy things at convenience stores and even to pay her utility bills.

But there is a sense of crisis at Alibaba due to market saturation; just about everybody in cities, especially young people and middle-income consumers, already buy stuff online -- either from an Alibaba site or a rival platform.

Tencent Holdings, a leading social network provider, has invested in Jingdong Group, China's second biggest e-commerce player. Already, Jingdong's market presence is growing -- and it has rolled out its own online payment system.

With a client base of 400 million WeChat users -- WeChat is China's biggest chat and voice over Internet Protocol app -- Tencent is a threat to Alibaba.

In China, just because a company enjoys a competitive advantage today doesn't mean it will be a winner tomorrow. Aware of this dynamic, founder Jack Ma is keeping Alibaba in the rapid growth stage.

*:
*

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## ahojunk

.
*'Internet Plus' changes people's lifestyles in China*
(chinadaily.com.cn) Updated: 2015-12-30 13:42

"Internet Plus", an action plan, was first presented in a Chinese government work report in March this year. It aims to integrate the Internet with traditional industries and fuel economic growth.

Now, the notion of "Internet Plus" is buzzing in China. People are changing their consumption and lifestyle habits, as more and more industries mix with Internet technology.





A woman shows the new farmer-oriented mobile phone app that provides online financial service, in Jingning county, Gansu province, July 29, 2015. The online service involves more than 20 types of business, including deposits and withdrawals, sales and purchases of agricultural products and agricultural technology and can function as an online bank, e-commerce site, rural finance tutor and loan source for farmers. [Photo/Xinhua]





A man introduces an agriculture application system, in Yushan county, Fujian province, July 29, 2015. The system uses Internet technology to monitor the growth of vegetables and fruits. [Photo/Xinhua]





An employee of Didi Kuaidi shows a senior citizen how to book a car by using the touch screen device at one of the many Didi stations installed by the company in Shanghai neighborhoods, Oct 15, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]





An employee of the Bank of Lanzhou shows a client how to deal with business by scanning a two-dimension code to sign up to a hospital's WeChat account, Lanzhou, Gansu province, Aug 14, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]





A couple show the handheld devices that can make emergency calls to a hospital and can contact family members if they require assistance, Hefei, Anhui province, Dec 29, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]





A poster show a hospital's WeChat account, Guangzhou, Guangdong province, Dec 29, 2015. Patients can register and pay fees online by scanning the two-dimensional code to sign up to the hospital's WeChat account. [Photo/Xinhua]





A Peking Opera actor performs at a ceremony to celebrate a Peking Opera app launch in Beijing, May 23, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]





A deliveryman of Chinese food delivery company Ele.me prepares to deliver meals in Shanghai, March 24, 2015. [Photo/IC]

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## ahojunk

*Jack Ma: great potential in rural internet development*






From CCTV
Length: 1 min 54 secs

---------

I hope Jack Ma's vision come to fruition as this will help the rural folks tremendously.

.

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## ahojunk

I like this "Rural Taobao" which benefits the rural folks greatly.
It gives them more choices, information, convenience and access to finance/credit.
When they start selling their produce via "Rural Taobao", it will lift lots of them out of poverty, if they are doing it properly.
Rural Taobao will allow these rural folks to sell to a much wider market.
Alibaba should expand it to more countries, especially those in the developing world.

---------------------
*China e-commerce firms tapping rural dollar*
PUBLISHED: DEC 1, 2015, 5:00 AM SGT
Esther Teo, China Correspondent In Beijing





_In Dongan village, in Jiaxing city, Zhejiang province, the shopping fever brought on by Singles Day, which falls on Nov 11, strikes many. Here, some villagers, including several elderly ones, gather at Alibaba's service centre to browse the Taobao online shopping website. This is the first time that Dongan's villagers can take part in the annual shopping event, thanks to Alibaba's outreach efforts. It is one of 6,000 villages across China that are now covered by Rural Taobao._

*Many, like Alibaba and JD.com, are turning to the country's immense interior in search of fresh profits*

Mr Wang Deyou used to have to pick up his online purchases at a nearby township, about 40 minutes away from his village of Zhuting in eastern Shandong province.

This year, for the first time, his Singles Day purchases of a water heater, a television set and a portable car-wash machine, which came up to more than 4,000 yuan (S$884), were all delivered right to his doorstep.

"It feels good to finally enjoy the services and convenience of cities. After all, more than half of China's population live in villages," Mr Wang, 32, told The Straits Times.

"Ma Yun has finally recognised the purchasing power of the common people," he added, referring to Mr Jack Ma, founder of China's largest e-commerce firm Alibaba.

While the world of online shopping might seem dominated by young and well-educated urbanites, industry giants like Alibaba and rival JD.com are turning increasingly to the country's immense interior in search of fresh profits.

Alibaba said recently that it will come up with a new online shopping event for Chinese New Year to tap rural consumption after villagers chalked up purchases worth more than 10 million yuan within the first eight minutes of Singles Day, the annual Nov 11 event seen as China's equivalent of Cyber Monday in the United States.

A farmer in Wenzhou, eastern Zhejiang province, even plonked down a 500,000-yuan deposit for a Porsche Macan, making it the most expensive buy on Cuntao, or Rural Taobao, Alibaba's online shopping website targeting villages.

Indeed, it was the first time Zhuting village, with about 2,000 residents, participated in the Singles Day event, which racked up record-breaking sales of 91 billion yuan in the 24-hour period.

A Taobao rural service centre had opened there last month, allowing residents' purchases made on the Rural Taobao website to be delivered directly to their homes, finally solving the logistics sector's so-called "last mile" problem.

Zhuting village is just one of the beneficiaries of Alibaba's wider strategy, announced in October last year, to invest 10 billion yuan in logistics, hardware and training in a bid to push its e-commerce model into 100,000 villages over the next three to five years.

The plan is to start by selling popular items such as washing machines, televisions and clothing, while gradually building up an online platform for farmers to sell vegetables and fruit to the cities, the company's executives had previously said.

Due to high commission fees and transportation costs, rural consumers often pay more for these household appliances than their urban counterparts.

Rural service centres, often located in villages' main convenience stores, are at the heart of Alibaba's new strategy.

As China's rural residents tend to be older and less familiar with technology, the centres provide computers for browsing and buying, help to ensure timely delivery of goods, and have trained Alibaba representatives on hand to provide assistance.

Mr Chen Xiaolong, 28, is one of the firm's young, Internet-savvy recruits. He assists some five villages in Shandong's Yanzhuang township, and said that while villagers were initially sceptical about online shopping, doubting the quality of the products they might receive, the idea has gradually caught on as positive experiences spread through word-of -mouth.

In fact, it was so busy on Singles Day that he had only two hours of sleep as villagers flocked to the service centre in droves.

"Even the elderly are getting more comfortable with the idea. I helped a 75-year-old grandmother buy a mobile phone on Singles Day," he told The Straits Times.

"But for those who are unsure, we tell them to buy known brands, such as Haier for home appliances, so they can be assured of a certain quality and can also compare the discount they are getting at physical stores," Mr Chen added.

E-commerce growth in the countryside now outpaces that in the cities, although less than a tenth of online purchases made on Alibaba platforms - which have an 80 per cent share of China's online market - were shipped to rural areas in the first quarter of this year.

The rural online market is estimated to be worth 460 billion yuan by next year, more than doubling from 180 billion yuan last year, according to Alibaba's research division.

The figures are even more staggering when taken in their entirety. China's e-commerce market recorded 2.79 trillion yuan in revenues last year, a jump of 50 per cent from the year before. This is equal to the entire economy of Austria last year.

As Beijing attempts to shift from investment-led growth to consumption-driven growth in the light of a slowing economy, e-commerce firms are finding that their strategies are dovetailing with government policies.

The Commerce Ministry said recently that it will encourage more e-commerce and logistics firms to expand into rural areas in a bid to create more jobs and provide better information access.

Said ministry official Kong Lingyu in May: "Building information sharing, financing and credit systems will be priorities to facilitate the development of e-commerce in rural areas, along with cheaper mobile Internet and logistics services."

Analyst Philix Liu of market research firm Mintel told The Straits Times that China is likely to see a rising number of rural entrepreneurs, with more graduates and migrants returning to start online businesses.

"But e-commerce firms are still in the early stage of developing the rural market so I don't expect a prominent national economic lift in the short term," he said.

"In the long run though, I would speculate that rural market growth would have a stronger and more positive impact on China's growth."

Until then, Mr Wang is more than happy to play his part. "This is just the beginning.

"After a good first experience, I will definitely be buying more things online now," he said.

--------





_An Alibaba rural service centre in Jinjia Village, Tonglu, Zhejiang province. E-commerce growth in the countryside now outpaces that in major cities. Alibaba expects the rural online market to be worth about 460 billion yuan ($74 billion) by next year, more than double the 180 billion yuan last year._





_A customer checking a parcel at the Alibaba rural service centre in Jinjia village. Products ordered online are transported to such centres which are often located in the villages' main convenience stores. This means rural consumers can get their online purchases delivered almost to their doorstep._





_Wantou village in Binzhou city in Shandong province is one of China's more than 200 Taobao villages. More than half of its 1,700 households make a living selling things online. Reflecting its e-commerce leaning, one slogan pictured here (above) reads: "Rather than running to and fro outside, isn't it better to stay at home and Taobao?"_





_In delivering goods ordered online to rural areas, logistical challenges are overcome by whatever means possible. In Longnan, Gansu province, entrepreneur Lee Yonglong faced a road block when he tried to deliver a parcel to a village. The alternative route required him to wade through an icy river stream (above) for about 30 minutes._





_An Alibaba logistics worker (above, in red) helps to deliver parcels to Mudun Island in Sihong county, Jiangsu province, using a speedboat. Due to the island's inaccessibility, Alibaba opened a rural service centre on it. Mr Tian Qianchun (seen here in the boat) is the island's sole Alibaba representative and has been using his own speedboat to deliver goods._

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## JSCh

*'Taobao village' on the move to deliver perfect holiday *
(chinadaily.com.cn) Updated: 2015-12-31 13:36




Employees of an online store process orders in Qingyanliu village, East China's Zhejiang province on Dec 29, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]​
E-commerce has delivered prosperity to Qingyanliu, a village in East China's Zhejiang province. With many residents operating online stores, it has been dubbed the No 1 e-commerce village in the country and is also referred as the Taobao village.

As Chinese Spring Festival nears, 3,000 online stores in the village are busy preparing for the crucial holiday season. According to the local authority, the village is expected to see total online transactions reach 4 billion yuan ($616 million) in 2015.





The truck is on its way in Qingyanliu village to deliver the goods, Dec 30, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]




Workers of an online store arrange goods in Qingyanliu village, Dec 28, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]




Workers of an online store arrange goods in Qingyanliu village, Dec 28, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]




A villager poses with Chinese knots as part of a promotional photo shoot in Qingyanliu village, Dec 30, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]




A man teaches marketing to online store owners in Qingyanliu village, Dec 30, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]​

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## ahojunk

*More villagers become e-retailers*
Not only are they becoming increasingly big online spenders but China's villagers are also quickly embracing e-commerce as retailers.

Taobao Villages, where at least 10 per cent of households make their living by selling products online and conducting at least 10 million yuan (S$2.2 million) in e-business every year, are rapidly emerging across the country as the Internet transforms the way of life of entire rural communities.

At the end of year 2014, there were 211 such villages, compared with just 20 in 2013, according to Alibaba, China's largest e-commerce company with an 80 per cent share of the online shopping market. Taobao is the firm's online consumer-to-consumer platform.

One example is Beishan village in Zhejiang province. While residents used to sell baked sesame buns known as shaobing, many are now online vendors of outdoor equipment such as tents and sleeping bags.

Beishan's fortunes changed after one of its residents, Mr Lu Zhenhong, started buying sleeping bags directly from manufacturers and selling them online in 2006. His business grew and he eventually established his own brand, BS Wolf, a reference to the name of his home town.

As of last year, there were more than 300 Taobao stores selling mostly outdoor gear and more than 600 people working in Beishan's e-commerce sector. Collectively, they churn out more than 200 million yuan in annual revenue, according to a Shanghai Daily report.

Another example of a Taobao Village is Wantou in eastern Shandong province, where grass and willow wickerwork is its 600-year-old traditional handicraft.

In 2008, its first online store was launched and, today, Wantou's 1,700 households run more than 1,000 online stores selling wickerwork products.

Some 30 stores on their own generated an annual turnover of more than one million yuan last year.

Alibaba said Taobao Villages are concentrated mostly in the coastal provinces of Zhejiang, Guangdong, Fujian, Hebei and Jiangsu. They account for more than 90 per cent of the total number.

But the phenomenon is spreading, with four villages in the inland provinces of Sichuan, Henan and Hubei making the list for the first time last year.

But there are risks involved. Vicious competition and poor quality control might lead to problems and eventually cause these small businesses to fail.

*Esther Teo*
*Straits Times*

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## ahojunk

Possibly another Singles' Day madness but on a smaller scale perhaps, to benefit the rural folks.
Good job Alibaba!

----------------
*Alibaba plans five-day ‘farmer’s festival’ to drive e-commerce in Chinese hinterlands over Lunar New Year*
With aid of Rural Taobao and Cainiao Logistics, nation’s online shopping juggernaut aims to tap broader Chinese market with series of events for this Spring Festival to build on success of Singles Day

Bien Perez
UPDATED : Friday, 15 January, 2016, 9:20pm





_Two elderly men stand in front of a ‘Rural Taobao’ workstation in Louyan village of Fenghua, Zhejiang province last month. China’s Alibaba is moving to capitalise on the largely untapped e-commerce market in China’s less developed regions._ 

Alibaba Group, which pioneered the Singles Day retail event in China that falls on November 11, is poised to make an all-out assault on the mainland’s largely untapped rural e-commerce market, with the launch of a five-day Lunar New Year online shopping festival from Sunday.

The world’s largest e-commerce services provider has mobilised affiliate Cainiao Logistics to bolster its “last-mile” delivery network in more than 270 counties and about 13,000 villages to support the new festival, an Alibaba spokeswoman said.

Cainiao’s big-data analysis and logistics infrastructure, including warehouses in five provinces, are expected to enhance delivery services during the festival.





_One of TMall rural partner finds out the measurement of an elderly folk before ordering a sweater online. This is in Louyan village of Fenghua, Zhejiang Province._

“Based on Cainiao’s big-data analysis, merchants on Alibaba platforms can deliver products that are expected to sell well to Cainiao’s county-level operations centres in advance,” the Alibaba spokeswoman said.

Those products are expected to arrive at the door of consumers in as little as 24 hours after the online orders are placed.”

Rural Taobao, the unit of Alibaba responsible for developing e-commerce business in the Chinese hinterlands, is spearheading the new online shopping festival with consumer-to-consumer platform Taobao Marketplace, business-to-consumer site Tmall.com and group-buying service Juhuasuan.

“The 11.11 shopping festival is designed for netizens, while the Chinese New Year Shopping Festival is created for farmers,” Alibaba executive chairman Jack Ma Yun said last month when the company first spoke about its rural shopping initiative.

*We aim to enable rural customers to access an extensive range of New Year goods from home and abroad, while making agriculture products from rural China more available among urban customers
ALIBABA CHIEF EXECUTIVE DANIEL ZHANG YONG*

Rural Taobao’s mandate includes organising free Chinese opera performances for rural communities and sponsor 13,000 rural service centre managers to host 10,000 New Year’s Eve dinners for the elderly, children and the disabled in each village with cuisine from all over the world.

It will also arrange for more than 500 premium overseas brands — including Uniqlo, Huggies, Estee Lauder and Lancome — to be available for the first time in the countryside.

Tmall Global, which runs the platform for overseas online merchants to sell in China, has opened a cross-border “online-to-offline experience centre” in the showcase district of Yujiapu in Tianjin, an industrial municipality near Beijing, to enable consumers in northern China to purchase branded products curated from around the world.

In addition, Tmall Global will work with eight country pavilions and some of the world’s major supermarkets, department stores and duty-free shops to provide premium goods during the festival.

“By hosting the sale, we hope to help sustain our traditional culture while also injecting new elements into the festival,” Alibaba chief executive Daniel Zhang Yong said last month.

“We aim to enable rural customers to access an extensive range of New Year goods from home and abroad, while making agriculture products from rural China more available among urban customers.”

Based in Hangzhou in Zhejiang province, Alibaba did not provide any estimates for the festival’s gross merchandise volume (GMV), which represents the total value of goods sold online during a specific period.

Alibaba posted total GMV of US$14.3 billion, all settled through its Alipay affiliate, on November 11. About 68.7 per cent of that was taken up by mobile transactions.

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## ahojunk

China Expands Cross-border E-commerce Pilot Zones to 12 Cities
2016-01-15 20:02:38 | Xinhua | Web Editor: Chu Yiming

China will set up 12 more pilot zones for cross-border e-commerce, the State Council said on Friday.

The State Council approved the establishment of zones in Tianjin, Shanghai, Chongqing, Hefei, Zhengzhou, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Dalian, Ningbo, Qingdao, Shenzhen and Suzhou, according to a statement released by the State Council.

The move followed the approval of a pilot zone in Hangzhou, where e-commerce giant Alibaba is headquartered, in March last year.

The new pilot zones will model themselves on Hangzhou while taking localized development measures, the statement said.

By experimenting with new models for technical standards, business procedures, regulatory mechanisms and other areas, the new zones aim to provide transferable experience to businesses nationwide.

The zones will attract businesses, help create jobs and nurture new business models to boost foreign trade and stimulate the economy, the State Council said earlier in a meeting.

The expansion of the pilot zones came at a time when the country is facing sluggish foreign trade. Total export and import value for 2015 decreased 7 percent year on year, falling for the first time in six years.

The Ministry of Commerce predicted that the trade volume of cross-border e-commerce in 2016 will reach 6.5 trillion yuan and will account for 20 percent of China's foreign trade in a few years.

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## ahojunk

No kidding! 

*Cargo ship auctioned on taobao.com




*

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## ahojunk

Alibaba is venturing into more areas of online activities....

------------------------
*Alibaba Ups The B2B Ante*
ByPYMNTS | Posted on January 14, 2016






Chinese eCommerce conglomerate Alibaba is once again bolstering its business-to-business capabilities.

Reports in the _South China Morning Post_ on Wednesday (Jan. 13) said Alibaba revealed having more than 25 partnerships with credit rating agencies and financial institutions throughout the globe as part of its strategy to link SMEs on its platform with working capital.

The collaborations mean small and medium-sized enterprises can use Alibaba to connect to cross-border trade finance, as well as to a new credit reporting tool, reports said.

“To Alibaba, regardless of B2B exports or imports, the ecosystem is very important,” said Alibaba Group CEO Daniel Zhang at a conference in China on Tuesday. “The Alibaba mission is to make it easy to do any type of business.”

At present, only Chinese companies can access funding from Alibaba and its banking partnerships. Existing bank partners include MYBank, Bank of China and China Merchants Bank.

According to the company’s president of B2B operations, Sophie Wu, the firm has begun work to launch a new credit rating system for Chinese suppliers, slated to debut later this year. Dubbed credit.alibaba.com, the platform will provide a credit score for businesses based on ratings aggregated from traditional credit scoring companies, as well as data from the Alibaba platform itself.

“By building up the credit profiles of Chinese SMEs based on business-related data, Alibaba.com’s credit reporting service can help overseas buyers identify trustworthy trading partners and provide Chinese suppliers access to innovative financing options,” Wu said.

Alibaba had already entered the credit scoring industry through its financial unit, Ant Financial, which launched a credit scoring offering last year in a collaboration with China’s central bank.

The development of a credit scoring service and the expansion of its SME trade financing efforts follow an agreement made in December with trade show corporation UBM, a deal that reports said will see Alibaba encouraging connectivity between buyers and suppliers at events.

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## ahojunk

*Online shopping in the Orient*
BY THO XIN YI
Saturday, 16 January 2016






I was balancing four parcels in my arms when a fellow passenger in the lift – a man in his 60s – commented, “Shopping for the upcoming Spring festival, eh?”

I smiled, but then the lift door opened before I could ask him if he shopped online, too.

Since stepping foot in China two-and-a-half years ago, virtual shopping megamall Taobao and its sister site, Tmall, along with Amazon China and JD.com have played an indispensable role in my life.

Before I got familiar with the neighbourhood and the city of Beijing in general, these online platforms were my go-to saviours to source necessities, ranging from plants to lightbulbs.

In fact, when I tried to find out from acquaintances where to look for certain things, their replies were always the same: “Just look it up on Taobao. You can find everything you need.”

True enough, it has seldom let me down.

The millions of sellers on Taobao do not only offer locally produced merchandise but also products from all over the world, including 3-in-1 coffee and instant noodles from home.

Just a few clicks and the items will be delivered within days by the express delivery companies.

While shoppers have to exercise caution to discern the authenticity and quality of products a lot of the time, Taobao is convenient, affordable and hard to resist.

Even friends back home have been lured by its wonders.

My friend, Tze Chin has been a loyal shopper for years, relying on Taobao for toys, children’s apparel and household essentials.

“If we compare the prices and take international shipping costs into consideration, the same items are way too expensive in Malaysia,” she said, adding that it was worth the wait for the forwarder to collect the items on her behalf in China and then send them to her at one go.

The hardcore Taobao fan also raved about the image search function in the Taobao mobile app, which allows her to snap photos of an item that she is looking for – a dress on another shopping site, for instance – and search for similar product on Taobao.

More often than not, the search will lead her to cheaper products.

The increasing popularity of Taobao in Southeast Asia has prompted the e-commerce giant to establish its presence in Singapore in September 2013 to meet the needs of its customers in the region, particularly Singapore and Malaysia.

“The focus of our local team in Singapore is to create an enhanced experience for users in the region, in the areas of payment, logistics and user interface,” Alibaba Group international B2C division marketing head, Karen Lam said.

Women’s apparel, consumer electronics, bags, luggage, toys and children’s clothing are the popular categories among Malaysian Taobao users.

During the online shopping festival on Nov 11 last year, which saw Taobao raking in US$14.3bil (RM62.6bil) in gross merchandise volume, Malaysian shoppers also joined in the festivities.

The top five categories of products purchased by Malaysians were dresses, handbags, T-shirts, mobile phone cases and vacuum cleaning robots.

The only setback for Taobao’s Malaysian users is that the interface is in Chinese, which means only those who read Chinese can use Taobao with ease.

Taobao said it had no plans to roll out an English-language website at this moment.

“Our platform displays user-generated content and product listings from our millions of sellers, and the majority of them communicate primarily in Chinese.

“Having said that, we do offer English translation of certain phrases on important pages, such as the order placement and payment pages, to facilitate the check-out process for our overseas buyers,” Lam said.

Home to 600 million people, South-East Asia offers a huge opportunity for Taobao.

“There is also a huge gap between Southeast Asia and other markets in terms of e-commerce penetration in retail sales, which implies significant growth potential for online shopping in this part of the world,” added Lam.

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## JSCh

*Feature: Internet adds spin to China's circular economy*
Xinhua Finance 2016-01-19 11:17 BEIJING

Life has been hard for Jin Yuhua and her husband. They moved from Shandong Province in 1997 and have worked as trash collectors in north Beijing since.

In sweltering heat and freezing cold, they sit on an old tricycle outside a housing compound, waiting for someone to buy rubbish that has a tradable value -- newspapers, plastics bottles, old appliances and the like.

The development of the Internet seemed almost irrelevant to their livelihood, but an O2O (online to offline) application is now changing their lives. When they began to use Bangdaojia, an application that allows users to request a garbage pickup on their smart phones, they went from waiting aimlessly in the street to offering a door-to-door service by appointment.

And much to their surprise, application developer Beijing Incom Resources Recovery Co Ltd offered them formal employment. Incom built its reputation on its plastic-bottle collecting machines that reward depositors.

By the end of 2015, Incom had recycled 18 million plastic bottles in Beijing through more than 3,000 machines. Incom general manager Chang Tao believes the machines, based on the Internet of Things, have something in common with the O2O application: they are changing the final destiny of rubbish.

Like many other garbage collectors in China, Jin and her husband are the start of the long recycling chain. They usually sell garbage to small waste collection agencies, which will resell it to recycling enterprises.

As the cost of processing recyclable materials is high for licensed recycling enterprises, says Chang, their price offers are less competitive than unlicensed agencies. As a result, a lot of garbage goes to underground collection and processing centers.

"I have been to some illegal processing centers on the outskirts of Beijing that exude a pungent smell. They don't have sewage treatment or proper environmental protection facilities. The chemicals are discharged into rivers or the earth, causing secondary pollution," Chang says.

"Incorporating Internet technology into the recycling chain not only expands the raw materials base, but also shows us who is recycling and where. We use the Internet to monitor recycled garbage and make sure it goes to legitimate factories where it is processed without pollution."

The recycling sector is one of the beneficiaries of Chinese government's "Internet Plus" initiative to enable more businesses to harness the Internet. GEM, a listed company and one of the forerunners in China's recycling industry, is trying to make a difference with the Internet.

GEM launched its O2O platform Recycling Brother in Shenzhen in August 2015 and promoted it in other cities including Wuhan, Jingmen and Tianjin. Users can sell any kind of trash that has a recycling value through the platform's detailed refuse classification.

With more than 3,000 offline garbage collectors joining the project, the platform's daily collection reaches 300 tons. Zhang Yuping, general manager of the Recycling Brother, says GEM has strengthened capacity in recycling materials since it was established on 2001, but encountered bottleneck in development.

"The problem is the lack of raw materials, which is also a problem for China's recycling industry. We are competing with underground collection centers and I hope this O2O platform that allows us to collect materials directly from the user will help," Zhang says.

More than eight cities, including Beijing and Shenzhen, have been exploring refuse classification since 2000, but so much is still randomly discarded due to the lack of workable methods and poor public awareness.

Zhang says the O2O platform's detailed refuse classification system to some extent solves the problem of incomplete waste sorting. And the rewards for selling garbage will promote the "trash-to-treasure" concept and encourage more people to participate.

"The 'Internet+Recycle' mode is viable commercially and environmentally. We have carried out extensive cooperation with local governments and hope the joint efforts of government, enterprise and individual will promote the circular economy," Zhang says.

China's Central Urban Work Conference held in December 2015 called for creative city management. Pan Yonggang, vice president of the China Resource Recycling Association, thinks 'Internet+Recycle' helps the government to promote management standards and innovation.

"The contribution made by thousands of migrant workers like Jin Yuhua, has been indispensable to China's recycling industry. The new trend is turning them into more-organized industry workers, to build a healthy collection system, which is essential to develop a circular economy," Pan says.

With recycling enterprises benefiting from the Internet, some Internet-based start-ups such as Zai Shenghuo and Ai Huishou have also branched into the recycling industry.

Pan is happy to see this, but he also advises that O2O-based refuse collection cannot survive without proper offline garbage management: "A well-Integrated recycling system needs both."

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## ahojunk

*Can e-commerce save China’s luxury goods market?*
Editor's Pick 22-Jan-2016.






French luxury brand Louis Vuitton is seeking to sue three counterfeiters who sold fake Louis Vuitton products on Taobao, Alibaba's e-commerce marketplace, between 2011 and 2014, according to information released by Beijing's Haidian District Court earlier this month. One of the counterfeiters made a profit of 1 million yuan ($152,367) from selling fake goods online, according to the court information. Louis Vuitton is demanding damages of 250,000 yuan, and as this is a relatively small amount, it seems the brand's main interest is to deter counterfeiters. 

Luxury goods consumption in China has undoubtedly shrunk, due to the overall economic slowdown, the government's campaign against austerity and extravagance, and Chinese buyers' increasing preference to buy overseas in order to benefit from lower prices. Another recent issue has been the depreciation of the yuan. In response, leading brands such as Prada and Burberry are limiting the opening of brick-and-mortar stores and even closing some existing ones. More and more labels are also shifting their strategic focus to e-commerce sales. There may still be a problem with sales of counterfeit goods, but online platforms in China could offer new hope for luxury brands.

There are several factors in favor of global luxury companies' digital efforts. The majority of luxury goods consumers in China are younger than 45, which roughly coincides with the age of active Internet users and frequent Internet buyers. 

In terms of brand communications and operations, online channels can be a cost-efficient way of narrowing cultural barriers and cultivating consumer loyalty. Off-line advertising campaigns and publicity events are generally time-consuming and require a substantial amount of human resources and capital investment. 

But international luxury brands need to pay attention to several aspects in order for their e-tailing pain to achieve better traction. First, they need to offer more reasonable prices. The fact that prices are currently higher in China than overseas is a big part of the reason why Chinese consumers are less eager to buy luxury goods in the domestic market. 

Second, they need to pay attention to the social comparison factor that influences Chinese consumers' decisions on buying luxury goods. Unlike the US and Japan, luxury consumption is not simply individual behavior in China. It is prompted by social causes, and buyers pay attention to what products people in their age group or professional category are buying. Desire for status symbols and self-reward are two important psychological motives for Chinese consumers' willingness to purchase luxury goods. Companies can tap into this by designing more appealing and even personalized interactive interfaces when cooperating with e-commerce platforms in China. For example, Burberry has teamed up with WeChat to launch an interactive messaging service that allows users to "unwrap" the brand's products via tapping, swiping and shaking. It also enables users to create a personalized digital Lunar New Year envelope to send to friends and family, a move that potentially enhances the role of social influence in Chinese luxury consumption. 

There are some things that Chinese online retailers need to do as well. First is getting rid of vendors that sell knock-off products. Even though this may take time, a platform that can build a transparent ecosystem with zero tolerance of counterfeit goods will be the one that international luxury brands are most eager to cooperate with. 

As the online luxury market in China is being reshaped, 2016 is expected to be an eventful year. It may see the disappearance of small-scale online retailers known for selling fake goods, and the emergence of new partnerships between international luxury brands and Chinese e-commerce giants. And Chinese consumers will be the true beneficiaries.

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## ahojunk

Now, that is one good looking delivery person

-----
*Online shopping company to hire foreign couriers for Spring Festival*
By Gao Yinan (People's Daily Online) 14:14, January 27, 2016




An e-commerce supplier in China plans to recruit international students to be couriers so as to ensure efficient express delivery services during Spring Festival, China Business News reports.

Online shopping sites are short-handed due to an exodus of workers for weeks before and after China's Lunar New Year, which falls on Feb 8 this year. But in a competitive market, companies such as JD.com, Cainiao and Alibaba have promised to keep business normal, at least in major cities, during the festive season.

Suning Tesco suggested its customers should not feel surprised when opening the door and seeing a foreign guy saying, "Here's your delivery!" as the company is inviting foreign students to be couriers in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Nanjing and Chengdu.

Foreign couriers are trained with courier skills, etiquette and Chinese culture and custom during Spring Festival and start working from Feb. 1.

Besides the shortage of employees, the express delivery industry was hit hard by the cold front that swept most parts of China.

Facing a slew of delays, the speed of parcel deliveries has slowed by 20 percent from Jan. 20 to Jan. 24, largely due to the bad weather, according to statistics from Cainiao and Alibaba.

Couriers are also facing other barriers, such as traffic congestion and frozen fuel tanks.


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## ahojunk

*Alibaba revenue jumps 32 percent*
CNBC.com staff | @CNBC
12 Mins Ago
Carlos Barria | Reuters





_An employee walks past the Alibaba logo at the company’s headquarters outside of Hangzhou, China._

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba's third-quarter revenue rose 32 percent, helped by the holiday shopping quarter, and beat analysts' average estimate.

Shares of Alibaba rose more than 3 percent in premarket trading immediately following the announcement.

Revenue rose to 34.53 billion yuan ($5.25 billion) in the quarter ended Dec. 31, compared with the average analyst estimate of 33.33 billion yuan, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Alibaba posted adjusted earnings of 99 cents a share.

Gross merchandise volume (GMV), or the total value of goods transacted on its platforms on China retail marketplaces, rose 23 percent to 964 billion yuan.

Alibaba competes with smaller rival JD.com, which has focused on more affluent shoppers in China's biggest cities, a strategy that may be paying off in an economy that last year grew at its weakest pace in a quarter of a century.

While the two companies calculate the total value of goods sold, or GMV, differently, JD.com's GMV grew 82 percent in the nine-months to September while Alibaba's rose 34 percent, suggesting China's biggest e-tailer was losing market share.

Earlier this month, Alibaba Chief Executive Daniel Zhang said the company will pivot towards "first-tier" cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou, after having trumpeted a push into China's countryside, as well as abroad.

— Reuters contributed to this report.

CORRECTION: This story has been corrected to say gross merchandise volume rose to 964 billion yuan, not 964 million yuan.

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## ahojunk

Alibaba's strong earnings seen as good news for China's economy
January 29, 2016
Paul Mozur






_Employees at Alibaba's headquarters in Hangzhou, China. Photo: Nelson Ching_

Gu Minghui's sugar-cookie business is enjoying growing sales and continued profits. The big question, for China's Alibaba Group and the Chinese economy, is whether the country's appetite will last.

Gu, a 37-year-old in Shanghai, worries that falling demand could hurt her business despite the current good times. "I'm not very confident" on e-commerce, she said. "The economic situation is not good this year, and I don't expect it to be any better next year."

Economists and investors alike are watching Gu and the millions of others who sell goods on Alibaba's Chinese e-commerce platforms for signs of resilience from consumers. That has made Alibaba a proxy for Chinese consumption and the economy - a proxy whose shares have been hurt in recent weeks amid growing unease about China.

On Thursday, the US-traded Alibaba offered investors a reason to cheer up. It said its profit doubled and its sales rose by nearly a third in its quarter ended in December in a potentially positive sign for consumer strength in its home country.

Gross merchandise volume, a closely followed measure of the total transactions on the company's websites, rose 23 per cent from the same period a year earlier to $US149 billion ($210 billion).

"The Chinese economy is going through a structural shift to more moderate, but more sustainable, growth," Joe Tsai, Alibaba's executive vice chairman, said in a conference call. He added, "it's still one of the fastest-growing economies in the world and we have no reason to think anything different in the future."

Citing the fact that retail sales in China grew more than 10 per cent in 2015, and that Alibaba is taking business from traditional bricks-and-mortar shops, Tsai said he thought Alibaba was insulated from the deceleration of the Chinese economy.

*Betting on China's prospects*

China's emerging buying class has grown in importance as the country's previous growth engines, like heavy manufacturing and exports slow, hurting global markets. Investors are using Alibaba's shares to make bets on the country's prospects.

Beijing is hoping that consumer spending on sites like Alibaba's will counterbalance the slowdown in other parts of the economy. Many investors doubt that will happen. They argue that market volatility, along with China's slowing economy, will eventually leak into consumer sentiment and hit companies like Alibaba and another US-traded rival, the search provider Baidu. Investors this year have punished Alibaba, pushing its shares down about 16 per cent.

"If you're sitting in Boston or New York and you want to trade China, the most liquid proxies are Alibaba and Baidu," said Chi Tsang, an analyst at HSBC.

Alibaba on Thursday said it made continued progress in tapping the growing numbers of Chinese who use their smartphones to buy goods and services online. The company's sales on smartphones almost tripled from the same period last year, and its monthly active smartphone users rose to 393 million, a jump of 47 million from the previous quarter.

In 2015, Alibaba captured about 35 per cent of the $US15.8 billion mobile ad market compared with just 29.2 per cent in 2014, according to the research firm eMarketer.

If the company wanted to, it could also do more to extract money from vendors like Gu. With the power to drive traffic, Alibaba is mostly in the business of selling ads and spots that get internet traffic to vendors.

Still, the company has been spending big to bolster growth in new sectors, including an expensive dive into online-to-offline services, which allow customers to use their smartphones to order a variety of goods and services, including meals and massages.

The New York Times

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## TaiShang

*Jack Ma's business school picks new students*
CRI, January 30, 2016

Jack Ma, founder of China's largest online shopping platform Alibaba, is starting a second round of courses on entrepreneurship for 40 business people in March at Hupan University.



Jack Ma, founder of China's largest online shopping platform Alibaba, speaks at the Hupan University. [Photo: qq.com]

Located in Hangzhou City, east China's Zhejiang Province, the university was established last year by Jack Ma, and co-founded by seven other well-established entrepreneurs and distinguished scholars. The non-profit college was created to foster China's next generation of top entrepreneurs.

Applicants need to have at least three years' experience of being the CEO of their own businesses; employ a team of more than 30 people; and have been recommended by three referees, drawn from Hupan's trustees, sponsors or alumni.

Entrepreneurs including Fok Kai-man, Vice-president of Fok Ying Tung Group and grandchild of the Hong Kong tycoon Henry Fok, and Jared Psigoda, co-founder and CEO at Reality Squared Games, who will be the first foreign student at Jack Ma's class, have already been selected out of 1800 aspiring applicants.

Many of the students already play a leading role in their own fields, such as the internet, real estate, manufacturing, the entertainment industry, and high-tech business.

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## ahojunk

Good move.
This will reduce corruption and conflict of interest.

-------------
*Officials prohibited from running e-commerce*
2016-01-26 09:10 | Global Times | Editor: Qian Ruisha

Civil servants and Party members are banned from running stores on online shopping platforms like taobao.com, a newspaper affiliated with the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, China's top disciplinary watchdog, and the Ministry of Supervision, said in a report on Monday.

In response to a question whether it is legal for officials who are members of the Communist Party of China (CPC) to own online stores on e-commerce platform taobao.com or social networking app WeChat, the Zhongguo Jijian Jiancha Bao newspaper said on its website officials who were Party members were prohibited from operating online stores, according to a set of Party rules on sanctions for those who violate the Party code of conduct, which stipulates that members engaging in profit-making activities will be punished.

According to the Party rules, the profit-making activities include running businesses, owning shares of an unlisted company, purchasing and selling stocks as well as securities as a means of investment, offering paid agent services, and registering or investing in companies abroad.

Those who breach the Party rules will be warned, deprived of their Party positions, or expelled from the Party, depending on the seriousness of their violations, said the article.

The CPC Central Committee in October 2015 issued the set of Party rules which took effect since January 1, 2016.

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## ahojunk

_"The Chinese Internet has helped Chinese people overcome poverty and I think this is a great success," said Nebe. 
This is good stuff!_

------------
*Internet helping Guizhou lift millions out of poverty*
Editor: zhangrui 丨Chinadaily
01-13-2016 06:31 BJT

With the booming development of e-commerce and big data technology, a southwestern Chinese province aims to lift millions out of poverty as the nation is making its final five-year dash to make all of its 1.3 billion people live a comfortable life.

In Guizhou province's five-year plan to develop society and the economy between 2016 and 2020, big data and big poverty alleviation are highlighted as two major strategies, according Liu Yuankun, the province's vice governor who is in charge of poverty alleviation.

"This means we will make full use of big data technology to reduce poverty," said Liu.

According to the province's schedule, more than 3 million of the remaining 6.23 million people living below poverty line will be lifted out of poverty by the end of 2017 and all will shake off poverty by 2020.

With the help of big data technology, a "poverty alleviation cloud" has been built, an electronic platform that pools all updated information about residents living below the poverty line such as their location, the causes of their poverty, how much subsidies they get and by what kind of poverty alleviation project they are covered, said Liu. "

By following the data stored in the 'poverty alleviation cloud', we are able to deliver more precise and targeted help to those in poverty," added Liu. Statistics show that Guizhou managed to lift 5.29 million people out of poverty from the beginning of 2011 to the end of 2014, which means that more than one million people in the province shook off poverty annually during the period.

Weining, a gathering place for Yi, Hui and Miao nationalities, is one of Guizhou's poorest counties because although it has favorable natural conditions to grow apple trees it's very difficult for local residents to sell them due to poor marketing skills.

However, now with the help of WeChat, the most widely used instant messaging and also one of the most influential e-commerce mobile app in China, local residents are able to sell ten tons of apples in a week, said Chris Nebe, CEO of Monarex Hollywood, who is currently shooting a documentary about Guizhou.

Rough estimates reveal that the province lifted 1.3 million out of poverty in 2015.

Nationwide, China was the first developing country to meet the Millennium Development Goals target of reducing the population living in poverty by half ahead of the 2015 deadline. Over the past three decades some 700 million rural residents across China have shaken off poverty.

"The Chinese Internet has helped Chinese people overcome poverty and I think this is a great success," said Nebe.

By the end of 2015, China still had 70.17 million people in the countryside living below its poverty line of 2,300 yuan ($376) in annual income by 2010 price standards.

Chinese President Xi Jinping urged local governments and Party committees in November to place poverty alleviation at the top of their work agenda.

But helping more than 70 million shake off poverty will be much harder than the lifting of 700 million out of their impoverished conditions that has been achieved in the past more than three decades, since those still living in destitution are either stranded in rural areas that are hard to reach or endure difficulties that they cannot overcome on their own.

"Internet has become a tool for poor Chinese people to make a better life," said Nebe.

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## TaiShang

China is determined to fully utilize Made in China 2020 objectives along the same line with Germany's Industry 4.0.

With its mature manufacturing and exceptional logistics (and huge affluent consumer basis), it is impossible not to materialize within the said timeframe.

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## ahojunk

*Internet firms battle for relevance in red envelope race*
(Xinhua) 09:13, February 10, 2016





_Traditionally, Chinese people gives red envelopes filled with money, known as "Hongbao," to friends and relatives during the Lunar New Year celebrations. [Photo by Liu Junfeng/for China Daily]_

BEIJING -- Worried about losing traffic on their smartphone apps while people are distracted by Spring Festival celebrations, Chinese internet firms vied to keep users tuned in with cash gifts.

Traditionally, Chinese people gives red envelopes filled with money, known as "Hongbao," to friends and relatives during the Lunar New Year celebrations. Tapping into the tradition, internet firms including Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu and Sina Weibo launched apps that enabled users to send, snatch and draw cyber red envelopes on their smartphones.

Alibaba's financial arm Ant Financial allowed users of its mobile payment app Alipay Wallet to draw money in the run-up to the Lunar New Year Eve.

It partnered with the state broadcaster's annual Spring Festival gala as its official red envelope distributor during the gala's five-hour broadcast on the new year's eve.

Tencent got the upper hand on the social front as its popular instant messaging app WeChat was the primary platform for hundreds of millions of smartphone users sending and opening digital red envelopes between friends, colleagues and family.

Tencent launched the red envelope service two years ago in hope that tradition would encourage people to exchange cyber red envelopes on WeChat and spend the money through its payment service Tenpay.

The plan worked, with millions of users tying their bank card with Tenpay to transfer money, shop online or simply send out more cyber envelopes on WeChat. Other domestic internet firms followed suit, but with mixed results.

The enthusiasm for various forms of cyber red envelopes has been high among Chinese smartphone users, though the money they get is often minuscule.

Despite shaking her phone day after day for pocket money from Alipay this year, Hao Yueyua often received less than one yuan. But she never gets bored.

"It has a lot to do with luck, but that's what makes red envelopes on the smartphone so fun," Hao said.

For others, cyber envelopes have made gift-giving during this time of the year less burdensome.

"Sending out money envelopes on smartphone is so much more efficient than handing out physical ones," said Wu Yan, who works at a bank in central China.

"It really saves me from all the usual back-and-forth when friends and relatives show their politeness by pretending to refuse your money envelopes," she said.

Chinese microblog Sina Weibo reported a surge in daily active users on Sunday thanks to the red envelopes distributed on its apps and a surge in discussions about the Spring Festival gala.

Sina said the number of active users from Sunday to the early morning of Monday, when the five-hour live broadcast of the Spring Festival gala ended and the Chinese Lunar Year of the Monkey officially began, surged 31 percent from last year's Lunar New Year eve on Feb. 18, 2015.

It said promotional cash gifts have been distributed to 100 million users through the platform.

Celebrities and dignitaries from Hong Kong and Taiwan to the United States and the United Kingdom also used Weibo to send out celebratory greetings for the Lunar New Year. The United Nations teamed up with Chinese actor Liuxiaolingtong, known in China for his portrayal of Monkey King in the TV series Journey to the West, to send out wishes to the Chinese for the Year of Monkey.


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## ahojunk

*Target HR chief Jodee Kozlak heads to Alibaba*
Longtime manager Stephanie Lundquist to replace Jodee Kozlak. 

*By Evan Ramstad* Star Tribune
FEBRUARY 12, 2016 — 7:25PM





_Jodee Kozlak, who has been Target's human resources chief for the past nine years, is heading to Alibaba Group as global HR chief_.

Jodee Kozlak, who was Target Corp.’s human resources chief for the past nine years, will join Alibaba Group as global senior vice president of human resources, the Chinese e-commerce company announced Friday.

Target separately announced that it promoted Stephanie Lundquist, a human resources executive with a decade of experience at the Minneapolis-based retailer, to succeed Kozlak as HR chief.

With the move, Kozlak, 52, joins a company that is smaller than Target but one that is growing far more quickly and considered by investors to be much more valuable. Alibaba has dominated the Chinese e-commerce market for more than a decade. Its 2014 initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange was the largest in U.S. history.

For Target, Kozlak’s departure marks another significant change in the group of executives who directly report to Chief Executive Brian Cornell, who has been with the company for 19 months.

The company’s human resources department becomes the fifth major unit with a leadership change since Cornell took over. He also hired a new chief financial officer, chief information officer and chief risk and compliance officer, and is looking for a chief merchandising officer. He created the role of chief operating officer, shifting finance chief John Mulligan into that job.

Kozlak became Target’s top human resources leader in March 2007, after serving as a senior vice president in the department for a year. She had previously been an executive and general counsel in the human resources unit.

“Jodee’s contributions in the past 15 years have made a tremendous impact on Target and our team members globally,” Cornell said in a statement.

Kozlak joined the company in 2001 from the Minneapolis law firm of Greene Espel, where she was a partner. She has been active with a number of Twin Cities cultural and educational institutions, including the boards of the Guthrie Theater and the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management. She is also on the board of C.H. Robinson, the logistics company based in Eden Prairie.

Lundquist, 40, was most recently senior vice president of human resources at Target and was responsible for personnel at the company’s Minneapolis headquarters as well as its operations in India.

“Stephanie has played a critical leadership role in Target’s transformation efforts, developing and initiating the human resources strategies necessary to drive long-term growth for Target,” Cornell said. “She’s been a leading voice as we push ourselves to think differently and work in new ways across Target.”

Lundquist wasn’t available for comment, a Target spokeswoman said, and Kozlak couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

At Alibaba, Kozlak is expected to play a key role in the company’s international expansion. The firm, which generated about $15 billion in revenue last year, provides software that is used by both consumers on smartphones and businesses in their data centers to facilitate transactions. Alibaba services are used by 450 million people daily. Its main shopping site, called Taobao, accounts for about 80 percent of all e-commerce transactions in China. Its Alipay financial payments system is ubiquitous in the country, used for purchases of all kinds and even to transfer money between people’s smartphones.

The firm now employs about 250 people in the U.S., chiefly in offices in the San Francisco area and Seattle with new ones to open in New York and Washington. Kozlak is likely to divide her time among the Bay Area, New York and the company’s headquarters in Hangzhou, China. She will report to Jane Jiang, who co-founded Alibaba with Chief Executive Jack Ma and is its HR chief, and to Michael Evans, the company’s president.

The firm is trying to attract more American businesses to sell products to Chinese consumers, an effort that is driving its expansion in the U.S.


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## ahojunk

_Is it going to be 5th time lucky for Applepay? 
Let's wait and see, but I don't think so._

-----------------
*Apple Pay launches in China, takes on entrenched rivals Alibaba and Tencent*





Paul Carsten 
February 18, 2016: 

Apple Inc launched its mobile payment system in China on Thursday in a bid to convince the hundreds of millions of users of the country’s entrenched, dominant services to switch.

“We think China could be our largest Apple Pay market,” Jennifer Bailey, vice president of Apple Pay, told Reuters in an interview in Beijing.

In an early boost, China’s biggest lender, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd (ICBC), was among the banks that said earlier this week that customers would be able to use Apple Pay from Thursday.

However, Apple Pay has not had an easy ride so far in China, the fifth country to get the service. Even in its U.S. home market, Apple has faced sceptical retailers in its effort to develop a new revenue stream.

China is not likely to prove any easier to crack.

“People switch applications for significantly better experiences, it (Apple) has to deliver not just a little bit more secure, or a little bit easier to use,” said Mark Natkin, founder of Marbridge Consulting.

Greater China is Apple’s second-largest market by revenue, and the world’s biggest smartphone market. By the end of 2015, 358 million people, more than the U.S. population, had already taken to buying goods and services by mobile phone, according to the China Internet Network Information Center.

The vast majority are using payment services from China’s two biggest Internet companies that have existed for years.

Social networking and gaming firm Tencent Holdings Ltd operates WeChat Payment, and e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, through its Internet finance affiliate Ant Financial Services Group, runs Alipay.

“With 100 percent saturation of local payment systems, no one in China is clamouring for Apple Pay,” said one retailer who declined to be named for fear of harming business prospects. “Today, everyone has a local payment option on their phone, so Apple Pay is a solution in need of a problem.”

BANKS ON BOARD

Deeply ingrained in China’s Internet, domestic payment services cover much more than ride hailing, food delivery and online shopping. Users can invest in wealth management funds, pay utility bills, send gifts to friends and give to charity.

An Ant Financial spokeswoman said Alipay has over 400 million active users, with 80 percent on mobile.

“Alipay is an app for both (Google software) Android and (Apple’s) iOS system and has little requirements for the make and model of the mobile phone,” she said.

The U.S. firm has 19 of China’s biggest lenders as partners. That means 80 percent of China’s credit and debit cards are eligible for Apple Pay, usable at about one-third of all locations that accept those cards, Apple’s Bailey said.

Apple’s approach is to not compete with banks and UnionPay, said Bailey.

“China UnionPay and our Apple Pay solution has a huge advantage, given the footprint of China UnionPay,” she said. “Its merchant acceptance network far exceeds what any of the other mobile platforms have today.”

Though banks have been rivals elsewhere, industry watchers say this tactic may offer Apple its best prospect.

Zhao Longkai, associate professor of finance at the Peking University Guanghua School of Management, said China’s banks, and state-backed payment card monopoly China UnionPay, have rankled at the popularity of alternative mobile systems associated with Alibaba and Tencent.

“The entry of Apple Pay has the potential to change the strategic landscape,” said Zhao. “UnionPay now has an opportunity to bring a new alliance to defend the market that it is losing to Tencent or Alibaba – Apple Pay first needs to figure out a way to win over Chinese customers.”

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## JSCh

*Alibaba expands e-commerce in rural China under gov't support*
Source: Xinhua 2016-02-18 01:04:01

BEIJING, Feb. 17 (Xinhua) -- Alibaba, China's biggest online trader, reached an agreement on Wednesday with the top economic planner to expand e-commerce in rural areas.

The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) will work with Alibaba in more than 300 rural areas to develop e-commerce, which is expected to optimize the agricultural industrial chain and encourage rural people to start their own businesses.

E-commerce is developing quickly in rural China as farmers begin selling produce online. E-commerce giants such as Alibaba and JD have set up service stations in villages to help those who lack the necessary skills to shop online. Villagers can order goods at the stations and return a few days later to collect their packages.

The number of Alibaba village service stations has risen from three in 2009 to 780, with plans to build a total of 100,000 such stations and 1,000 county-level stations by 2019. Total investment is projected to be 10 billion yuan (1.53 billion U.S. dollars).

China's online sales remained strong in 2015, jumping 33.3 percent year on year to 3.88 trillion yuan.

Online sales in rural areas grew more rapidly, doubling the pace of growth in urban areas. Rural netizens, who account for nearly one-third of the total, spent 195 million yuan online last year.

Online retailers made great efforts to tap the potential of the rural market. Last year, 22.4 percent of online shoppers came from rural areas.

"Developing e-commerce in rural areas is not only beneficial to entrepreneurship and employment, but also helpful to upgrading the economic growth mode at the county level and relieving poverty," said Wang Xiaotao, deputy head of the NDRC.

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## JSCh

*Alibaba Blazes a Trail with Online Health Care Pilot*
_Internet giant launches service providing diagnoses and prescriptions to fishing village in Hubei, and other companies are mulling similar businesses
_
By staff reporter Li Yan




(Beijing) – Villagers in the central province of Hubei recently spoke with doctors hundreds of kilometers away through the Net and then had prescriptions delivered to their doors as part of China's emerging Internet health care service.

Like many fishing villages, Hongshiyuchang has poor public transportation and is far away from major public hospitals. Villagers usually have to spend hours on a bus to get to doctors in nearby cities, but now these isolated villages are having some of their health care needs met by Internet companies.

On January 18, a pilot launched by the e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. in Hongshiyuchang attracted many villagers who wanted to test out the new medical service. One villager, Hu Tianshun, said that after making a reservation and putting details of his health history online, he was interviewed by a doctor in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei, in a video call. After the diagnosis, the doctor placed an electronic prescription so Hu could order medicine in Alibaba's online shops. Hu got his drugs the next day, and completed the transaction by paying the deliveryman.

Hongshiyuchang is among the several villages that are part of the Alibaba pilot. Over the past two years, the company has provided various services on its e-commerce and payment platforms that allow users to make hospital appointments, buy medicines and pay their medical bills.

"We want to build a health care product sales platform that links manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers to offer various medical products and services to customers," said Ni Jianwen, vice president of Alibaba's health business division.

Other Internet companies are also eyeing the online health care sector. Tencent Holdings Ltd. has invested more than US$ 100 million in the medical service provider We Doctor Group, also known as Guahao. In December, We Doctor launched the country's first Internet-connected hospital in Wuzhen, in the eastern province of Zhejiang.

According to market research group iResearch, the country's online medical service sector had revenue of 10.9 billion yuan in 2014, up from 200 million yuan in 2009. The figure for last year would be about 16 billion yuan, iResearch predicted.

Alibaba announced its Future Hospital strategy in May 2014. The first stage of the plan is to offer online reservation, payment and health check reports for users. Next, the company wants to sell prescription drugs and delivery services. Finally, Alibaba plans to cooperate with medical institutions and equipment manufactures to offer disease prevention and health management services based on its data analysis technology.

Alibaba says its online and mobile platforms have allowed 400 major hospitals nationwide to offer reservation and payment services to more than 50 million people. The pilot in Hubei would be part of the second stage of the Internet company's plans.

*Going Online*

Alibaba's Hubei pilot has partnered with the Central Hospital of Wuhan, a major public hospital. Central Hospital agreed to offer medical inquiry services from 13 of its departments, including gastroenterology, endocrinology and dermatology.

"The cost to cooperate with Alibaba is not high," said Sun Changlin, the Communist Party chief of the hospital. "We just established an Internet office and assigned doctors from different departments to take up rotating duty for the online inquiries."

The partnership with Alibaba is part of the hospital's plan to divert some of its patients to smaller hospitals to reduce its workload, Sun said. It is a response to central government's reform plans announced last year that call for using Internet technology to direct patients to different medical institutions based on their needs to reduce the pressure on big hospitals and improve the efficiency of medical resources.

Sun said the partnership with the Internet giant generates no profit for his hospital, but he expected benefits down the road because "Alibaba can bring valuable traffic to the hospital."

Tencent also wants to be part of the trend. In September, We Doctor announced a plan to invest US$ 300 million to set up an online medical service platform within five years that would link 1,600 hospitals nationwide in offering offer online reservations, diagnoses and payment services.

In December, We Doctor launched its Wuzhen Internet Hospital to offer online medical services. It is based at the Tongxiang No. 3 People's Hospital, in Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province, in which We Doctor holds a controlling stake.

However, Sun said online medical services face limits because "many diagnoses need to be checked onsite, so Internet hospitals mainly focus on referrals and chronic disease management."

Liu Qian, an independent Internet medical service analyst, said that how well Internet companies help hospitals redistribute patients remains a question because the relationships between medical facilities are complicated.

Another obstacle facing Alibaba and Tencent is how to get their medical services covered by the national medical insurance system. Ni said due to the different regional policies, Alibaba's drug sales receipts sometimes are not accepted by local medical insurance authorities, creating difficulties for people buying medicines from the Internet firm.

*Drug Sales*

Before it partnered with Central Hospital, Alibaba sought cooperation with hospitals in Beijing and the northern province of Hebei, but failed, said a source close to the matter. The problem was that "Alibaba can't offer benefits to the hospitals," he said.

For hospitals, partnering with Alibaba to offer online prescription means they would allow patients to buy medicines from the Net firm's online pharmacies, giving up a business that accounts for nearly 70 percent of a public hospital's revenue.

The cooperation with Central Hospital was timely. In August, Wuhan severed the links between hospital income and drug sales. Instead, public hospitals in the central city were allowed to raise their prices for medical services to offset the loss.

The most important aspect of Alibaba's pilot in Wuhan is the access it gives Alibaba to a doctor writing prescriptions, the source said. "Electronic prescriptions can form a great medical database that is likely to create business value," he said.

Nearly 90 percent of prescription drugs sales are controlled by hospitals. If they are opened up to the market, total sales, including prescription drugs and over-the-counter (OTC) medicines, will hit 3 trillion yuan, predicts UBS Securities. OTC sales currently stand at about 200 billion yuan.

As part of the Hubei pilot program, Alibaba cooperates with Haoyaoshi Pharmacy Co., a subsidiary of China's largest private medicine distribution company, Jointown Pharmaceutical Group Co. After prescriptions are placed by doctors at the Central Hospital, Alibaba will send the orders to Haoyaoshi's online store and then deliver the medicines to villagers.

A person close to Jointown said deliveries handled under the pilot are being done for free, with Jointown and Alibaba sharing the costs. The question is how long this can be sustained.

"Logistics need big volumes to reduce costs," said Liu, the analyst. "If the volume can't increase quickly, it will be difficult to sustain."

And competition in the new field is already grower fierce. The China Medical Pharmaceutical Material Association said that between 2010 and 2013, online medicine sales in the country grew 250 percent every year on average. And the number of online pharmacies has risen accordingly, to 249 in 2014 from 35 in 2010. Some 10 billion yuan worth of medicines were sold online in 2014.

Alibaba's major e-commerce rivals, JD.com and yhd.com, have both gotten licenses from the government to sell medicines online. "With so many competitors joining in the game, it will be difficult for Alibaba to dominate the market," Liu predicted.

Alibaba will also face challenges with how to replicate the Hubei pilot elsewhere. An industry expert said that while We Doctor, which relies on its own hospital, Alibaba will need to find more partners to expand the pilot. But the partnership with Central Hospital has many special features, the expert said, and "it is difficult to find partners with those same features."

(Rewritten by Han Wei)

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## ahojunk

*Alibaba in Talks With Banks for up to $4 Billion Loan*
China’s biggest online shopping company plans to use funds for expansion plans





_Alibaba’s plans to add to its war chest come after it spent billions of dollars on investments and acquisitions over the past year. Above, Alibaba's headquarters on the outskirts of Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, China.PHOTO: REUTERS_

By JURO OSAWA
Feb. 26, 2016 7:10 a.m. ET

Chinese Internet giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is in discussions with banks for a loan of up to $4 billion to fund expansion plans, including acquisitions, according to people familiar with the matter.

Alibaba’s plans to add to its war chest come after it spent billions of dollars on investments and acquisitions over the past year, both in China and overseas markets such as India.

The discussions, involving several banks, started with plans for a $3 billion loan, but the amount could be increased to $4 billion, the people said. One of the people said that the loan is expected to be finalized next month.

China’s biggest online shopping company has been ramping up its investments in a wide range of businesses, from mobile apps and logistics partners in China to online payments in India.

In June, Alibaba and its financial-services affiliate said they would together invest nearly $1 billion in Koubei, a food-ordering app, to turn it into a broader service that connects online users with brick-and-mortar businesses like restaurants. Two months later, Alibaba announced it would spend about $4.5 billion for a nearly 20% stake in Chinese electronics retailer Suning Commerce Group Ltd., as part of its efforts to beef up its logistics by teaming up with a major bricks-and-mortar retail chain. In November, Alibaba said it would turn Youku Tudou Inc. into a wholly-owned unit in a deal that valued the online video provider at about $4.4 billion.

In India, Alibaba invested in online shopping startup Snapdeal.com and One97 Communications Ltd., which runs a dominant local online-payment service called Paytm.

Write to Juro Osawa at juro.osawa@wsj.com

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## JSCh

* Alibaba's Internet lender extends 45 bln yuan in loans in 8 months*
Source: Xinhua 2016-02-29 18:53:22

BEIJING, Feb. 29 (Xinhua) -- An Alibaba-backed private lender said on Monday that its focus on providing financial services to clients who are underserved by traditional banks has resulted in billions in loans to small businesses and individuals over the past eight months.

E-commerce giant Alibaba holds a 30-percent stake in MYbank through its financial arm, Ant Financial. MYbank said it has lent a total of 45 billion yuan (around 6.88 billion U.S. dollars) to farmers, merchants on Alibaba's online marketplace, restaurant owners and mom-and-pop stores, extending loans to 800,000 borrowers that have trouble accessing financing through traditional banks.

In the eight months since it opened for business last June, MYbank's loan balance has grown 30 percent each month on top of a client base that has been expanding 12 percent for the past five months.

Its rival, Tencent, also runs a private lender called WeBank based in the southern Chinese boomtown of Shenzhen. Neither lender has a physical presence, instead providing services online or through mobile applications.

They are among a group of private lenders approved by the Chinese banking regulator under a trial program to encourage lending to the country's small and private businesses and the rural population.

China's large, state-owned banks have been more inclined to lend to big, state-owned companies as the implicit guarantee they have from the government has made lending to such firms almost risk-free.

Smaller companies and individuals don't have such backing, and without adequate credit records, banks don't know how much risk they are exposed to when lending to these companies.

MYbank has tended to lend to companies and firms that have historically been underserved by big banks, while WeBank has focused on consumer credit and wealth management. Both touted their ability to accurately evaluate clients' creditworthiness based on their online activity, in addition to information gathered through traditional due diligence work.

MYbank didn't disclose the aggregate amount of credit extended to farmers, but said average credit for rural household across 2,425 villages in 24 provinces stands at 44,000 yuan.

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## JSCh

*Infographic: Charting growth of e-commerce in rural China *
(chinadaily.com.cn) Updated: 2016-03-09 07:06

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## JSCh

*Alibaba to train 1 million rural e-commerce gurus*
Source: Xinhua 2016-03-15 21:20:17

BEIJING, March 15 (Xinhua) -- Alibaba reached an agreement Tuesday with China Communist Youth League, a CPC reserve force, to train 1 million teenagers to take e-commerce to rural areas.

The agreement sealed in southwest China's Guizhou Province, means Alibaba will help the rural youth to jumpstart online businesses offering training, funds and partnerships.

Alibaba's Internet finance arm Ant Financial will earmark 1 billion yuan (154 million U.S. dollars) to support college graduates who want to return to their hometowns to start businesses.

E-commerce is developing quickly in rural China with farmers selling produce online. Service stations have been set up in villages to help those who lack the necessary skills to buy and sell online. Villagers can order goods at the stations and return a few days later to collect their packages.

The number of these village hubs has risen from three in 2009 to 780, with plans in place to build another 100,000 village stations and 1,000 county stations by 2019 at a cost of around 10 billion yuan.

China's online sales remained strong in 2015, jumping 33.3 percent to 3.88 trillion yuan. Online sales in rural areas grew at double the pace of urban areas. Rural shoppers, who account for nearly one-third of the total, spent 195 million yuan online last year.

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## JSCh

*China Focus: Agricultural e-commerce bridges China's urban-rural gap*
Source: Xinhua 2016-03-15 19:34:56

BEIJING, March 15 (Xinhua) -- A year ago, farmer Liu Tongyong, who lives deep in the mountains and had never used the Internet, was worried about his snake gourd sales.

Now the 45-year-old from east China's Anhui Province is selling his produce online. "I have not only sold out of product, but also gotten a better price," he said.

Liu's home in Taiping Village is about a two-hour ride from the seat of Yuexi County.

In the past, he had to wait for someone to collect the gourds. Sometimes the collectors wouldn't even show up. Liu had no choice but to let the fruit decay in the field.

This year, an e-commerce service center was set up in Taiping Village, which has helped more than 300 farmers sell their products. About 7,500 kilograms of snake gourds were sold in a year.

A report by the China Internet Network Information Center showed that of China's 688 million Internet users by the end of 2015, 195 million, or 28.4 percent, were rural residents.

China has witnessed a boom in rural e-commerce in recent years, with 780 villages exceeding 10 million yuan (1.5 million U.S. dollars) each in online transactions in 2015, according to a report released by online retail giant Alibaba.

China's online sales remained strong in 2015, jumping 33.3 percent year on year to 3.88 trillion yuan, with 22.4 percent of online shoppers coming from rural areas.

E-commerce has not only helped farmers sell their products, but also helped them buy things.

With the spring growing season on the way, Zhou Zhuwen in east China's Jiangxi Province is buying fertilizer for his grain online.

"It is cheaper, and I have more choices," he said. The fertilizer can be delivered to his home, saving him the trouble of transportation. "This time, I bought 20 tonnes and saved more than 10,000 yuan," he added.

"E-commerce is changing farmers' work habits and boosting their efficiency," said Zheng Fengtian, vice head of the School of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development at Renmin University.

Last year, China's Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Commerce announced 200 counties that would serve as demonstration bases for rural e-commerce and earmarked two billion yuan to help with development there.

According to Minister of Commerce Gao Hucheng, the country will reduce logistics costs, which are 15 to 16 percent of total product costs on average, almost double that in developed countries.

"Methods of consumption will be improved," he said, adding that online sales have become the trend.

In this year's government work report, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang promised to "encourage the introduction of e-commerce into rural areas", and increase the accessibility of broadband networks in both urban and rural areas.

The government has pledged to spend 140 billion yuan by 2020 to provide at least 50,000 villages with broadband Internet access. At that time, about 98 percent of the nation's rural areas will be hooked up to the Internet.

Alibaba plans to invest 10 billion yuan to establish 100,000 village service centers in the next three to five years, which will serve to teach rural people how to use the Internet for shopping or business.

Farmer Liu has just expanded acreage of his snake gourd fruit. "With the help of the Internet, I hope that more products could be sold," he said.

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## ahojunk

*China: A Fast Growing but Chaotic Internet Finance Industry*
April 29, 2016 @ 5:26 pm By JD Alois

China’s internet finance industry continues to grow while encountering ongoing challenges as fraud remains prevalent in the loosely regulated sector of the finance industry. Dominated by peer to peer lending (the largest in the world), as of March over 3900 platforms were counted by *WDZJ* (other estimates differ) with about 950 having problems. While rules are tightening and new entrants are slowing, the government is starting to pound the table regarding a looming crack-down where bogus platforms will be shuttered and those operated poorly may be forced to close. Of course, the remaining platforms should gain in traction and consumer trust as the dodgy platforms are washed out of the system.






While the largest alleged fraud in the P2P sector remains Ezubao at a loss of about 50 billion yuan, other “smaller” platforms have run afoul of the law. According to ECNS, earlier this month the police raided Zhongjin Capital Management. Apparently several employees were arrested under allegations of fraud. Another peer to peer lender, ironically named “Easy Richness”, had its accounts frozen by authorities as it was accused of taking deposits illegally. This all comes as the Chinese authorities are considering “unprecedented” actions against internet finance platforms they deem problematic. These actions are said to take up to a year and will be coordinated across multiple government agencies. During 2015, ECNS stated that the China court system dealt with an astounding 1.42 million cases involving peer to peer lending issues.

Meanwhile, some internet finance firms are taking their own actions to combat fraudulent borrowers. Lenovo has launched the FIDO or Fast Identity Online Alliance. The idea is provide an industry standard process for user verification. The service could be used for payments as well as the other online financial firms. It was reported that as of this month over 150 digital products from large, well known companies are integrated with FIDO.

Last week, Dianrong announced a borrowers blacklist. Individuals who have not repaid loans will be singled out and identified. Not only will lenders see who they are – there will be an added stigma of being outed as being in default on a loan.

As the industry starts to settle down and the rules tighten up, well-managed firms will consolidate control over the online lending industry and things should start to settle down. But even more important is the fact that online lenders are imperative to growth and evolution of the Chinese economy. Ning Tang, founder and CEO of CreditEase, the largest and oldest Chinese peer to peer lender, recently stated;

“Internet finance is key to China’s economic transition. It is not possible to have grassroots entrepreneurs in China without it.”

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## ahojunk

*China to increase average broadband speed to 30 Mbps*
2016-04-28 16:19 | Ecns.cn | _Editor: Wang Fan_

(ECNS) -- China expects to improve its average broadband Internet speed to 30 megabits per second (Mbps) by the end of this year, said Wen Ku, a bureau chief at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

Wen said the ministry has rolled out a series of measures to improve Web access speeds, including fiber-to-home broadband for communities with outdated connectivity in cities.

The ministry has accelerated installation of fiber optic networks in rural areas and is planning to upgrade telecommunication infrastructure in 50,000 villages this year.

It plans to increase the average broadband speed for fixed-lines from 20.5 Mbps in 2015 to 30 Mbps in 2016. In the mobile Internet sector, more effort will be put into expanding the 4G network, with a projected increase of 260 million new users.

The ministry also promised to encourage market competition among the current three major service providers and support private investment into the sector as the country implements its "Internet Plus" strategy that aims to integrate the Internet and industry while encouraging entrepreneurship and innovation.

Officials from the ministry also pledged to increase supervision to enhance user experience.

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## ahojunk

The following is taken from a commentary/blog.

------------
*Goldman Turns Positive On China Internet Profits, First Time Since 2010*
May 16, 2016, 11:52 P.M. ET

By Shuli Ren

For the first time since 2010, Goldman Sachs feels confident that Chinese Internet companies can generate profit. This is in contrast to the last five years when margins slipped on competition, user acquisition and an impetus to tackle new entrants.

Goldman Sachs thinks China’s Internet space (ex-financials) will grow at annualized 20% to have $2 trillion addressable market by 2020 and can generate $70 billion in profit by then.

Of all the Internet categories, fintech will be the biggest, which explains why all the Internet companies are fighting over it. Goldman sees online finance to have $5.38 trillion addressable market by 2020, from $1.5 trillion in 2015. Alibaba Group (BABA) and Tencent Holding‘s (700.Hong Kong) AliPay and TenPay are the biggest players, with 68% market share currently. Not surprisingly, online retail, or e-commerce, comes second with $1.5 trillion market by 2020, versus $606 billion now. But you can still see e-commerce is more mature and has a smaller pie than fintech. Alibaba and JD.com (JD) are the biggest players, with 88% market share.

Bigger is better. Goldman estimates Alibaba, Baidu (BIDU) and Tencent will collect 308 billion yuan in operating profits by 2020, versus 97 billion yuan in 2015, or 78% of the total profit pile.

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## ahojunk

*Alibaba, SoftBank set up JV cloud services in Japan*
By Enterprise Innovation editors | 2016-05-19

Alibaba Group Holding and SoftBank established a joint-venture firm SB Cloud to launch cloud computing services in Japan that use technologies and solutions from Alibaba Cloud, the cloud computing arm of Alibaba Group.

SB Cloud will open a new data center in Japan and provide competitive and enhanced public cloud computing services from Alibaba Cloud to meet the various needs of Japanese customers, ranging from startups to multinational companies.

The joint venture will enable Alibaba Cloud to further expand its cloud computing service platform with SoftBank’s extensive business customer base in Japan, which comprises numerous global organizations.

SB Cloud will play a key role in supporting Alibaba Cloud’s business presence in the Japan market where the demand for public cloud computing services is growing rapidly.

The joint venture will provide Japanese enterprises with Alibaba Cloud’s diverse offerings, including data storage and processing services, enterprise-level middleware as well as cloud security services.

“I believe the JV team can develop the most advanced cloud platform for Japanese customers, as well as for multinational customers who want to use the resources we have available in Japan,” said Eric Gan, CEO of SB Cloud and EVP of SoftBank.

SoftBank Group, SoftBank’s parent company, is a major shareholder of Alibaba Group Holding.

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## ahojunk

Good to know that Alibaba is doing something about counterfeits.

--------------
*Alibaba Says Its Future Depends On Fighting Counterfeiters*
by Leena Rao @leenarao MAY 19, 2016, 3:38 PM EDT

The Chinese e-commerce giant is trying to counter complaints that it does too little.

Facing backlash over counterfeit items being sold on its marketplaces, Chinese e-commerce juggernaut Alibaba is on the offensive.

Alibaba president Michael Evans said on Thursday that Alibaba’s future depends on its success in fighting counterfeiters. He argued that his company was “100% committed to fighting this battle” while emphasizing the need to work with product makers to tackle the problem.

Speaking at event sponsored by Washington, D.C.-based International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition, or IACC, Evans also talked about Alibaba’s data team that helps track down counterfeit goods sold by third parties through its e-commerce sites.

“Our anti-counterfeiting system is now processing 100 million pieces of data per second,” he said. “We’re talking about 8.64 trillion pieces of data each day. In 2015, we were able to block and proactively take down around 120 million suspicious product listings on Taobao. That’s before any of you asked us to do anything.”

Alibaba’s flagship e-commerce marketplace Taobao, where sellers list everything from scorpions to fake Louis Vuitton purses, has long been known as a source of counterfeit goods. The site is a Chinese version of eBay with nine million small sellers.

Last month, Alibaba gained membership into the IACC, prompting a number of the group’s other members, including Gucci America and Michael Kors, to quit in protest. The companies even went as far as describing Alibaba as “our most dangerous and damaging adversary.”

It was also revealed that IACC president Robert Barchiesi owned Alibaba stock, which raised accusations that he had a conflict of interest in his role leading the coalition. The coalition has hired an independent organization to investigate the allegations.

Soon after the backlash started, the coalition said it would suspend Alibaba’s membership. Alibaba, which disagreed with its suspension, has vowed to keep fighting counterfeit goods despite the recent events.

Alibaba’s founder, Jack Ma, was originally schedule to speak at the IACC event on Thursday. But he pulled out and was replaced by Evans.

Evans also spoke of early success in removing counterfeits from Alibaba’s site. Through a partnership with product makers and IACC, Alibaba has shut down and banned nearly 5,000 storefronts on Taobao, according to Alibaba. It has also removed more than 180,000 counterfeit listings.

In the past, Alibaba has made strong statements against counterfeiting, but the problem has persisted. The company is now trying to show that it is taking real action. Alibaba said previously it is spending millions on anti-counterfeiting efforts and hired a former Pfizer executive to oversee its anti-counterfeiting programs in December. But don’t count on Alibaba to win the good graces of product makers anytime soon.

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## ahojunk

*Are You Alibaba Literate? 5 Things to Know About the Company*
By ERIKA KINETZ, ASSOCIATED PRESS SHANGHAI 
— May 27, 2016, 2:48 PM ET

Alibaba is the world's biggest e-commerce platform. Over 420 million people scooped up $485 billion worth of stuff last year on Alibaba's sites. The company went public in 2014, raising $25 billion — more than Facebook — in the largest offering in the history of the New York Stock Exchange. Some things to know about the company:

WHAT IS ALIBABA?

Alibaba's e-commerce platforms cater to both Chinese and global consumers. At its heart is Taobao, a Chinese consumer-to-consumer website much like eBay. Tmall offers merchants official storefronts to consumers in China. Alibaba and AliExpress connect businesses in China with buyers around the world.

———

WHAT ELSE DOES ALIBABA DO?

Alibaba also runs an online payment platform called Alipay. It has stakes in Sina Weibo, China's version of Twitter, as well as Youku Tuduo, a video platform akin to YouTube. And it's building up a cloud computing and internet infrastructure business.

———

WHO'S BEHIND THE COMPANY?

Alibaba was founded in the living room of a former English teacher named Jack Ma. A self-made billionaire, Ma is a folk-hero to some Chinese.

———

WHY DO SOME PEOPLE HATE ALIBABA?

There is widespread suspicion that Alibaba knowingly profits from the sale of fakes on its platforms — a point Gucci America, among others, has made in an ongoing U.S. lawsuit. Some brands complain about how slow and difficult it is to get fakes removed from Alibaba's sites. Alibaba says it has spent tens of millions of dollars on anti-counterfeiting and that it is constantly trying to improve its systems.

———

WHERE'S THE NAME FROM?

Ma knew from the beginning that he wanted a name people around the world would recognize. He asked a waitress in a San Francisco restaurant if she recognized the name Alibaba and she said, yes, open sesame! Drawn from Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, the name stuck.

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## TaiShang

*Taobao starts live streaming for products*




Working staff of Taobao, one of China's leading e-commerce platforms, shows how to collect pollution-free honey through a live-streaming app in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality, May 30, 2016. In order to help consumers have a direct understanding of goods they want to buy, Taobao kicked off its live-streaming for agricultural products in Tujia-Miao Autonomous County of Xiushan in Chongqing Monday. (Xinhua/Chen Cheng)

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## TaiShang

*Alibaba Expands Village Taobao Program*
2016-06-02 16:57:48 Editor: Chen Xieyuan






Alibaba has built 100-thousand service centers in small towns or villages in China. [Photo: Agencies]

For Chinese online retailers, the country's vast rural areas are presenting huge potential despite the current economic slowdown.

*Yet according to the Ministry of Commerce, among the 186 million Internet users living outside of cities, 60 percent have never hit up the internet to make a purchase*.

*To tap into the potential of this market, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has built 100-thousand service centers in small towns or villages to help rural people shop and do business online.*

Alibaba is known for its online marketplaces Taobao and Tmall, which account for 75 percent of China's online retail sales. The company launched its Village Taobao program in 2014, employing local people as its partners at village service centres.

Village Taobao partners were tasked with helping villagers, most of whom know little about online shopping, to make purchases on the internet.

After receiving goods, villagers pay the centre, and can return goods back to the centre if they are not satisfied.

If people purchase large equipment, the partners can also help install it and provide post-sale services.

Villagers can also pay phone and utility bills at the service centre.

Tang Zhongqiang, Alibaba's regional manager of Village Taobao, said the programme was designed to benefit both farmers and Village Taobao partners financially.

"For example, a commodity might be sold for 4,500 yuan at a physical store, but cost 3,900 online. Villagers can save 600 yuan via e-commerce. If the cost of the commodity is 3,700 yuan, it can generate profits of 200 yuan. A proportion of the 200 yuan will be given to the Taobao partners as a commission fee. Merchants will have to make some sacrifices."

Tonglu County in east China's Zhejiang Province is a pilot area for the Village Taobao program. Local official Shen Shihua said the program has been welcomed by villagers, and the monthly sales volume at a local service station now stands at more than 30,000 yuan, or 4,500 US dollars.

"In the past, deliveries could only reach counties and towns, but now they can reach villages directly. The Village Taobao program introduces many villagers to online shopping for the first time. It also pushes logistics platforms to reach villages, the most grass-roots level, and to occupy the rural markets."

Tang Zhongqiang of Alibaba said helping locals make purchases on Taobao can also help improve the sense of e-commerce among rural people, and it's expected that in the future, rural online buyers, or at least some of them, will become online sellers.

"We hope that after farmers recognize the potential of the e-commerce model, they can make money through e-commerce. We'd like to promote their agricultural products, light-industry products, and local handicrafts online. Our Alibaba partners and third-party professionals will help package the products. To upload and sell goods online is a complex industrial chain. It's not easy, especially for fresh products. It's difficult, but we have to try."

Up to now, Alibaba has established rural service centres in some 16,000 villages in 29 provincial regions.

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## TaiShang

*Promising Internet of Things cooperation across Taiwan Strait *
Xinhua, June 4, 2016

The Chinese mainland and Taiwan, having identified their complementary advantages in the development of the Internet of Things, see promising cooperation across the Strait.

Applications of the Internet of Things have seen strong momentum on the mainland, said Ni Guangnan, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, at a seminar on the sharing economy and the Internet of Things held Saturday in Xiamen, east China's Fujian Province.

*The two sides across the Strait can perform better if they combine the mainland's advantages of talents, resources, and market with Taiwan's advantages in hardware, particularly integrated circuits, said Ni, who is also a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Sciences.*

"We have forged long-term cooperations with our mainland counterparts.* We are now following the mainland's smart city development*," said Pin-Hsien Liang, chairman of Taiwan Internet of Things Alliance.

Liang said that as an application-oriented industry, the Internet of Things has a rosy future on the mainland which has a very good foundation in applications.

*"Taiwan has mastered some key technologies related to the Internet of Things, such as chips and cutting-edge equipment. It has also developed smart city, smart industrial park, and smart life much earlier,"* he said.

Liang's association has cooperated with mainland partners in developing smart city, electronic toll collection, and smart elevators.

*Two travel agencies and one company in Xiamen signed a letter of intent in May with Kaohsiung's tourism association to improve smart tourism in Kaohsiung and explore more tourism opportunities. *

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## ahojunk

Let's collate all the news on Internet, Alibaba, Baidu, Tencent, WeChat, O2O, Online Services, etc and related stuff on this thread.


--------
*For the next Silicon Valley, look to Beijing*






Online services, robotics, drones, smartphones, electronic payment systems, mobile games, super computers, cyber security, the internet of things, e-commerce: not just random words but rather those sectors where China has become a dominant force in just a few years.

According to _BI Intelligence_, a Chinese brand, DJI, has gained a 75% share of the US commercial drone market.






Almost unknown in the West until recently, such names and services as Alibaba, Didi, Baidu and Wechat are now circulating wildly among media outlets, professionals and on smartphones around the world.

A major computer security conference recently held in Amsterdam featured a large number of Chinese speakers on a variety of topics, along with many top-level research and security products made in China.

Two top hardware manufacturers, Huawei and Xiaomi, are investing significant resources in research and development. And a few days ago, Huawei announced that it is developing its own operating system, while Xiaomi has launched its foldable electric bicycle. As the US technology blog Techcrunch asked, “is there anything that China’s Xiaomi doesn’t sell?”

Wechat is being used by 650 million people worldwide, while its parent company Tencent Holdings Ltd. just bought the Finnish company Supercell, producer of Clash of Clans, for $8.6 billion. Thus the high-tech group is becoming a leader not just in the mobile messaging sector, but also when it comes to games played on smartphones and tablets.

Tech giants and universities are spending billions in research and development. According to the OECD, China was the second largest R&D spender in 2012, allocating $294 billion compared to the US, a top-spender at around $454 billion that year. Furthermore, China is leading on patents. According to an _Economist_ article, China is filling patents in every single sector.






But there is more. As renowned _New York Times_ tech reporter John Markoff explains in a recent piece, “China dominates a biannual ranking of the world’s 500 fastest supercomputers. Also for the first time, the world’s fastest supercomputer uses Chinese-made microprocessor chips instead of chips from Silicon Valley’s Intel.”

As the same articles points out, “supercomputers are viewed in scientific circles as an indicator of national technology leadership”. A leadership that is becoming increasingly unstoppable: tech giants, universities and other businesses are investing heavy resources in research and development to foster local talents and projects that will further benefit the Chinese economy.






Last March, US tech media company _The Information_ organized an event in China led by its director Jessica E. Lessin to better understand how this technology ecosystem is growing so fast. And a May report in _Recode_ argued that “after three weeks in China, it's clear Beijing is Silicon Valley’s only true competitor”.

This overall trend leaves little doubt on what many stakeholders in the West perceive as a big problem, that is, a Chinese Digital Empire with no borders and few competitors.

On the other hand, though, it is obvious that such fast growth is also challenging for China itself. One of the most significant challenges is whether the Chinese government will be able to arrange and implement effective policies on such complex topics as privacy and cybersecurity, to name just a few. Also crucial will be to define a fair working relationship between tech companies, government and citizens. In other words, those broad and successful developments require a deep commitment to the future of the country itself. For example, Chinese officials should commit to bringing fast internet connectivity everywhere, implement digital literacy options, and switch to online services to ease bureaucracy. But at the same time they must protect citizen rights and provide some balanced policies on national security.

These are crucial points to ensure that this new tech leadership will benefit China in its entirety (and even beyond), while also pushing the US to get even more competitive in a sector that is increasingly up for grabs.

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## Nan Yang

Shenzhen too.

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## ahojunk

_The changing of the guard..._

--------
New Internet Chief Named in Reshuffle
2016-06-30 08:16:51 China Daily/Agencies Web Editor: Zhang Xu





_Lu Wei (R), the former head of the Office of the Central Leading Group for Cyberspace Affairs, has been replaced by Xu Lin (L), one of his deputies. [File Photo: Agencies]_


China's top internet regulator has been replaced amid a round of personnel reshuffles, according to an official statement released on Wednesday.

Lu Wei, the former head of the Office of the Central Leading Group for Cyberspace Affairs, has been replaced by Xu Lin, one of his deputies, according to the statement, released by the Communist Party of China Central Committee.

There was no mention of where the 56-year-old Lu would go. Ministerial-level officials usually retire at the age of 65.

Xu, a 53-year-old Shanghai native, held various posts in the eastern metropolis before being appointed deputy head of the cyberspace management office last year.

He has served as chief of Shanghai's Civil Affairs Bureau, Agricultural Commission and its booming Pudong New Area.

From 2013 to 2015, Xu was the city's publicity director, giving him experience in media management.

The internet in China has seen rapid growth. By the end of last year, the country had 688 million netizens and 4.23 million websites, up by 6 percent and 26 percent respectively year-on-year, according to the China Internet Network Information Center.

The statement also announced that Lu Xinshe, governor of East China's Jiangxi province, would replace Qiang Wei as Jiangxi's top official.

Qiang, 63, will no longer be a member of the CPC Jiangxi Provincial Committee or its Standing Committee, the statement said, without disclosing Qiang's next arrangement.

Wang Guosheng, governor of Central China's Hubei province, replaced Luo Huining as the top official of Northwest China's Qinghai province.

The statement also said that Luo would be given another assignment.

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## ahojunk

*China clamps down on undisclosed search ads*
June 28, 2016







The Chinese government is to enforce stricter controls on the way search engines display ads in the country, in a bid to better distinguish between natural and paid-for content.

Users have been particularly concerned with medical ads, which are a threat to people’s health, according to authorities.

The move means that Baidu and other search engines in the country will have to report banned content and verify advertisers’ qualifications in its latest attempt at Internet regulation.

The new rules, set to be in place by August 1st, have been implemented by the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC).

“Some search results contain rumors, obscenities, pornography, violence, murder, terrorism and other illegal information,” the CAC said.

“Some search results lack objectivity and fairness, go against corporate morals and standards, misleading and influencing people’s judgment.”

Under the new legislation, search engines operating in the country will be prohibited from providing banned information in various formats including links, summaries, cached pages, associative words, related searches and relevant recommendations,

They will also be required to report websites and applications that contain prohibited content when spotted, the regulator said.

The Chinese government already exercises widespread controls over the internet and has sought to codify that policy in law.

The Cyberspace Administration of China said search engines should investigate the “aptitude” of clients offering paid-for ads, set a clear upper limit on such ads and clearly distinguish which are paid-for ads and which come from “natural searches”.

“Internet search providers should earnestly accept corporate responsibility toward society, and strengthen their own management in accordance with the law and rules, to provide objective, fair and authoritative search results to users,” it said.

Baidu said in a statement that it was committed to providing the best search experience and will fully comply with the law.

“Baidu will work closely with government agencies, internet users and the community to uphold a healthy internet environment, and strive to provide objective, impartial, and authoritative search results to our users,” it said.

The move could be good news for marketers and consumers alike. The changes fall in line with the approach pioneered in the UK to ensure transparency of paid promotion. Since the late 1990s Google had been clear on what was sponsored and what was in natural search.

Industry insiders told us that when this was first tackled in the rest of the world, the discussions with US and European search engines at the time had been both very swift and very aligned. That was driven by the culture of media transparency that is more developed in Western Europe and North America than in China.

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## ahojunk

*Can Big Data Cure China’s Health Woes?*
Sixth Tone - *Cai Yiwen*
Jun 28, 2016

China is pushing ahead with plans to increase data sharing between hospitals to improve the country’s health care system.

In what experts have described as a significant breakthrough, the State Council, or China’s cabinet, is calling for the development of a national platform that would allow the country’s medical and health care institutions to connect with one another and share patient data and other medical information.

The State Council-issued guidelines also encourage a greater development role for “socially innovative forces” — typically interpreted to mean startups and other internet-based health care companies. 

China hopes to extend affordable and high-quality health care to all citizens by the end of this decade, a goal the World Health Organization has described as “one of the most ambitious” such health-related undertakings in the world.

Yet considerable barriers remain in achieving this target, including low standards for health care available to patients in the towns and smaller cities of China’s heartland.

This means that when people in these rural areas become ill, they often avoid local hospitals and rush instead in large numbers to big hospitals in provincial capitals. Some even venture to the more developed coastal cities such as Beijing and Shanghai in pursuit of what they see as higher quality medical care.

This puts a huge strain on the country’s hospital system. In addition to being costly and inefficient, traveling large distances to big hospitals for health care can also be ineffective.

Experts say technology and greater data sharing have the potential to significantly enhance the quality of care available to Chinese. For example, they offer patients in rural areas the chance to access some of the best doctors and specialists through telemedicine, a process whereby consultations can be made via satellite or internet connections between hospitals in the countryside and major hospitals in larger cities and major metropolitan areas.

In recent years, more internet companies have begun to participate in the medical and health care market in China. A number of health care websites and apps, such as Chunyu Doctor, We Doctor, and Dingxiang Doctor, have been created to help patients book appointments with doctors or find doctors online.

According to data from iiMedia Research Group, China's mobile health care market has grown 44.7 percent, from 2.95 billion yuan (around $444 million) in 2014 to 4.27 billion yuan in 2015.

Last year, China’s first “internet hospital” was established in Wuzhen, in eastern China’s prosperous Zhejiang province. The hospital is as an online platform that assists patients in finding doctors online and in booking appointments with them; it also acts as a communications link between large public hospitals and hospitals in rural or smaller cities.

Up until now, limited access to patient data has been a big obstacle for the proliferation of internet health care in China. That’s because many public hospitals are not willing to share their information with third parties, including internet health care companies, which consequently find it difficult to expand.

Despite rapid development last year, many internet health care companies still cannot make a profit and are struggling to survive, according to Zhao Heng, an expert in health care policy and founder of the medical and health consultancy Latitude Health.

But the new State Council guidelines offer hope. “This is not just good news; it is a critical breakthrough,” said Liao Jieyuan, CEO of internet health care company We Doctor. Liao said that while hospitals have a wide variety of documents — items such as medical histories and checkup results — stored in their computer systems, such records are “just isolated islands of information” without a link between the systems.

Regardless of its good intentions, China still has a long way to go. Gong Yihua, president of Jointown Pharmaceutical Group, said during a workshop at an internet health care conference in Wuzhen last weekend that the use of big data in the medical field is still immature in China, and that the lack of a robust database of medical information must be addressed.

“You can’t tell anything from the data [in its current state], and it’s very hard to imagine it being used as an effective tool,” he told participants from the medical and information technology sectors. “It’s going to take a long time to come up with a good system.”

Zhao of Latitude Health also described China’s medical data as “fragmented” and “unsystematic.” He said one step toward successfully tapping information technology to promote a better health care system was to establish a systematic way of gathering data.

Persuasion, too, will be an important tool: “The point is to push public hospitals to share their data,” he said.

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## ahojunk

*China's Alibaba expanding into rural market*
2016-06-06 11:14 | CCTV | _Editor: Xu Shanshan_

China's e-commerce giant Alibaba has announced an investment of 10 billion yuan, or 1 and a half billion U.S. dollars, over the next three years, to set up its service in the country's rural areas. This will likely help alleviate poverty. CCTV's Han Peng reports from one of Shandong's villages, to see how the service is improving the lives of residents.

Rural life in China isn't all idyllic. Marginalized from the booming urban market, one out of ten peasants still lives under the poverty line.

But the rising e-commerce market is providing to be a much-needed platform to sell their produce at a higher price. And it makes it easier to buy urban products as well.

That's the latest program by China's e-commerce giant Alibaba. The company is setting up some 100,000 rural service stations over the next three years in some of the poorest and remotest villages.

"My business aims to help my neighbors to buy what no one sells, and sell what no one buys in our village. We believe there is huge market potential in rural areas," said Xia Youzhi, rural resident.

Xia Youzhi used to run the only convenience store in his village. Last year, he decided to join Alibaba, and set up a rural service station.

Alibaba is by far the first and only online retailer in China to set up a sales and purchasing platform for rural residents. And in Chinese villages, e-commerce works in quite a different way.

Villagers don't really know how to use a computer or a mobile app, so Xia has to install a big computer screen in his store to help them pick out products and make online orders.

Most villagers are skeptical about online payment, fearing that sellers might scam them. So Xia, as a trusted local shop owner, receives the cash from villagers, and then pays online through his own bank account.

But his most demanding work lies outside the store. Most villages have no roads for trucks, so deliverymen can only send the packages to the rural service station.

Xia has uses a motor-tricycle to transport the packages to villagers' homes. At the same time, he can collect from the villagers whatever they hope to sell.

We now follow Xia Youzhi to complete the so-called "last kilometer logistics". The roads here are quite bumpy and difficult, but this is regarded as the core to e-commerce competition. No matter how new e-commerce may look like to local buyers, the deals have to be completed in the most traditional and rural way.

Figures show that one-third of China's villages lack the necessary infrastructure for logistics, and two-thirds still have no access to the Internet.

But as China pledges to complete Internet infrastructure for all villages by 2020, Alibaba says it is confident in tapping into the huge potential of the rural market.

"E-commerce can solve one of the biggest problems for rural residents -- that is by helping them be equally informed about the market with urbanites. With just a click of a mouse, they can buy and sell what they want, making them an equal player in the market," said Sun Lijun, partner of Alibaba Group.

Xia Youzhi's rural service station is one of the earliest in China -- in a village near Shandong's central city of Weifang.

It was never a booming export region until now.

Local authorities say despite a nation-wide shrinkage, Weifang has seen its export rising last year, because it embraced the idea of rural e-commerce.

Some say with more villagers buying and selling online, the world might just see a "Made in China" tag coming out of the country's villages.

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## ahojunk

*Alibaba announces $1.5 billion investment in online shopping in China's rural areas*
CCTV News 
Published on 26 May 2016

China's e-commerce giant Alibaba has announced investments worth 10 billion yuan, or 1.5 billion US dollars, over the next three years, to set up its services in China's rural areas. It is the first, and so far, only online retailer in China to set up a sales and purchasing platform for rural residents. Some say this is likely to help alleviate rural poverty.

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## ahojunk

MIT Technology Review
June 21, 2016

*A View from Edward Jung*
*China’s Internet Boom*

Online experimentation doesn’t have to be limited to tech companies.

It’s tempting to portray the rapid growth of the Chinese Internet as just one more example of China’s efforts to catch up with the West: Alibaba is the eBay of China, Baidu is the Google of China, Didi is the Uber of China, and so on. But China is actually conducting some fascinating experiments with the Internet (see “The Best and Worst Internet Experience in the World"). You just need to look outside the tech sector to notice them.

The most significant innovation is happening not among Chinese Internet companies but in the country’s so-called “real” economy. Corporations in old-school sectors like construction, agriculture, transportation, and banking are pursuing new business models based on big data, social media, and the Internet of things.

These are some of the largest firms of their kind in the world, yet many are young enough to be helmed by their original owner/founders. They’re like Rockefeller, Ford, or Carnegie with access to smartphones.







So it’s China’s largest residential-property developer—not a tech company—that is pioneering the integration of Internet-based technology and services into fully wired communities. Vanke wants to create urban hubs that supply residents with gardens, safe food, travel, entertainment, and medical and educational services, all enabled by the Internet.

China’s insurance and banking industries have also embraced the Internet. Firms like Ping An Insurance recognized early on the opportunity to build customized models for risk assessment based on information gleaned from 24/7 tracking of physical and online activities.

Regulatory and finance structures in the West militate against this kind of experimentation, but China’s corporate culture encourages the broad reach. Asia specializes in big-tent conglomerates with protean areas of interest: a boat maker goes into semiconductors; a snack vendor might have an automotive division. In China, every big company can be an Internet, software, or device company, too.

China’s tech companies are similarly uninhibited. Xiaomi, a handset manufacturer, has taken a global leadership position in deploying the Internet of things. Tencent founded the online-only WeBank, which analyzes data from hundreds of millions of WeChat users to assess risk and extend small consumer loans without loan officers or physical branches. Alibaba is using its unprecedented knowledge of small business to provide financial services with an information advantage that no traditional bank has.

If Google did banking, these would doubtless be called the “Chinese banks of Google.” But it doesn’t—that’s the point. Information, entertainment, retail, and communication were the easy plays for U.S. companies, the real-economy sectors that the Internet could infiltrate without too much trouble. Chinese companies will be first to bring the Internet to the other realms of life and industry.

Then the West could be playing catch-up with the East.

_Edward Jung is the founder and chief technology officer of Intellectual Ventures._

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## ahojunk

_This is a positive development for the online retail industry in China._

--------
*Alibaba announces new system to track and remove fake goods*
Now it's easier for brands to stamp out counterfeit products

Sean Buckley, @seaniccus
07.01.16 in Gadgetry







If you've ever shopped at Alibaba, you know to tread carefully: the online marketplace has long had a problem with merchants peddling counterfeit goods. It's given the site a bad reputation, creating tension between Alibaba and major brands. Today, the company announced a new program designed to smooth things out and help companies identify and remove fake products from Alibaba's marketplace.

Alibaba's new "IP Joint-Force System" seems to be an extension of the company's existing good-faith take-down program -- essentially a method of streamlining communications between rights holders and Alibaba staff. Brands with counterfeiting concerns, like Louis Vuitton or Apple will be assigned an Alibaba account manager and be given access to an online portal, which companies can use to quickly identify authentic or counterfeit product listings and flag them for removal.

Alibaba is hoping to foster an image of teamwork with the program, stressing that companies "complaining about each other or criticising each other" won't stop counterfeit sellers -- and Alibaba _needs_ to stop the deluge of fake products. Earlier this year, the company was kicked out of the US-based anti-counterfeiting alliance after several major brands complained. Company founder Jack Ma is insistent that the fake products need to go, and that they have "no place on Alibaba." With any luck, this new iniative is a step in the right direction.


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## ahojunk

_Seems that everybody is getting into the driverless technology business._

--------
*China's Internet Giant Baidu To Mass Produce Driverless Cars In 5 Years*
Tycho De Feijter, CONTRIBUTOR
I write about the Chinese car market. 
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.





_Baidu BMW 3 GT driverless test car. Photographer: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg_

China’s internet-search giant Baidu BIDU -0.01% is planning to mass produce driverless electric cars in five years, bringing the fight to Google GOOGL +1.11% and Apple AAPL +0.35%.

The company, which currently holds 80% of the internet-search market in China, will not manufacture the cars itself. Instead, it will outsource the actual production to an existing Chinese automaker, in the same way LeEco planning to outsource production of the LeSee. Baidu has approached several Chinese automakers but hasn’t made a final decision yet.

Currently, Baidu is testing its driverless technology with a fleet of BMW 3-Series GTs. The tests started in December 2015 with test cars driving on public roads in Beijing and Wuhu. BMW will have no involvement in the eventual Baidu driverless production car.

In April Baidu announced the formation of a driverless-technology research center in Silicon Valley, and the company’s chief scientist said they want to start testing driverless cars in the United States “soon”.

Baidu’s first commercially available driverless production vehicle is scheduled for launch in China in 2018. It will be a shuttle bus designed to run on a pre-set loop line. Similar lines already exist in other countries, including Greece, The Netherlands, and China. Production of these shuttles will be outsourced as well.

The driverless car for public roads will launch in 2021. The car will be fully autonomous without any need of any input of the passengers, bar their destination. The operating system is called Baidu AutoBrain (百度汽车大脑).

The system was announced in September 2015. It combines all the key ingredients needed for driverless driving, plus Baidu’s MyCar car-connectivity software and Baidu’s CarLife synchronization software for mobile devices.

One of the most important elements of the system, or any autonomous driving system, is the map. And Baidu has one of the best, fully incorporated in their search software. BaiDu Maps is comparable to Google Maps, but at least in China it is more accurate and up to date, with fully photographed 3D surroundings of every street and lane in every Chinese city. And again like Google Maps, it is helped by the millions of users adding information and photos while using their mobile Baidu apps.





_Baidu HQ in Beijing seen with Baidu maps. Screenshot._

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## TaiShang

*China cyberspace regulator bans fake news*
2016-07-04






A villager expresses anger over an article, which falsely described the village as a corrupted place in Baoshi village, northeast China’s Liaoning province, on February 23, 2016. [Photo: Xinhua]

The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) is cracking down on fake online news and false coverage, the People's Daily reported on July 3.

The CAC has released a notification requiring media outlets to provide real, objective, and impartial coverage by improving news production procedures and internal checking mechanisms.

It is also mandating local cyberspace regulators to tighten up their supervision, to avoid distorted news coverage based on rumor or speculation.

*This year, the CAC has punished many major media outlets including sina.com and ifeng.com for disseminating fake news, following a series of false coverage scandals. Websites involved disposed of the public accounts responsible for the false information.*

The CAC is also encouraging netizens to participate in the supervision of fake news.

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## ahojunk

_I love how the Internet and e-Commerce are helping to improve the lives of rural folks._

--------
*How e-commerce changes lives in rural China*
Phoenix Kwong

*Concerns over fake goods have also prompted some people to turn to online shopping.*

PUBLISHED : Sunday, 05 June, 2016, 5:49pm
UPDATED : Sunday, 05 June, 2016, 6:27pm

Like several of her rural peers, Wang Xia, a farmer from Houtuan village in Shouguang city of Shandong province is reaping the rewards of China’s rapidly expanding rural e-commerce.

“I buy several of my daily necessities, clothing, fertilisers and even home appliances online. Not only is online shopping convenient, but also cheaper. In addition, I do not have to make long, trips to shopping malls,” she said.

E-commerce is not only helping to revitalise Chinese rural villages, home to half the population, but also opening the doors to a huge market for companies.

Wang’s family makes a living growing tomatoes in a 2,666 square-metre farm in the village and earned about 100,000 yuan (HK$118,000) last year. She purchased a new television set last month on Taobao, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba’s online shopping platform and made a single transaction of more than 5,000 yuan in a month.

Alibaba, which started its Rural Taobao strategy in late 2014 has set up 16,000 village-level and 380 county-level service centres to support its e-commerce activities and provide delivery services in rural areas. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.

Villagers like Wang can pick up goods they buy online at the nearest service centre which also sells products pre-ordered from merchants.

Concerns over fake goods have also prompted Wang to turn to online shopping.

“I buy infant milk formula for my two-year-old son from Tmall (Alibaba’s brand-focused e-commerce platform) and I don’t need to worry if it’s fake as the platform ensures the” product is genuine, she said.

Shi Binting, a Rural Taobao partner of Antao village’s service centre in the county-level city of Shouguang, said the gross merchandise volume (GMV) could reach 3,000 to 6,000 yuan per day.

“Most of our consumers are villagers. One of them once spent more than 200,000 yuan to buy a car and sent the same to this centre. There are some others who have spent more than 10,000 yuan to buy home appliances such as air conditioners,” Shi said.

Shi, who previously ran a shop selling cell phones in the village, said his income has more than tripled to about 10,000 yuan a month by being a partner who generates income primarily from charging service fees.

The income prospects offered by Rural Taobao for its partners have encouraged many youngsters to leave their jobs in cities and return home to run their own businesses.

Sang De, partner of a Rural Taobao service centre in Shouguang city’s Beiluo Township, is one of those.

“I had gone to Japan for work a few years ago. But I could not find anything that was to my liking, nor did I make any significant gains. I happened to learn about Rural Taobao and decided to come back last year,” she said.

The Beilou service centre was set up last October right before the Singles’ Day shopping festival.

Sang said the GMV at the service centre reached 430,000 yuan on that day (November 11) while monthly sales are about 400,000 yuan. During some festivals such as the Lunar New Year, the sales during a single month could surpass 1 million yuan, she said.

Sang declined to reveal how much she usually earns a month, but said she is happy with her income and the fact that she can stay with her family.

Another e-commerce giant, JD.com, is also expanding in the rural market by opening self-operated service centres and Jingdong Bang, a home appliance delivery and maintenance team in partnership with local shops.

JD.com, which runs about, 1,000 service centres, plans to have 1,500 of them by the end of this year. Jingdong Bang has opened more than 1,300 outlets.

Changjiang Securities analyst Li Jin said the rural e-commerce market has become more complex due to limitations in logistics, payment systems and product diversity.

Brick-and-mortar outlets are therefore important as villagers can get access to e-commerce and delivery services through these services centres, Li said in a study. One-stop services can also help build up rural residents’ online shopping habits.

Unlike Alibaba and JD.com, electronics and home appliances retailer Suning Commerce Group’s rural strategy is to open self-operated stores. It plans to invest 5 billion yuan this year to open 1,500 physical stores and expand its agent and authorised services network in rural areas.

The strategy of opening self-operated stores will allow Suning to have deeper integration with the local market, internet consulting company iResearch said in a report.

It’s hard to say which company’s business model will have an advantage, but Suning’s strategy will be more welcomed by local governments as its investment will also drive growth in other sectors and create more jobs in underdeveloped areas, it said.

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## TaiShang

***

*Online game giant aims to ride the 4th Industrial Revolution*
By Guo Yiming
China.org.cn, June 27, 2016




Robert Xiao, CEO of Perfect World, China's leading online game developer and publisher [Photo / China.org.cn]

China should strive to contribute and even lead the tide of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, said Robert Xiao, helmsman behind Perfect World, China's leading online game developer and publisher.



Xiao, CEO of the online gaming juggernaut, made the remarks during an exclusive interview with China.org.cn on June 26 at the sideline of the Annual Meeting of the New Champions, a World Economic Forum (WEF) event known as the Summer Davos, in China's northern port city of Tianjin.

"Though China missed the past three industrial revolutions, it is now at the same starting point with the rest of the world in embracing the fourth one," said Xiao, who believes that his company, as a tech firm specializing in developing massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), is poised to keep pace with the times during the current intelligence and internet-driven development paradigm.

The WEF event, themed "The Fourth Industrial Revolution and Its Transformational Impact", convenes over 1,700 business leaders, policymakers and experts from 90 countries and explores the economic, societal, cultural and ecological impact of the latest shift in human history.

*A global vision*

The event, as one of the most prestigious gatherings of the world's thought-leaders, is particularly beneficial for Chinese companies who have a global vision to get some insight in their future strategies, said Xiao whose company is vying for a growing share of the world's profitable gaming industry.

According to him, Perfect World has undergone four stages in its globalization strategy. From the initial stage of marketing and selling its products through agent companies and then building locally based operations and offices, to investing in localized development and production, the Beijing-based video gaming giant now embraces a stage of global resource integration and consolidation that mainly benefits from its global network of distribution and production.

"Thanks to this global network, we can pool the wisdom of our employees worldwide," Xiao told China.org.cn. "One individual project might be, without any exaggeration, inspired by an excellent IP (Intellectual Property) from Japan, developed by our US designers, processed by a group of Chinese programmers and polished by our French visual effects artists."

According to statistics, the sales of its independently-developed online games ranked first in terms of overseas sales for many consecutive years against other domestic rivals and once took up as much as nearly 40% of China's total game exports.

Xiao confessed that the competition for talent and the games' entry threshold in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, with regard to cultural differences, are still major obstacles for its globalized ambitions.

*Chinese culture 'imbedded' in games*

In a world of competition for soft power, all forms of entertainment, including video games, are important vehicles of disseminating a country's unique culture. Xiao said that many of the company's games were developed based on Chinese ancient stories and myths while presented in traditional Chinese artistic styles.

"As one of the most profitable online games developed by the company, the Perfect World International (PWI) was actually inspired by the Classic of Mountains and Seas (Shan Hai Jing), a Chinese classic text and a compilation of mythic geography and myth," said Xiao, revealing that some users actually got interested in Chinese history and culture through playing the game.

Another example, as Xiao revealed, is a video game adapted from Chinese Kong Fu novels, which became so popular overseas that it actually boosted the original book's sales in South Korea by over 20% as soon as the franchised game hit the market.

"Games, in essence, are a form of digital art," he said. "By imbedding Chinese art into our games, we are actually introducing our cultures to overseas gamers in a way that can be better accepted by the younger generation."

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## ahojunk

*Baidu Will Bounce Back*

Regulators clamp down on the leading Chinese search engine as fallout of an unfortunate death earlier this year lingers.

It's going to be harder for Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU) to make money in China in the near-term. The Cyberspace Administration of China announced over the weekend that search engines will have to do a better job of identifying paid search results, something that was widely expected in the aftermath of a cancer patient that died after seeking treatment from a center that was a sponsored listing on Baidu.

The late April death of the university student went viral, especially as he took to social media to call out Baidu and the questionable treatment center he found through the site.

The Cyberspace Administration of China's move isn't a surprise, and even Baidu had already started to pare back on the way it was doing business. Regulatory agencies in China had already come to the conclusion that Baidu shouldn't depend on merely the highest bid in dictating which medical-related ads pop on its results pages. Reputations should matter. It was also suggested that Baidu limit the ads populating results pages to just a third of the listings.

This weekend's development may seem jarring, but Baidu was already moving in that direction. It slashed its top-line guidance two weeks ago after tweaking the way it accepts and broadcasts the once lucrative medical-related paid search listings. It went from initially forecasting $3.119 billion to $3.192 billion in revenue for the current quarter to a range of just $2.807 billion to $2.823 billion.

*The new normal*
The lower guidance will linger. It will probably be at least a year before Baidu's top-line growth approaches the 31% adjusted gain that Baidu sported during this year's freshman quarter. If the new restrictions stick -- and investors have every reason to expect that to be the case -- the next four quarterly reports will be stacked against periods when Baidu was living high on the high-margin hog of unchecked health-related ads.

There's naturally going to be a fair deal of skepticism about Baidu, but it's not going to change its role as the undisputed top dog in the world's most populous nation. Everyone will have to play by the same rules, and this may actually make it even harder for smaller rivals to grow and diversify the way that Baidu can.

The naysayers are starting to show up. Short interest in Baidu exploded from 4.8 million shares in mid-May to 8.8 million shares by the end of the month. The mid-June tally finds 9.1 shares of Baidu sold short, the highest tally since late last year.

Baidu has overcome similar hiccups in the past, and it's a more diversified company these days in terms of businesses as well as regions. It's no longer merely China's largest search engine provider. That was a problem with investors last year when the stock was slumping, but now it's a silver lining in justifying Baidu's valuation premium to the market at a time when organic sales growth is slowing dramatically. Baidu will bounce back. It's just what it does.


_Rick Munarriz has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Baidu. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy._

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## Jlaw

TaiShang said:


> Another example, as Xiao revealed, is a video game adapted from Chinese Kong Fu novels, which became so popular overseas that it actually boosted the original book's sales in South Korea by over 20% as soon as the franchised game hit the market.



That's the most effective way to export Chinese culture. Through video games and movies. Another good way is to properly translate some of the classic 武俠 novels to English for English speakers and overseas Bananas who cannot read Chinese.

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## ahojunk

*Alibaba Unveils New System For Combating Counterfeit Goods*
DAVID MURPHY

JULY 3, 2016 07:40PM EST

Will it be enough to make brands happier with the online retail giant?

Online marketplace Alibaba is adding a few new tricks for keeping counterfeit goods off its website, a move that could improve relations between it and various high-end retailers who want knock-off products to go away.

Alibaba already has a "Good Faith Takedown" program, which has more than 700 participating brands. Depending on the skill of each brand at successfully reporting fake goods on Alibaba's websites, brands are given priority access to the company's counterfeit reporting and removal tools—ensuring that brands' reports are reviewed and processed more quickly if they're good at spotting fakes.

Expanding on that system, Alibaba is introducing a new "IP Joint-Force System." Brands that are particularly prone to copyright infringement—or at least, very concerned about it—will be assigned an Alibaba account manager that will work directly with the brand to go after fakes on Alibaba's sites.

"The system will enable Alibaba to directly and efficiently seek information from rights holders regarding suspected counterfeit product listings, which Alibaba, as a third-party marketplace, is unable to authenticate on its own with full certainty," reads Alibaba's description.

"The system allows brands to identify the authenticity of a product and easily notify Alibaba of the infringing listing. Alibaba will then initiate the Good Faith Takedown process and immediately remove the listing without required subsequent correspondence with the brand. This two-way communication stream is critical in creating a feedback loop that will continue to improve the speed and accuracy with which Alibaba is able to determine the authenticity of a product."

It's unclear just how many companies are going to be participating in the IP Joint-Force System. Presumably, it's just reserved for some of the bigger brands and/or brands that have the largest infringement issues on Alibaba. At some future point, Alibaba expects that all companies already involved in its Good Faith Takedown program will also be able to be a part of its IP Joint-Force System.

"As the internet sector continues to evolve, brands and online marketplaces alike face new IP enforcement challenges. As the leading online marketplace, we have a responsibility to all of our constituents to govern our platform and find innovative solutions," said Jessie Zheng, Alibaba's chief platform governance officer, in a statement.

Alibaba was suspended from the International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition in May, following complaints and threats from other member brands that they would leave the coalition if Alibaba was allowed to stay. They accused Alibaba of failing to do enough to prevent the sale of counterfeit material on its online marketplaces.

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## ahojunk

_The Chinese eCommerce market place is very competitive, cutthroat - it's getting too hot for some!_

--------
*Walmart sells Yihaodian, its Chinese e-commerce marketplace, to Alibaba rival JD.com*
Posted Jun 20, 2016 by Jon Russell (@jonrussell)






Walmart is partnering with China’s second largest e-commerce firm, JD.com, as it aims to take a larger bite out of the world’s most populous country.

In a wide-ranging alliance announced Monday, the U.S. retail giant said it has sold Yihaodian, its online commerce marketplace, to JD.com. Walmart will retain the Yihaodian direct sales business, but rather than operate its own online store entirely, it will become a retailer inside Yihaodian. It is also bringing its Sam’s Club membership service to JD.com, while Walmart’s physical stores will be listed on JD.com’s O2O JV Dada delivery platform.

On the financial side of things, Walmart is buying a five-percent stake in NASDAQ-listed JD.com, which is slowly increasing its marketshare and closing the gap on Alibaba. That investment is worth around $1.5 billion right now based on JD.com’s share price.

Walmart first invested in Yihaodian, which specializes in grocery and items focused on affluent female consumers — in 2011 and it bought the B2C service its entirety last summer: so why is it cutting a deal to get out of the business less than a year later?

The U.S. giant seems to have fully realized that the Chinese market is dominated by two major players, and it is seriously cutthroat.

Data from iResearch suggests that Yihaodian accounts for less than two percent of China’s e-commerce spending — Alibaba and JD.com are collectively over 80 percent — although Walmart claims the service is strongest in eastern and southern China. Based on that, it makes sense to lean on JD.com as the distribution partner to help grow its business in China.

The Wall Street Journal reported that one-third of the $482.1 billion in annual sales that Walmart makes outside the U.S. market comes from China, so the country is clearly still hugely important. It’ll certainly be interesting to see how it fares with JD.com, which differentiates itself from Alibaba by owning its own logistics and specializing in fast delivery and fresh goods.

It isn’t uncommon to see e-commerce players sell on rival platforms. Amazon opened a store on Alibaba’s Taobao mall last year, for example.

“JD.com shares similar values in making the lives of customers better. It also has a very complementary business and is an ideal partner that will help us offer compelling new experiences that can reach significantly more customers,” Doug McMillon, president and CEO of Walmart, said in a statement.

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## ahojunk

_From an Indian website, Alibaba is expanding into Indian market. 
Note that Vijay Shekhar Sharma is biased as his company is 40% backed by Alibaba. I will just take what he says with "a pinch of salt"._

--------
In a year, Amazon and Alibaba will dominate Indian ecommerce: Vijay Shekhar Sharma 
By Gulveen Aulakh, ET Bureau | Jul 04, 2016, 06.02 AM IST

NEW DELHI:The fight for India's lucrative ecommerce market will be mainly between Amazon and Alibaba, with the contours of the battle likely to be clearer in about a year, says Vijay Shekhar Sharma, chief executive officer of Paytm, a company backed by the Chinese online retailing giant. 

"The ecommerce business and market is reaching maturity of players. The next 6-9 months, it will be decided who the key contenders of the business are. Logically, to fight Amazon, you need the might of a strategic player - that is why it makes a lot of sense for people to align with Alibaba versus a lot of others," Sharma said, signalling the possible start of consolidation in the Indian ecommerce market. 

Paytm, a digital wallet and online retailer backed by Alibaba and its affiliate Ant Financial, is preparing to start a payments bank. It will spin off its ecommerce platform into a separate company, which will have a new name and brand and the same shareholders as Paytm. It will then look to raise funds or be merged or acquired. The entity will be separate from the company's payments bank, which will go live around October, pushed back again by a quarter, Sharma said. 




India's ecommerce battle lines are already being drawn. Amazon, the world's largest online retailer, said last month it will invest an additional $3 billion (over Rs 20,000 crore) in India, raising the stakes after having spent about $2 billion. The announcement came as existing biggies such as Flipkart and Snapdeal face additional pressure to raise fresh funds, when money is harder to find than before and the government has written up rules that bar platforms from offering deep discounts and cash-backs.

Alibaba plans to directly enter India's online retail market, which Goldman Sachs projects will more than treble to $36 billion in 2016-17 from $11billion in 2014-15. Alibaba Group Holding's 40% share in Paytm gives the Chinese ecommerce giant a strong foothold in India to begin with. However, it also holds a 4% share in Snapdeal. 

Sharma is timing the bifurcation of Paytm's businesses around the festival of Diwali. "We are going to make the marketplace separate, then we will be able to raise money, or do M&A, which means we will look to acquire correct optimum sized (companies) to become larger," Sharma said, without sharing details of how much equity will be diluted to raise cash and who the new investors are likely to be. Sharma expects Paytm's ecommerce business would be profitable on all levels by October, when Diwali will be celebrated this year. "Now is the time that Paytm should be identified with payments and financial services and commerce business can get its own name in due course," he said, adding that the move will bring clarity among merchants and investors, in terms of future investments, focus and also unlock value for both businesses.

On the payments bank side, the Noida-based company has put in place financial and technology integration on the backend from Infosys's Finacle core banking software, and Wipro, preparing for a late October or early November launch. The start of operations will hinge on approval from the Reserve Bank of India.

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## ahojunk

_So many events occurring in the ecommerce or Internet space.
In business, timing is very important. Good timing will lead to a good bargain!_

--------
*Alibaba Rumored To Buy SoftBank-Backed Wandoujia At Greatly Discounted Price*
By Nina Xiang | 04 July 2016 — 14:39 HKT






Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd. is rumored to be buying Wandoujia, a Beijing-based Android mobile app distribution platform backed by SoftBank Corp., Goldman Sachs, DCM and Innovation Works at a greatly discounted price.

The price for the 100% buyout is reportedly around US$200 million, a fraction of the US$1 billion valuation at the time of Wandoujia's last financing round back in 2014.

Alibaba first approached Wandoujia for a potential acquisition two years ago, offering US$1.5 billion just after the company raised US$120 million in a new financing round, according to Chinese media reports.

The Android app store has since suffered from internal strife and increasing competition. The stress is reflected by the fact that the company did not raise additional financing for the past two and half years.

With the latest deal, Alibaba plans to incorporate Wandoujia into its mobile Internet unit, completing its portfolio with a top ranked app store in China.

The deal would allow Wandoujia's venture and private equity investors to exit, albeit at a disappointing price.

Alibaba did not respond to an inquiry to confirm the news.

In January 2014, Wandoujia raised US$120 million in a series B round led by
SoftBank Corp., with participation from DCM and Innovation Works Development Fund.

Two months later, Goldman Sachs invested an undisclosed amount in Wandoujia in the Wall Street investment bank's first investment in a Chinese mobile Internet company.

Founded in 2009, Wandoujia previously received seed funding from Innovation Works in 2010, and US$80 million series A funding led by DCM in 2012.

In 2014, Wandoujia was ranked as the third largest app stores in China in terms of market share.

Among China's top four app vendors, Baidu app store group took a 23.4% share, Qihoo app store held 16.8%, while Wandoujian followed with a 10.9% stake and Tencent owned 8.7% of the market, according to T.H. Capital.

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## TaiShang

ahojunk said:


> *Walmart sells Yihaodian, its Chinese e-commerce marketplace, to Alibaba rival JD.com*



National market looks like consolidating. It is good to see that domestic champions are offering cut-throat competition to foreigners.

This will improve quality over all.

***

*Baidu, Wuzhen planning driverless car tourist services *
Xinhua, July 4, 2016

Visitors to Wuzhen in east China may soon be able to get a lift between their hotel and tourist spots in the Venice-like town, after Baidu signed a deal with the local tourism agency to develop such services on Sunday.

*Baidu and Wuzhen Tourism Co. will research which routes could be served by driverless cars and details like costs and how many vehicles will be needed before nailing down a more exact plan, said Wang Jin, Baidu's senior vice president and head of its autonomous driving division.*

Wang did not say when the service might be launched.

Despite being a historic town dating back 1,300 years, Wuzhen, in Zhejiang Province, is also known as a technological pioneer after its IT infrastructure was upgraded over the past few years. It became the permanent host venue for China's World Internet Conference (WIC) in 2014.

Baidu debuted its driverless car at the second WIC in Wuzhen last year and generated a lot of excitement when it successfully completed a rigorous road test in Beijing in December.

The company said earlier this year that it would choose 10 urban locations to try out driverless cars in 2016. Wuzhen is the third after east China's Wuhu City and an automobile industrial park in Shanghai.

The driverless car's core operating system is called *Baidu Brain*, artificial intelligence that includes high-precision electronic mapping, positioning, sensing and decision-making and control systems thanks to *Baidu's mining of big data*.

Baidu is aiming to commercialize the driverless technology by 2018 and to achieve mass production of the cars by 2020.

Hinting at the kind of services that could be offered in Wuzhen, Wang said Baidu was open to working with regulators and other players in the automotive industry chain, and the cost of hiring a driverless car could drop below that of hiring a driver in the foreseeable future.

***
_
This is a great way to test and improve Baidu's drivereless cars. _

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## ahojunk

_Amazing!_

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*45% of top-100 Android-game revenues in China belong to Tencent*
JEFF GRUBB JUNE 30, 2016 11:35 AM





Above: King of Glory from Tencent is a mobile take on its megapopular PC game League of Legends.
_Image Credit: Tencent_

The company that owns League of Legends and has a minority stake in Unreal Engine also owns an enormous chunk of the Chinese Android gaming market.

Tencent accounts for 44.5 percent of all the revenue spent on the top 100 highest-grossing Android games in China, according to a joint intelligence report from research firms Newzoo and TalkingData. The international conglomerate publishes 23 of the 100 top-performing games. In 2016, China is on pace to generate $7 billion in mobile gaming revenues, which puts it ahead of the United States and Japan as the top market for in the world.

“[King of Glory], a popular MOBA mobile game, continues to be the company’s top performing title in terms of revenues,” reads the Newzoo and TalkingData report. “The most installed Tencent game is Happy Lord. It released at the end of 2015 and is favored by people of all ages and playable across both low- and high-end devices.”

Tencent’s Myapp store is also still the top installed distribution channel in China. Google Play is not available in the country, and this has led to dozens of marketplaces popping up and competing for players. Myapp, with a 24 percent install rate, is the clear winner.







Tencent’s dominating market position in China is likely going to grow once it closes the deal to acquire leading global mobile-game developer Supercell this summer. Earlier this month, Tencent spent $8.6 billion to take an 84-percent stake in the maker of Clash Royale and Clash of Clans.

Clash Royale is an ideal game for China because of its focus on head-to-head competitive play. That kind of action is popular on all platforms there.

“In May, Clash Royale landed the No. 3 spot in top downloaded games on app channel 360 Mobile Assistant and No. 6 on the Baidu Mobile Assistant store,” reads the Newzoo report. “We believe it won’t take long for the title to appear in the rankings of China´s No. 1 Android app store — Tencent’s Myapp store.”

And that is likely one of the major reasons why Tencent decided to invest so heavily in Supercell. If the publisher can bring worldwide hits like Clash Royale and any future releases to its players, it could continue unlocking more of the value in a mobile-gaming market that isn’t finished growing.

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## ahojunk

_With the advent of the Internet, journalists write articles that attract 'clicks' not those that educate.
The following law will remove unfounded rumors and hopefully improve the quality of the news._

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*China bans online news without credible sources*
2016-07-04 10:52 | Ecns.cn | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_

(ECNS) -- The State Internet Information Office of China has urged increased vigilance in cracking down on fake news on the Internet.

The office said in a circular that all news websites must ensure the reports they publish are "true, comprehensive, objective and impartial."

It forbids running news that sacrifices truthfulness for the purpose of being first, or directly quoting content on social networking platforms as news.

The circular has demanded that websites give credit to the original news source and bans publishing hearsay as news or distorting facts.

A number of heavyweight news portals, including Sina.com.cn, 163.com, caijing.com.cn, qq.com and toutiao.com were either fined or disciplined for running news that broke the rules, according to the office.

The office was established in 2011 to direct, coordinate and supervise online content management and handle administrative approval of businesses related to online news reporting.

An official said the office will maintain strict control over fake news and information, and further improve legislation to regulate the spread of news online.

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## TaiShang

ahojunk said:


> or directly quoting content on social networking platforms as news.



That's it. Social media should not be considered as news-worthy because there is no discipline and professionalism. Journalism is a science and taught in school. It must be done by those who are educated. News portals cannot use and quote social media accounts as reflection of truth.

Journalism requires first hand observation, examination and reporting. Journalism means being there. It does not mean surfing the internet and then pretending to be a journalist without leaving the desk.

If this is journalism, why some real journalists put themselves in the line of fire in war regions and at times get killed?

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## ahojunk

_Alipay is expanding worldwide._

--------
*Worldline Partners with Alipay to Bring its Payments App to Germany*
Alipay's payment app enters German market via Synergy with Worldline.

Steven Hatzakis | Payments (FinTech) | Monday, 04/07/2016|13:19 GMT

The European-based payments provider, Worldline, with global operations and 40 years in business, today announced a synergy with Chinese payments conglomerate Alipay to enhance the German retail industry and potential revenue streams for network providers in the country.

The addition of Alipay in Germany this month allows users of the Alipay app to pay at authorized retailers with Worldline providing its gateway that enables access to additional network providers.

This synergy could set the stage for further related deals in other local industries in the future, including in capital markets and trading with online brokerages. Alipay is operated by Ant Financial Services Group and has 450 million clients – making it one of the largest payments companies globally.

Commenting in a corporate statement regarding the deal, Wolf Kunisch, Managing Director for Financial Processing & Software Licensing & CEE at Worldline, said: “Alipay is a sophisticated payment solution and we support expanding it in Germany. We make shopping for Chinese tourists – and future transactions for all foreign tourists – easier and more comfortable.”

*Pilot program underway in July*

Alipay uses a QR Code function as part of its app and is something that Chinese consumers prefer. It is under a pilot program in Germany this month before the scheduled live launch.

An official announcement regarding the deal explained how the number of business people and travelers coming to Germany from China has risen in recent years and is expected to continue to grow. Half of China’s payments market is already dominated by Alipay for online payments, with an even higher share of mobile at 70%.

Rita Liu, Head of Alipay EMEA, said in a corporate statement regarding the synergy: “With Worldline as a partner, we can expand our market position in Europe. Based on these developments, each party gets great benefits.”

Mrs. Liu added: “The customer can conveniently shop outside of China and pay comfortably with Alipay. The merchant, in addition to the Alipay payment solution, can benefit from the Alipay marketing solution ‘Global Lifestyle Platform’ to communicate offers and make recommendations to customers to increase revenue.”

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## TaiShang

*Xinjiang’s millennial entrepreneurs make the most of the Internet age*
By Yin Lu and Zhang Xinyuan Source:Global Times
Published: 2016-7-4







A young saleswoman sells scarfs to a customer at the Urumqi Fair in Xinjiang. Photo: CFP


Young entrepreneurs from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region are exploring new business areas such as *e-commerce, online education, digital solutions, the Internet of Things and more*. They are utilizing their talents in business hubs all over the country, and some are even planning to expand overseas.

While Xinjiang is positioned *as one of the "core areas" of the "One Belt, One Road" initiative*, its young people are striving to realize their dreams, taking advantage of the resources and opportunities offered by the Internet age.

Abdulhabir Muhammad learnt about the importance of the Internet the hard way. 





Abdulhabir Muhammad, 26, from Aksu, founder of A.B.U. Education. Photo: Li Hao/GT

In March, he got sick after going from school to school in Xinjiang for a whole month to give speeches and talk to high school and college students about going overseas for further education. He decided that there must be a better way to reach people. 

"In the past, I thought I should be a traditional type of educator, but there are limits to that. Then I realized how important it is to make use of the Internet," he said. Muhammad graduated from the State University of New York at Binghamton with an MBA in 2014. Muhammad founded A.B.U. Education this year, which provides language training and consultation services to Xinjiang students who want to study overseas. 

Over the last three months, Muhammad has been working on promoting his firm on the Internet, after researching China's major social media platforms, messaging apps, and real-time streaming websites. 

On top of launching a WeChat public account, he has also started discussions about overseas studies on SinaWeibo which ended up trending. He does online streaming, talking about topics related to overseas education and life, such as introducing US universities and high schools to his audience. He also offers online classes on Xinjiang's first English-language radio channel, Voice of A.B.U., which is available on multiple online platforms and apps. 

"Now I feel like I am adapting to the requirements of this age," he said. 

His efforts have proven to be effective, and now his Weibo page has more than 120,000 followers. The demographics of his fan base are gradually changing too. In the beginning about 60 percent of his followers and audience online were Xinjiang natives, but as he has started to stream in Chinese and English the majority of his new followers are from other parts of China. 

Muhammad is very encouraged by the fact that many of his followers are from outside Xinjiang, and some schools in other regions are now asking him to deliver speeches. Therefore, he is successfully shifting his focus to a broader market, targeting students across the entire country. 

Muhammad would also like to create a platform that offers online courses taught by professors overseas to help students in Xinjiang who can't afford to go abroad. 

"We want to bring these courses to Xinjiang and other western regions, in English, Chinese, Uyghur and other local languages," he said. However, his biggest objective is to serve overseas returnees who are from Xinjiang and other western regions of China, starting from building connections among the community as well as collecting and sharing information regarding job hunting. 

"I hope the students who go overseas will come back to contribute to our economy," he said.





Adil Mamattura, 26, from Kashgar, founder of Xinjiang Nut Cake Prince Company. Photo: Courtesy of Adil Mamattura

A 2012 incident that involved a vendor selling Xinjiang nut cake - a traditional street snack made of nuts, sweets and glutinous rice - prompted Mamattura to start his own nut cake business. He was then a student at the Changsha University of Science and Technology, Central China's Hunan Province. At the end of that year, a Uyghur nut cake vendor who got into a fight with a customer over the price of his wares was paid 160,000 yuan ($24,080) for cakes damaged in the fight, raising controversy over inter-ethnic relations. Mamattura thought that this incident would give people a bad impression of his homeland's traditional snack, so decided to promote the cake online.

Now, four years later, the monthly sales volume of his nut cake company has reached 3 to 6 million yuan. These staggering numbers are the result of how he has used the Internet to promote nut cake, his Nut Cake Prince brand and himself.

Mamattura regularly makes videos and posts them on social media to show how nut cake is produced. He believes transparency - key in a nation that has been hit again and again by food scandals - will make customers trust his product.

"WeChat is a platform that we attach great importance to right now. Our account has over 1.2 million fans, and we rely on fan marketing, like if our fans invite other people to follow our account we send them some nut cake as a gift," Mamattura said. 

Mamattura is also trying to use the live streaming trend to expand his business. He plans to promote his new line of cantaloupes by going to Turpan and using apps such as Yingke to show the cantaloupe fields, how they are grown and the transportation process, to prove the cantaloupes are of good quality.

"I did not deliberately make myself an Internet celebrity, but since customers recognize my face and trust me, I will use this advantage to help more customers know and trust our brand," Mamattura said.

Mamattura is planning to make Xinjiang nut cake go international, and challenge the status of Snickers as one of world's leading sweet, nutty snacks. "At a frisbee event in Shanghai, some of the foreigners had a bite of Xinjiang nut cake, and they said it's more delicious and healthy than Snickers. Since it's made of a variety of different nuts, it's very nutritious and can replenish one's energy quickly," Mamattura said. 

Their comments got Mamattura thinking. Xinjiang nut cake is soft, and easily influenced by temperature, and thus has short expiration date. This makes it difficult to sell in large quantities and for people to carry it around with them. He is now developing a new recipe to make it more crispy and give it a longer shelf life. 

"I plan to launch the new product as an energy bar next year, in small and fashionable packaging that will attract more young customers," Mamattura said.





Ailikemu Abujili, 28, from Hami, founder and CEO of Hangzhou Qiming E-commercial Company Ltd. Photo: Courtesy of Ailikemu Abujili

Ailikemu Abujili owns a company that sells toys and men's sportswear online, based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province. 

Starting from a small, humble apartment he rented in November 2014 where all his staff live and work, the company now has a team of seven people and boosts a monthly turnover of $120,000. His sales are mostly made overseas, mainly to the US, through online platforms including Ebay, Amazon and AliExpress, e-commerce giant Alibaba's cross-board marketplace. 

However, prior to this, like many other Chinese college graduates of his age, Abujili went through a period of not knowing what to do with his life after he graduated with a degree in aerial transport from a Ukrainian college.

Finally, he decided that e-commerce is the future of business. 

So he chose Hangzhou, where e-commerce giant Alibaba is located, due to its comparatively lower logistics costs and the subsidies provided by the local government to start-ups. 

Abujili even got his household registration moved to Hangzhou. Now he is also planning to open offices in Shanghai, due to its Free Trade Area, and Shenzhen, South China's Guangdong Province. 

Abujili believes he's found the right place for himself, and he hopes more young people from Xinjiang will join this industry and try their luck in different cities in the country.

Originally from Hami, a city known for its sweet melons, he thinks simply being known as a place where good fruit is grown is far from what the region's young people want their countrymen to think about Xinjiang. 

"Many people still think that business owners from Xinjiang are no more than restauranteurs, or those who run barbecue stands and fruit shops," he said. "I would like to let them know that we are capable of making breakthroughs in e-commerce too." 





Arfat Anvar, 24, from Gulja, founder of YammiGO. Photo: Li Hao/GT

Arfat Anvar wants to make sure that people all over the country who want halal foods are able to quickly receive their fresh _nang_, a traditional type of Xinjiang flatbread, wrapped in tinfoil in a box with the logo of their company hand written on it. 

With a diploma in software engineering from Beijing's North China Electric Power University, Anvar has recently been trying to promote his services on social media, such as giving prizes to Net users who participate in discussions about his brand. With the website and app they are about to launch soon, individuals and retailers will be able to purchase halal foods ranging from dried fruits and mutton jerky to biscuits and energy bars from YammiGO. 

His primary targets right now are college students from Xinjiang studying in other parts of China, as he understands how hard it is for them to eat religiously suitable food. "When I was in school, I found it hard to find halal foods," he said. 

While there are shops on bigger retailing platforms such as taobao.com, and many halal food companies have developed their own apps or WeChat accounts to sell their products, there's no other company like Anvar's which sells a variety of different halal foods on one platform. 

Anvar said that his background and connections in Xinjiang have been an advantage for him. "I know where to find the most authentic halal food. I know if I want jujube, I go to Hotan (in Xinjiang) and directly buy them from a local peasant."

His ambition is to build his brand into an international success story like Amazon. Starting in Malaysia, Anvar is trying to build connections and cooperate with foreign major food companies, and represent them in China. 

Anvar encourages young Uyghurs who want to get out of their comfort zone and start something new, to not to be afraid to take their first step. 

"Some people might not be confident enough, thinking whether or not a humble young person from Xinjiang is able to start up a good business in other parts of the country. I want to let them know that you absolutely can. Just go ahead and build a team and start going," Anvar said.





Skyline in Urumqi, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Photo: CFP

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## ahojunk

_I thought China is moving to mobile payment via smartphone, i.e. Alipay, WeChat, etc
Isn't UnionPay much bigger than Visa or Mastercard?_

--------
*Mobile payments market explodes in China*
2016-07-07 09:04 | China Daily | _Editor: Xu Shanshan_





_According to Paul Jung, head of products and digital solutions of Visa Northeast Asia, China is now leading the way in mobile wallets. (Photo provided to China Daily)_


The mobile payments market in China is expanding so rapidly that global leaders are drawing up exclusive strategies to meet the growing local demand.

According to Paul Jung, head of products and digital solutions of Visa Northeast Asia, China is now leading the way in mobile wallets.

So, during the three-day 2016 Mobile World Congress that ended on July 1 in Shanghai, Visa Inc, the global card payment services provider, announced its mobile payment services will combine internet of things and biometrics.

Visa is also using near-field-communication or NFC solutions on wearables such as rings, smart watches and wristbands. It has introduced a biometrics payment technology based on the reading of palm print and fingerprint.

Besides, in March last year, it launched Visa Checkout, a service with six commercial banks in the country. The service removes the need for sharing card details with retailers.

It was introduced in China in response to the rapidly expanding cross-border e-commerce. So far, 10 banks, including China Merchants Bank, Shanghai Pudong Development Bank and China Everbright Bank, have rolled out this service.

"We will continue to promote Visa Checkout in China this year, for this is a key part of our new e-commerce strategy here," said Shirley Yu, general manager of Visa China.

Meanwhile, Visa's contactless payment technology payWave is gaining wider acceptance among Chinese cardholders ever since it was rolled out in the country two years ago.

So far, the service has been the most prevalent one in the Pearl River Delta region. For, Guangzhou province is one of the most popular inbound tourism markets in China, receiving a large number of tourists from neighboring Hong Kong.

More than 5,000 payment terminals in the region are now connected to the payWave service.

"China is now one of biggest and most active markets for Visa. The country has so many innovations now that it is no longer a follower. Our team in China now has to report the local demand to our global headquarters so that our products can meet the Chinese customers' demand first," said Yu.

According to global market consulting firm eMarketer, China will have more than 195.3 million users of mobile payment solutions by the end of this year.

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## JSCh

*Tencent opens up big data platform to boost sharing economy*
By Zhou Mo (China Daily) Updated: 2016-07-07 08:18






The logo of Tencent [Photo/IC]
​Tencent Holdings Ltd has announced that it will fully open up its big data platform and machine learning technology in a move to build a "sharing economy" based on cloud services.

Enterprises will be able to use a set of big data analysis tools developed by Tencent, helping them gain a better understanding of their clients and improve their products.

The Shenzhen-based internet giant, which owns instant messaging tools QQ and WeChat, has years of experiences storing and analyzing huge amounts of data.

The opening of its core technologies is part of Tencent's efforts to develop cloud services, an area which many other big companies including Alibaba and Baidu are also tapping into.

"Development of a sharing economy is closely related to cloud services" said Ma Huateng, chairman of Tencent. "Like transportation, accommodation and many other areas, cloud services are also a kind of sharing economy."

He said cloud computing has become one of the key areas Tencent focuses on and the company is dedicated to opening its IT resources and technological capabilities to outsiders.

"In the past, enterprises were only users of internet technology. Now, as they engage themselves in the cloud, they are becoming a part of the internet ecosystem," Ma said at the 2016 Tencent Cloud Summit held in Shenzhen this week.

Cloud technology has achieved greater importance in recent years as more and more Chinese enterprises integrate themselves deeper with the internet. However, it remains difficult for companies, especially smaller ones, to build their own data center because it involves large capital investment and a waste of resources, said Dowson Tong, senior executive vice-president of Tencent.

Cloud services help enterprises get access to more resources while reducing their operating costs, Tong said.

According to the 2016 Internet Trends report, services provided by Tencent are the most commonly used by Chinese internet users. More than 50 percent of their time on the internet is spent on Tencent services.

"We are not offering cloud services as a separate business. Instead, it is a part of Tencent's entire strategy. Enterprises will be able to get access to all Tencent platforms by using its cloud services," Ma said.

Joe Weinman, a leading cloud computing strategist, said Tencent has a good background in offering cloud services. The company owns a huge amount of consumer data and knows what consumers need. This will enable it to do better in user experience and improve availability of its products, he said.

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## JSCh

*Alibaba and SAIC partner on internet car*
By Meng Jing in Hangzhou, Thursday, July 7, 2016, 10:10



Representatives of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd and SAIC Motor Corp sign on a jointly developed internet-enabled vehicle, which was launched on Wednesday in Hangzhou, while Alibaba's Executive Chairman Jack Ma (left) looks on. (Xu Kangping / For China Daily)

It seems a long shot to replace smartphones with cars. But Alibaba Group Holding Ltd is heading in that direction. It unveiled on Wednesday a new internet-enabled vehicle equipped with the e-commerce giant's YunOS operating system.

The car, which is dubbed the first internet car to go into mass production, is part of a partnership that Alibaba and SAIC Motor Corp, one of China's major car manufacturers, inked about two years ago.

Jack Ma, executive chairman of Alibaba, described the vehicle as a milestone product that marks the beginning of the so-called internet of everything - an era in which everything is connected to everything else via the internet.

"Just like what the smartphone does to our life - about 80 percent of the features of a smartphone are not related to making phone calls anymore. In the future, about 80 percent of the functions of a car will not be related to transportation," said Ma.

The car, which will be put on to the market soon at a retail price from 148,800 yuan (US$22,250), enjoys some tech-savvy features such as voice control to change the in-car temperature and a real-time navigation system that can relieve the driver from the pressure of staring at smartphone-based navigation tools.

Some of the features may not seem major breakthroughs. But James Yan, research director at Counterpoint Technology Market Research, said that it is actually much more complicated than it looks to connect a traditional car to the internet.

"With the installed operating system, Alibaba is likely to introduce more features, such as streaming videos and online shopping, in the future generations of its smart vehicles," said Yan.

However, he doubts that cars can replace smartphones as a key internet device. "After all, people don't spend that much time in cars, only when they need to commute."

Among China's major tech companies, Alibaba is considered to be an early bird in terms of launching an internet car that is ready for sale. But its rivals, such as Baidu Inc and Le Holdings Co are focusing on self-driving technology.

Baidu plans for its cars go into mass production in five years, Le Holdings, known for its smart TV and smartphone products, in April released its first concept self-driving electronic car - 28 months after the company decided to enter the industry.

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## ahojunk

*5G heralds driverless cars*
2016-07-07 09:14 | China Daily | _Editor: Xu Shanshan_
_
*Carmakers, telecom firms explore uses of next-generation communication system*
_
Visualize this seemingly futuristic scenario: you set out in your car for a long-distance trip. Only, you don't sit behind the wheel to drive.

Instead, you sit there to square up against a computer in a game of chess on the display screen on the dashboard. While you ponder and plot your moves, your electric self-driving car, too, makes its moves on the road.

It "communicates" with other similar vehicles, keeps a safe distance from them, and, just as you checkmate the computer after a long, exhausting game, the car reaches the destination.

That's not science fiction but reality waiting to unfold sooner than you would expect.

Welcome to the world of 5G or the fifth-generation mobile communication technology.

"The race towards 5G will be a key driver of the driverless cars," said Xu Zhijun, the rotating CEO of Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, the world's largest telecom equipment maker.

It is difficult to introduce highly automated or self-driving cars right now because they require sophisticated communication networks that are fool-proof or 100 percent reliable, ultra-efficient and capable of processing big data in a jiffy, experts said.

Such a network should be able to conduct real-time analysis of complex transportation scenarios, Xu said at the Mobile World Congress Shanghai last week.

"That's exactly where 5G will come into play," he said.

The next-generation network is expected to deliver peak data transfer at the speed of 20 gigabits per second, almost 100 times faster than the current 4G networks.

Also, technological progress will enable ultra high capacity, improved signalling efficiency and lower power consumption.

China plans to start commercialization of 5G in 2020. Local telecom players are already rushing to partner with carmakers to explore applications of the cutting-edge technology in real life.

Last week, China Mobile Communications Corp, the world's largest wireless telecom operator by subscribers, said leading auto companies such as Audi AG and BYD Co Ltd have become the latest partners of its global 5G Innovation Center.

"5G will make it possible to achieve more than 1 million connections per square kilometer," said Li Yue, president of China Mobile, adding such huge capacity will lay down a sound technology infrastructure for internet-connected cars.

At the MWC in Shanghai, the company demonstrated a line of 5G-enabled miniature self-driving cars through a partnership with Nokia Corp.

Connected to the mobile cloud in real time and equipped with a complete minicomputer inside its body, each car can automatically pilot itself, and can stop as soon as it notices obstacles.

China United Network Communications Group Co, the smaller rival of China Mobile, is also moving in the same direction. The company set up a branch last August to focus on an information system for self-driving vehicles.

"We believe over 200 million cars will be connected to the internet by 2020," said Xin Keduo, general manager of China Unicom's car-system unit. "But building connections is only the first step. What's more important is to realize various applications based on these connections."

Xiang Ligang, founder of the telecom industry website cctime.com, said telecom operators are betting that autonomous and connected cars will be the driving application for 5G.

"Huge investments are needed to build 5G telecom stations and networks, so telecom companies have to ponder which applications will drive consumers to switch from 4G to 5G networks and justify such big investments," Xiang said.

"The prevalence of smartphones has kindled consumers' demand for 4G. Telecom companies believe that the killer app in the 5G era will be the internet of things－and connected cars will be a big part of that phenomena," he said.

Also, telecom companies' increasing enthusiasm for smart cars comes amid the government's support by way favorable policy.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the top industry regulator, last week urged enterprises to start with internet-connected cars as part of the broad efforts to accelerate R&D efforts on how to integrate 5G technology into vertical industries.

Fu Liang, an independent industry expert, said it will take several years before the international community reaches a consensus on 5G network standards. But Chinese companies' 5G experiment still makes sense, he said.

"Key technologies enabling the commercial use of the internet of things are very likely to be accepted as part of 5G standards, which will then have a big edge in the deployment of 5G networks," Fu said.

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## ahojunk

_Who you know is more important than what you know.
Contacts and networks are important._

--------
*Top court spokesman joins Alibaba's media relations*
2016-07-07 08:50 | chinadaily.com.cn | _Editor: Xu Shanshan_


A high-profile spokesman of China's top court, Sun Jongong, will join the nation's e-commerce giant as vice-president mainly covering public affairs.

Over the past two weeks, a lot of information about the resignation of Sun and his employment in Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, has swept the internet, stirring the court system and also arousing public attention.

Alibaba's media relations office declined to comment when reached by China Daily on Wednesday. But an employee of the company, with access to its internal website, confirmed that Sun's information is already available on its online platform.

The employee, who declined to be named, said that Sun's job description is shown online as "vice-president, head of public affairs, reporting directly to Jin Jianhang, president of Alibaba Group".

Another employee in the company, who wished to remain anonymous, explained that the position is to deal with public affairs and help coordinate important activities.

Sun responded on Wednesday with a text message when China Daily contacted him, saying that he is not taking any interviews at present.

China Daily also found that Sun's name has disappeared from the position of "deputy director of the publicity bureau with the top court" on the highest judicial authority's website, and no new candidate has been added so far.

There has been no official statement about Sun's resignation from the top court since the news hit the media, or about who will take his place.

The State Council Information Office shows that Sun, born in Beijing in 1968 and with a doctoral degree in law, worked for the criminal department under the court's research office, the court's newspaper and the court's general office.

He had been engaged in work regarding judicial interpretations of criminal laws, the judicial policies and news presses as he employed in the court, according to his introduction on the information office's website.

He became the court's spokesman in April 2009, it said.

By March, he had hosted more than 300 press conferences, Chinese media reported.

He opened his own blog on Xinhuanet.com, the official website of Xinhua News Agency, after he was named as the spokesman, and he said in his first blog that he would not tell lies and welcomed netizens to communicate with him online, the media said.

He also said in May 2009 that the court would have a press conference once a month in principle and could hold more at any time if there were important issues to address.

In 2015, Chinese media reported about 1,000 judges had resigned from courts for different reasons, such as pressure of case hearings and the economic burden.

In Shanghai, at least 50 judges have voluntarily left the judicial system since January last year, according to Yangcheng Evening News. The resignations followed the departure of 105 judicial officers, including 86 judges, in the city in 2014, a rise of 90 percent from 2013.

Beijing High People's Court also confirmed the brain drain last year, saying that more than 500 legal officers in the capital have resigned in the past five years.

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## ahojunk

ahojunk said:


> _So many events occurring in the ecommerce or Internet space.
> In business, timing is very important. Good timing will lead to a good bargain!_
> 
> --------
> *Alibaba Rumored To Buy SoftBank-Backed Wandoujia At Greatly Discounted Price*
> By Nina Xiang | 04 July 2016 — 14:39 HKT
> 
> View attachment 315752
> 
> 
> Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd. is rumored to be buying Wandoujia, a Beijing-based Android mobile app distribution platform backed by SoftBank Corp., Goldman Sachs, DCM and Innovation Works at a greatly discounted price.
> 
> The price for the 100% buyout is reportedly around US$200 million, a fraction of the US$1 billion valuation at the time of Wandoujia's last financing round back in 2014.
> 
> Alibaba first approached Wandoujia for a potential acquisition two years ago, offering US$1.5 billion just after the company raised US$120 million in a new financing round, according to Chinese media reports.
> 
> The Android app store has since suffered from internal strife and increasing competition. The stress is reflected by the fact that the company did not raise additional financing for the past two and half years.
> 
> With the latest deal, Alibaba plans to incorporate Wandoujia into its mobile Internet unit, completing its portfolio with a top ranked app store in China.
> 
> The deal would allow Wandoujia's venture and private equity investors to exit, albeit at a disappointing price.
> 
> Alibaba did not respond to an inquiry to confirm the news.
> 
> In January 2014, Wandoujia raised US$120 million in a series B round led by
> SoftBank Corp., with participation from DCM and Innovation Works Development Fund.
> 
> Two months later, Goldman Sachs invested an undisclosed amount in Wandoujia in the Wall Street investment bank's first investment in a Chinese mobile Internet company.
> 
> Founded in 2009, Wandoujia previously received seed funding from Innovation Works in 2010, and US$80 million series A funding led by DCM in 2012.
> 
> In 2014, Wandoujia was ranked as the third largest app stores in China in terms of market share.
> 
> Among China's top four app vendors, Baidu app store group took a 23.4% share, Qihoo app store held 16.8%, while Wandoujian followed with a 10.9% stake and Tencent owned 8.7% of the market, according to T.H. Capital.


.
_This is no longer a rumor. The acquisition of Wandoujia by Alibaba is confirmed._

--------
*Alibaba buys app firm to lift position*
2016-07-06 10:38 | Shanghai Daily | _Editor: Huang Mingrui_

Alibaba yesterday said it has acquired domestic Android application distributor Wandoujia to strengthen its position in the mobile Internet market.

Wandoujia will merge with Alibaba's mobile business unit, which includes UC Browser and online mapping service AutoNavi, to tap on each other's strength.

"Both companies share the same strategic vision, and we believe Alibaba's mobile business and Wandoujia could form a strong product offering and deliver synergies under new mobile Internet trends," said Yu Yongfu, president of Alibaba mobile business group.

The founder of Wandoujia, Wang Junyu, said combining each other's resources and data analytic capabilities will help shape its future growth.

Earlier media reports said the deal is valued at around US$200 million but both companies declined to comment on the financial details.

Launched in 2010, Wandoujia is one of the earliest Android app distributors in China. Former Google China head Kaifu Lee's Innovation Works, Softbank Group and DCM have invested in it.

Alibaba has been trying to catch up with Baidu and Tencent in the mobile Internet sector. According to Beijing-based Big Data Research, Baidu, Tencent and Qihoo 360 took the top spots among Android app distributors in China in the first quarter.

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## ahojunk

*Tougher rules for ads on internet released*
2016-07-10 06:57 | China Daily | _Editor: Gu Liping_

China has introduced a tougher regulation to take a firmer grip on the country's internet advertising industry following the death of a college student, who sought treatment for his disease on online search giant Baidu Inc.

The State Administration for Industry and Commerce on Friday released a new internet advertising regulation on its website. The regulation, which takes effect on Sept 1, has made it clear for the first time that China now considers *all pay-for-performance searches as advertising*.

Zhang Guohua, head of the advertisement department at the administration, said on Friday that search results displayed on online search engines and e-commerce platforms were considered as advertisements as long as their rankings were influenced by financial factors rather than appearing in their order of relevance to search terms.

The new regulation means that pay-for-performance searches, which are some of the high-earning businesses for China's internet groups like Baidu Inc, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd and Sohu.com Inc and others, will be under tighter control.

Zhang said that *all paid online listings needed to be labeled as "advertisements" as of Sept 1*.

"Some of them are labeled as 'promotions' right now, which are not in line with the new rule," he said.

Baidu, which was investigated by the government in May after the death of the student, said in a statement on Friday that the Beijing-based company was a strong advocate of the new rule.

It said it would continue to crack down on fake and illegal information online.

Lyu Ronghui, an analyst with internet consultancy iResearch Consulting Group, said the new rule may not further dampen Baidu's business.

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## ahojunk

_I like how eCommerce is improving lives in rural China.
Three cheers to Alibaba, JD, etc._

--------
*E-commerce lets a village thrive*
2016-07-05 09:10 | China Daily | _Editor: Feng Shuang_





_A willow craft is among the exhibits at the willow weaving cultural heritage center near Xuezhuang village in Shandong province. (Photo by Lu Peng/Xinhua)_

As the temperature rises to 35 C in the early afternoon, Liu Yuesheng places another finished pet basket on the pile in his home, which is almost touching the ceiling. And despite sweat streaming down his face, he is working on weaving a willow cushion.

Born and raised in a small village called Xuezhuang, located in Tancheng county, 90 kilometers from Linyi city, in southern Shandong province, Liu, 48, has been weaving willow since young.

He says that the people of the village have been planting willow trees and weaving willow straw into various products－from furniture to decorations－for generations.

The villagers never made much money from their willow products until the village comprising around 1,000 people－led by pioneers like Liu－discovered Taobao, an online shopping platform of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, in 2011.

Now, with four online stores on Taobao.com and one store on Alibaba's business-to-consumer site Tmall, Liu has sold thousands of products nationwide with yearly income crossing 4 million yuan ($601,000).





_Two women make Chinese knots at the factory owned by entrepreneur Wang Chao at Honghua town in Linyi. (Photo by Lu Peng/Xinhua)_

"In the past, we sold our products to nearby commodities markets, but now we run our own businesses, which gives us freedom and more money," says Liu.

"All my family members, including my two sons, who have just graduated from university, are working for the online stores. Our buyers range from individuals to companies. We also design products for customers."

According to Wang Yanping, the head of Xuezhuang village, weaving willow is a traditional skill in the village with a nearly 300-year history.

Following Liu's success, nearly all the families in the village have learned how to combine their traditional skills and e-commerce.

The village, which has land measuring more than 1,100 mu (73 hectares) under willow cultivation, sold woven willow products worth more than 60 million yuan in 2015, earning it the title "*Taobao village*".

Slogans written on the village walls now say "*Gold bowls and silver bowls can't beat willow bowls*", replacing phrases promoting the family-planing policies.

In recent years, the country's urbanization has changed people's lives in rural areas. One of the biggest challenges that the rural areas have faced is that young people left for cities to make a living, which resulted in "empty nests" and "left-behind children".

Empty nests refer to the elderly, who live alone unaccompanied by any family as their children have grown up and left to pursue their own careers, while left-behind children are those left behind in rural areas under the care of relatives, mostly grandparents with little or no education, and family friends as their parents move to cities in search of work.





_A local villager makes willow products at home. (Photo by Lu Peng/Xinhua)_

But thanks to the success of the willow-weaving businesses, almost all the young people are now staying in the village and managing online stores, says Wang, adding that even major delivery companies, such as Shunfeng Express, have built offices in the village to ensure good service.

"We send some of our young people to learn about e-commerce in the city and they then return and pass on their knowledge to the villagers. They also teach the older generation how to use computers, and how to set up and manage a Taobao store."

Last October, the village started working on an e-commerce industry park with an investment of 20 million yuan. It will provide offices, factories and warehouses to the villagers. Many residents from nearby villages have also been coming to Xuezhuang village to work and learn willow-weaving skills.

Meanwhile, according to statistics from the China Center of Information Industry Development, China's internet population has grown dramatically in the past decade and by June 2015 China had 667 million internet users.

The online business model has had a dramatic impact on the lives of village youth. An example of this is Wang Chao, a 28-year-old resident of Honghua town, located at the southern end of Tancheng county.

Speaking of how the online model has made a difference to his life, Wang, who owns Linyi Qiaoyi E-Commerce Company－the biggest online company selling Chinese knotted products－says: "Thanks to the development of e-commerce and the rising number of Chinese online consumers, we (online entrepreneurs) not only make more money now, but also enjoy better lifestyles."

With three registered brands and nine online stores on popular e-commerce platforms－Taobao, Tmall and Jingdong－Wang sells products worth around 15 million yuan a year.





_Packing for delivery. (Photo by Lu Peng/Xinhua)_

"Opening an online store is free. You don't need a large space, or much funding," says Wang, who also attributes the popularity of Chinese knots to the growing awareness of Chinese consumers about traditional Chinese culture.

"People like decorating their rooms and cars with traditional folk artwork, especially during Chinese festivals," he says.

In 2012, like many young people, who were leaving their poor villages to seek better opportunities in the cities, Wang joined an internet company in Shenzhen, in Guangdong province.

He came up with the idea of selling Chinese knots online after seeing his colleagues buying the products before the traditional Spring Festival celebrations.

He tested his idea by opening a Taobao store and selling Chinese knots, which he bought from nearby commodities markets.

The following year, Wang quit his job and returned to his hometown to start his own company.

Separately, the local government is also supporting the e-commerce trend by offering free or cheaper land for entrepreneurs to build offices and factories.

"We all want our villages to become richer and better," says Wang.

"*The success of companies is not just about reviving traditional folk art, but also offering job opportunities to young people, so they don't have to leave their villages to seek jobs.*"

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## TaiShang

*New tax on search advertising to hit Baidu, Alibaba*
China Daily, July 12, 2016

Some of China's biggest internet companies may see their earning taking a hit from a new regulation, as the country takes a firmer grip on search advertising.

The State Administration for Industry and Commerce on Friday released the new regulation, which for the first time classifies paid searches as internet advertising. Analysts said that the revenue could be subject to an additional 3 percent culture-cultivation tax.

*Such a move could force Baidu Inc, which runs China's biggest online search engine, to cut its fiscal 2017 net income to 16.3 billion yuan ($2.4 billion), according to analysts at Daiwa Capital Markets HK Ltd led by John Choi.*

That estimate is about 4 percent below the average of estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

*About 50 percent of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's revenue in the first quarter would be affected, suggesting a 2.4 percent hit to earnings, wrote Hong Kong-based Choi.*

"We would expect the market to cut its 2017-19 earnings forecasts for Baidu and Alibaba, given the additional surcharge burden," Choi said in a report.

The new regulation, which will take effect on Sept 1, is seen as the government's increased effort to oversee the country's $23.2-billion internet advertising market, which was under media scrutiny earlier this year after the death of a college student, who sought out a treatment for his rare disease on Baidu's search results.

*Baidu said in a statement that the company would fully implement the new regulations. Alibaba said in a statement that if its pay-for-performance ads were charged a 3 percent fee, the impact of on its margins would be in the "low single digit" range as its revenue channels are becoming more diversified.*

Analysts said the regulation would have positive impact on the Chinese online advertising industry. That is because it makes it clear that advertising publishers have the obligation to review ad contents－and advertisers from certain industries such as healthcare will have to obtain relevant licenses from watchdogs before they can do online advertising, said Jialong Shi, head of Nomura China Internet and Media Research.

"But being officially classified as an ad service, internet search operators will have the new obligation to review the paid search results which Baidu indicated in its 2015 annual report as 'being burdensome'," Shi said.

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## ahojunk

*China outlines regulations for driver requirements for ride-sharing services*
(CRI Online) 13:22, July 12, 2016





(File photo)​

Regulations governing driver requirements for ride-sharing services were issued jointly on Monday by the Internet Society of China, a non-profit NGO established by Chinese Internet companies in 2001, and Didi Hitch, a hailing service app that matches drivers and passengers who share similar routes.

There are three primary restrictions on who can be hired in accordance with theregulations. Fugitives or those who have engaged in activities jeopardizing national or public security; persons who have violated Regulations on Administrative Penalties for Public Security, which include violations such as assault and use of illegal drugs; and violators of laws on road traffic safety are also excluded.

A debate on whether or not to exclude persons with criminal histories from the ride-sharing service broke out in March, after thousands of drivers working for popular car-hailing apps in Shenzhen had been found to have criminal records, including drug offenses.

Some feared the restrictions would violate equal employment rights of those with administrative and criminal records on file. Others said they were concerned about the backgrounds of the people that provide chauffeur services, especially those with criminal records.

In the past six months, two Didi drivers have been sentenced to prison -- one for raping afemale passenger, and the other for rape and robbery.

Didi says it will continue to vet drivers by conducting background checks and looking into criminal records. It requires applicants to register and provide identification, a driver's license, and vehicle registration information before they can be approved as drivers.

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## TaiShang



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## JSCh

Wednesday, July 20, 2016, 11:13
*Another winner from Hangzhou*
By Wang Ying and Shi Xiaofeng In Hangzhou




At JollyChic's headquarters in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, staff review a presentation on the company's 2015 sales and targets in the the Middle East region. (Liu Weifeng / China Daily)

For consumers in the Middle East, the most widely used online marketplace for cross-border e-commerce is JollyChic. Surprisingly, the rising brand is based in Hangzhou, where Alibaba has its headquarters.

The JollyChic brand is owned by Jolly Information Technology Co Ltd, which was founded in 2012 by Ding Wei and his two partners to serve consumers in Europe, the United States and the Middle East.

"We rely on big data and are able to quickly respond to market demand and prepare for overseas orders," said Ding, executive president of Jolly.

The company has a big data research and development team based in Silicon Valley in the US.

"Big data helps us track each item's consumer feedback, ready-to-pay rates and make simultaneous calculations accordingly," said Ding.

By analyzing big data, Jolly taps the huge market potential in the Middle East, and offers more tailor-made products to the area. About 70 to 80 percent of Jolly's revenue comes from this market," said Ding.

For instance, big data analysis showed that the Middle East consumers shop mostly for clothing, shoes, baby-care items, parenting goods, beauty, household and electronic products.

By catering to such demand, Jolly has emerged as the most influential Chinese mobile app in two years in the Gulf Cooperation Council member-states (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates).

Through cooperation with a variety of local suppliers, Jolly expanded its revenue quickly from 10 million yuan (US$1.51 million) in 2013 to 500 million yuan in 2015.

It helped as many as 1,500 Chinese small- and medium-sized enterprises to find markets abroad and establish their brands in public consciousness, a much better option than being original equipment manufacturers or OEMs.

Revenue of Jolly is projected to reach 2 billion yuan this year.

"Jolly provides an example of how information technology is helping develop great cross-border e-commerce along the Belt and Road Initiative countries," said Zhao Yide, Party chief of Hangzhou.

Jolly's success signifies the coming of age of Chinese enterprises. Made-in-China products are offering better quality than before, thus meeting the global demand for such products, he said.

Jolly's story also suggests cross-border e-commerce is more than buying products from overseas markets through agents or directly online - it is a huge business opportunity for international trading that could benefit talented people, local manufacturers, and firms engaged in logistics, financial payments, international law and big data, said Wu Changhong, an official from China (Hangzhou) Cross-Border E-commerce Comprehensive Pilot Area.

Launched in March 2015, the Area has attracted 1,570 enterprises so far, which accounted for 5.4 percent of Hangzhou's exports in 2015. The figure rose to 11.84 percent in the January-April period this year, said Wang Chong, an Area official.

About 3 percent of the city's GDP is invested in R&D, said Zhao.

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## TaiShang

*Cross-border Pioneer *

* Successful innovations piloted in the Nansha New Area are being rolled out nationwide.*

20 July 2016





Celebrations to mark the first anniversary of the Nansha New Area
Launched in April 2015, the Nansha New Area, a key cross-border e-commerce hub in the heart of Guangzhou, has successfully piloted a number of reforms and innovations, designed to promote investment and raise trade efficiency. It has also led the way in ensuring compliance with various international investment and trade requirements.

In a sign of its success, the Ministry of Commerce nominated Nansha's cross-border e-commerce supervision model as one of its eight national Cases of Best Practice. In another telling testimony, 25 out of the 27 cross-border trade initiatives currently active in Guangdong were tested in the Nansha New Area. In many cases, they were also the first initiatives of their kind to be implemented anywhere in the country.

Four of these initiatives – Hong Kong Connect, One-stop Processing, Cross-border E-commerce Product Quality Tracking and Smart Inspect – are considered having a particular impact.

*Hong Kong Connect*
This business platform has led the way in allowing companies in Nansha to fully access Hong Kong's business services. Established by Chong Hing Bank, the Yuexiu Group and Nansha Investment Consulting, the initiative enables Hong Kong companies and individuals to handle all the procedures related to setting up business in Nansha without having to leave Hong Kong.

*One-stop Processing*
The adoption of this initiative has greatly simplified the licensing and certification needs of most businesses. With the exception of food businesses and enterprise investment-filing certificates, applicants need only log in twice to secure all the 15 licences and certificates required. The entire process can often be completed within a working day. As a result, the Nansha New Area is said to lead the country in processing speed for multiple business permits.

*Online Cross-border Product Quality Tracking*
The adoption of this facility means that consumers only need to input their order number, ID number or courier checking number to access information related to their cross-border e-commerce goods purchase. The information available includes the commodity name, quantity, item number, declared place of origin, name of manufacturer and the entry port. As of February, more than 140,000 searches had been made using the service.

*Smart Inspect*
This innovation has cut the clearance time for imports by about 70 per cent, while there is virtually zero waiting time in the case of exports. Under the terms of this new 24-hour, paperless express clearance system, all inspection fees are borne by the government, provided that nothing is found wrong with the goods in question.

Overall, given these four notable innovations, as well as its general progress, the Nansha New Area has benefited in four key sectors – cross-border e-commerce, shipping logistics, financial innovation and technological innovation.

*Cross-border E-commerce*
*As of the end of February, 774 cross-border e-commerce companies had registered with the Nansha Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau and started operations.* Of these, 392 are cross-border e-commerce companies, 299 are e-commerce platforms, 30 are foreign trade comprehensive service companies, 10 are payment companies, 23 are warehousing companies and 20 are logistics/delivery companies.

Cross-border e-commerce operators in Nansha handled online bonded imports worth more than Rmb1.38 billion in 2015, a 45-fold increase over the previous year. Other companies have since started operating in the new area, including Hong Kong's Four Seas Mercantile Holdings Cross-Border E-Commerce Direct Sales Centre and Travelnomall, a business established by Fok Kai Man, Vice-President of the Fok Ying Tung Group.





Travelnomall: a new addition to Nansha




Hong Kong e-commerce goods on show
*Shipping Logistics*
*The Nansha Port had a container throughput of 11.77 million TEUs in 2015, making it among the world’s top 12 ports.* One year since the Nansha New Area’s establishment, the port has increased its number of international routes to 74. In addition, 10 dry ports have opened, five shuttle-bus feeder lines have been introduced, and 1,200 new shipping logistics service companies have been established – three times the number in operation prior to the approval of the pilot Free Trade Zone (FTZ).

Additionally, a total of 575 ships, worth Rmb1.958 billion, changed hands at the Guangzhou Shipping Exchange. Nansha also completed its first cross-border settlement of capital via a third-party platform.

*Financial Innovation*
A total of 969 new financial and quasi-financial institutions have been established over the past year. Collectively, they have handled the filing of cross-border renminbi loans worth more than Rmb5.688 billion, most of which were conducted in association with Hong Kong and Macau financial institutions. Hong Kong's Chong Hing Bank has also set up a branch in the Nansha New Area.

*Financial Leasing*
A total of 103 new financial leasing companies – collectively with a registered capital of some Rmb45 billion – have moved into the New Area. The value of the new contracts subsequently secured amounted to about Rmb30 billion.

Guangzhou has also made considerable progress in the area of aircraft leasing. Three planes have been delivered as part of an initial cross-border aircraft leasing deal with the Guangdong FTZ.

*Science and Technological Innovation*
Local spending on science and technological research this year saw a 68 per cent year-on-year increase, with the New Area now home to 25 per cent of all new R&D institutions in Guangzhou. The number of high-tech enterprises in the New Area has also increased dramatically, rising by 35.7 per cent year-on-year. This resulted in the production of high-tech products, worth Rmb136.4 billion, some 47.6 per cent of the region's gross industrial output.

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), in collaboration with the University of Hong Kong and the Chinese University of Hong Kong, has established the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau (International) Youth Entrepreneur Hub. This now operates under the auspices of the HKUST Fok Ying Tung Research Institute.

*From a macro point of view, the Nansha New Area registered increases across all of the relevant economic indicators in 2015. Its average economic growth during the 12th Five-Year Plan period, which covers 2011 to 2015, was also the highest in the city*. A total of 9,919 new enterprises were established locally, exceeding the number of enterprises that existed before the establishment of the FTZ. Collectively, the registered capital of these new enterprises was about Rmb83.58 billion.

There are now 783 Hong Kong- and Macau-funded enterprises in the New Area, representing a total investment of US$11.57 billion.

_Hong Kong Trade Council_

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## Mangus Ortus Novem

TaiShang said:


> *Cross-border Pioneer *
> 
> * Successful innovations piloted in the Nansha New Area are being rolled out nationwide.*
> 
> 20 July 2016
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Celebrations to mark the first anniversary of the Nansha New Area
> Launched in April 2015, the Nansha New Area, a key cross-border e-commerce hub in the heart of Guangzhou, has successfully piloted a number of reforms and innovations, designed to promote investment and raise trade efficiency. It has also led the way in ensuring compliance with various international investment and trade requirements.
> 
> In a sign of its success, the Ministry of Commerce nominated Nansha's cross-border e-commerce supervision model as one of its eight national Cases of Best Practice. In another telling testimony, 25 out of the 27 cross-border trade initiatives currently active in Guangdong were tested in the Nansha New Area. In many cases, they were also the first initiatives of their kind to be implemented anywhere in the country.
> 
> Four of these initiatives – Hong Kong Connect, One-stop Processing, Cross-border E-commerce Product Quality Tracking and Smart Inspect – are considered having a particular impact.
> 
> *Hong Kong Connect*
> This business platform has led the way in allowing companies in Nansha to fully access Hong Kong's business services. Established by Chong Hing Bank, the Yuexiu Group and Nansha Investment Consulting, the initiative enables Hong Kong companies and individuals to handle all the procedures related to setting up business in Nansha without having to leave Hong Kong.
> 
> *One-stop Processing*
> The adoption of this initiative has greatly simplified the licensing and certification needs of most businesses. With the exception of food businesses and enterprise investment-filing certificates, applicants need only log in twice to secure all the 15 licences and certificates required. The entire process can often be completed within a working day. As a result, the Nansha New Area is said to lead the country in processing speed for multiple business permits.
> 
> *Online Cross-border Product Quality Tracking*
> The adoption of this facility means that consumers only need to input their order number, ID number or courier checking number to access information related to their cross-border e-commerce goods purchase. The information available includes the commodity name, quantity, item number, declared place of origin, name of manufacturer and the entry port. As of February, more than 140,000 searches had been made using the service.
> 
> *Smart Inspect*
> This innovation has cut the clearance time for imports by about 70 per cent, while there is virtually zero waiting time in the case of exports. Under the terms of this new 24-hour, paperless express clearance system, all inspection fees are borne by the government, provided that nothing is found wrong with the goods in question.
> 
> Overall, given these four notable innovations, as well as its general progress, the Nansha New Area has benefited in four key sectors – cross-border e-commerce, shipping logistics, financial innovation and technological innovation.
> 
> *Cross-border E-commerce*
> *As of the end of February, 774 cross-border e-commerce companies had registered with the Nansha Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau and started operations.* Of these, 392 are cross-border e-commerce companies, 299 are e-commerce platforms, 30 are foreign trade comprehensive service companies, 10 are payment companies, 23 are warehousing companies and 20 are logistics/delivery companies.
> 
> Cross-border e-commerce operators in Nansha handled online bonded imports worth more than Rmb1.38 billion in 2015, a 45-fold increase over the previous year. Other companies have since started operating in the new area, including Hong Kong's Four Seas Mercantile Holdings Cross-Border E-Commerce Direct Sales Centre and Travelnomall, a business established by Fok Kai Man, Vice-President of the Fok Ying Tung Group.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Travelnomall: a new addition to Nansha
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Hong Kong e-commerce goods on show
> *Shipping Logistics*
> *The Nansha Port had a container throughput of 11.77 million TEUs in 2015, making it among the world’s top 12 ports.* One year since the Nansha New Area’s establishment, the port has increased its number of international routes to 74. In addition, 10 dry ports have opened, five shuttle-bus feeder lines have been introduced, and 1,200 new shipping logistics service companies have been established – three times the number in operation prior to the approval of the pilot Free Trade Zone (FTZ).
> 
> Additionally, a total of 575 ships, worth Rmb1.958 billion, changed hands at the Guangzhou Shipping Exchange. Nansha also completed its first cross-border settlement of capital via a third-party platform.
> 
> *Financial Innovation*
> A total of 969 new financial and quasi-financial institutions have been established over the past year. Collectively, they have handled the filing of cross-border renminbi loans worth more than Rmb5.688 billion, most of which were conducted in association with Hong Kong and Macau financial institutions. Hong Kong's Chong Hing Bank has also set up a branch in the Nansha New Area.
> 
> *Financial Leasing*
> A total of 103 new financial leasing companies – collectively with a registered capital of some Rmb45 billion – have moved into the New Area. The value of the new contracts subsequently secured amounted to about Rmb30 billion.
> 
> Guangzhou has also made considerable progress in the area of aircraft leasing. Three planes have been delivered as part of an initial cross-border aircraft leasing deal with the Guangdong FTZ.
> 
> *Science and Technological Innovation*
> Local spending on science and technological research this year saw a 68 per cent year-on-year increase, with the New Area now home to 25 per cent of all new R&D institutions in Guangzhou. The number of high-tech enterprises in the New Area has also increased dramatically, rising by 35.7 per cent year-on-year. This resulted in the production of high-tech products, worth Rmb136.4 billion, some 47.6 per cent of the region's gross industrial output.
> 
> The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), in collaboration with the University of Hong Kong and the Chinese University of Hong Kong, has established the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau (International) Youth Entrepreneur Hub. This now operates under the auspices of the HKUST Fok Ying Tung Research Institute.
> 
> *From a macro point of view, the Nansha New Area registered increases across all of the relevant economic indicators in 2015. Its average economic growth during the 12th Five-Year Plan period, which covers 2011 to 2015, was also the highest in the city*. A total of 9,919 new enterprises were established locally, exceeding the number of enterprises that existed before the establishment of the FTZ. Collectively, the registered capital of these new enterprises was about Rmb83.58 billion.
> 
> There are now 783 Hong Kong- and Macau-funded enterprises in the New Area, representing a total investment of US$11.57 billion.
> 
> _Hong Kong Trade Council_



For the second phase of development China needs to replicate such successful models throught the country.

The scope of services sector is just mindboggling. 

Good going.

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## ahojunk

*WeChat Moments 'annoying' to 35.8 percent surveyed*
2016-07-26 11:20 | Ecns.cn | _Editor: Mo Hong'e
_
(ECNS) -- Despite the huge popularity of WeChat, China's biggest Internet-based mobile messaging platform, 35.8 percent of those polled want to close its fundamental feature called Moments, according to a survey by China Youth Daily.

Moments looks like a closed social network, allowing users to post text updates, upload up to nine images as well as share videos and article links, just like a Twitter Newsfeed. However, it can be overwhelming if a user agrees to see the updates of all WeChat friends.

The top three most annoying things for Moments users are advertisements (58.1 percent), updates to show off something (44.9 percent), and purchase assistance (38.9 percent). The survey showed that 2.4 percent had already chosen to close it.

The most favored two activities on Moments are forwarding funny posts (21.6 percent) and images (21.2 percent).

In the survey, 40.8 percent said they have more than 100 WeChat friends, 100-200, 35.0 percent, and 200-300, 16.1 percent. About 1.3 percent said they have more than 500 friends on WeChat.

There are 57.1 percent who said the first thing they do in the morning is check for updates on Moments.

Deng Chunyang, a teacher in charge of a first-grade class at the Donggaodi No. 3 Elementary School, said WeChat has become a key communication tool for parents of students.

"The first thing for me everyday is to check Moments and WeChat groups, so I will know what parents are discussing or if they are unsatisfied with their children's school life," said the teacher.

Zhang Xue, who works for a dot-com company, said she felt more at peace with her life after closing the Moments feature more than a month ago, because she feels less pressure to follow or participate in activities.

Kuang Wenbo, a professor of mass communication with the Renmin University of China, said younger users of WeChat may need guidance to help judge unfiltered content on Moments generated by users.

WeChat was developed by Chinese technology conglomerate Tencent and has more than 700 million monthly active users.


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## TaiShang

*Baidu delivers more bad news to investors*
China Daily, July 30, 2016



Robin Li, founder of Baidu Inc, meets the media at an IT summit in Shenzhen, Guangdong province.

Baidu Inc warned that curbs on online advertising will hurt revenue growth for the next two to three quarters, delivering the latest dose of bad news to investors in China's largest internet search service.

The company forecast lower-than-expected sales of 18.04 billion yuan ($2.7 billion) to 18.58 billion yuan this quarter, hit by government limits on the amount of ads it can show users.

The bottom of that range translates to a decline of 1.9 percent, which would be the first drop at the search giant founded by Robin Li since at least 2007.

"The implementation of new regulations and the stricter standards that we proactively imposed to make our platform more robust will likely suppress revenue for the next two to three quarters," Li said. "This period of uncertainty will pass."

The company, which has endured a number of setbacks to the business since the start of the year, is now looking beyond the next few quarters.

Li described how Netflix-like iQiyi will be an "important pillar" as the company ventures outside of search and into areas from media to artificial intelligence and the cloud.

But it would likely be another 12 months before revenue and profits could start returning to their normal pace of growth, said Kirk Boodry, an analyst at New Street Research.

"You can get past the regulatory hurdles but then people have to make a decision on whether the advertising revenue growth by that point is going to be spread among a lot more players," he said.

"It's hard to draw a direct line between artificial intelligence and revenue growth outside of search."

Baidu sounded its cautionary note after also posting a 34 percent plunge in second-quarter net income, it largest since at least 2007.

Customer growth will continue to slow as it adapts to the new government guidelines, Chief Financial Officer Jennifer Li told analysts on a conference call.

"Because we're having higher entry requirements for new customers I would expect that the overall customer accounts would not be exponentially growing as you would typically see in the past," she said.

**
_
Baidu is moving into new fields such as AI and driverless cars; so, traditional revenue streams have to be regulated to create a cleaner internet environment._

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## ahojunk

'Insight economy' to fight hackers, cyber attacks
2016-07-29 13:46 | CCTV | Editor: Feng Shuang

Industry professionals and geeks from around the world are attending The Big Data World Forum 2016 in Beijing to discuss the sector's latest technology, including cyber attacks and other security issues. While the threat of data breaches worries some, it also opens up business opportunities for others.

Big Data- A buzz word still buzzing. Now in its 6th year, the Big Data World Forum that's in session today (Thursday) and Friday gathers some of the industry's most influential business decision makers, strategists, architects, and developers.

What the experts have in common is that they collect, analyze, and manipulate data from across financial services, healthcare, oil & gas, government, and other sectors.

Mobile internet player Cheetah is going big on big data. It mainly collects data on gender and age, and the type of mobile apps and news information.

Hadoop - an open-source software framework for storing data - as well as the data processing engine Spark are the latest talk of the town here.

New regulations on capital markets also require better reporting of hedges and trades. That requires more and more number crunching and analytic tools.

You might ask yourself - is big data still a big deal? The answer: yes it is. With the rise in cyber attacks, online pirates, and hacked email and bank accounts around the globe, Big Data has also become an increasingly big ticket item.

Recent cases of data breaches and hacking scandals have pushed companies, governments as well as individuals to cash in and protect their information.

That's why industry experts have come up with a new term: the "insight economy".

The International Data Corporation forecasts that worldwide revenues for big data and business analytics will grow from 122 billion US dollars in 2015 to more than $187 billion in 2019, a jump of more than 60%.

Anti-virus software company McAfee estimates that cyber crime costs the global economy $500 billion every year. But, those figures are based on known data only, the real amount is likely much higher.


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## ahojunk

*China should levy taxes on digital economy: Finance Minister*
2016-07-25 08:35 | Global Times | _Editor: Li Yan_

China should levy taxes on the digital economy to ensure taxation fairness is not compromised in its push for innovation, China's Finance Minister Lou Jiwei said on Saturday.

The digital economy, an emerging economy which includes e-commerce, digital sharing, and services, demands a change in current policy, as a large portion of the sector remains untaxed, Lou said at a meeting between G20 finance ministers and central bank governors in Chengdu.

It is absolutely necessary to levy taxes on the digital sector because many of these companies are in traditional sectors, and have merely expanded onto the Internet and are not an innovation of core technology, but rather represent just a change in business models, Gao Liankui, research program director of China and World Economic Governance at the Department of Economics of Renmin University of China told the Global Times.

China needs to develop new sources of tax revenue because the country's interest payments for public debt have exceeded public expenditure on science and technology, and besides individuals and entities in the digital economy should pay taxes as they also enjoy public resources and services, Gao said.

Taxation in the digital economy can be rolled out on trial basis and tax immunity mechanism can be in place to waive taxes for some new firms or firms whose business revenue is below a certain level.

Meanwhile, Lou said on Saturday that China would move forward in its long-delayed reforms on income tax and property tax.

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## ahojunk

_Ecommerce is progressing along nicely in China._

--------
*Chinese O2O giant sets up e-commerce training college*
(Xinhua)Updated: 2016-08-01 08:00

BEIJING - Chinese online-to-offline (O2O) giant Meituan & Dazhongdianping has announced it will set up a college to train e-commerce personnel.

The college, named Internet Plus University (IPU), is the first of its kind in the e-commerce sector to focus on developing business models, technology and skills to promote China's "Internet Plus" strategy.

It will integrate the company's training departments to establish several schools to train internal staff and business partners on upgrading e-commerce, the company announced Saturday evening.

E-commerce platforms should not only focus on marketing and transactions, but also expand to other upstream services, according to Wang Xing, CEO of the company, noting that the essence of China's "Internet Plus" strategy is improving efficiency and reducing costs across all sectors by integrating the Internet with more industries.

Formed by the merger of group-buying platform meituan.com and review service dazhongdianping.com in October 2015, Meituan & Dazhongdianping offers a range of O2O services, from food delivery to movie tickets.

The company has established partnerships with about 4.32 million vendors. Including their separate pre-merger customer counts, the company boasted about 220 million active customers in the last 12 months, with about 180 million using its mobile app to order services, according to an early statement.

China's online retail volume reached 2.24 trillion yuan ($335.3 billion) in the first half of 2016, up 28.2 percent year on year, data of the National Bureau of Statistics showed.

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## TaiShang

Hope nobody got to be listed in here 

**

*China launches website for bankruptcy cases*
(Xinhua) 19:13, August 01, 2016

BEIJING, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- The Information Website for National Bankrupt Enterprises Recombinational Cases went live Monday, according to the Supreme People's Court (SPC).

The new site provides services to investors, including debtor company information, investment requirement posting and communication channels with bankruptcy administrators.

Through the website, creditors, debtors, investors and other related parties can exercise their legal rights online, including filing cases, reporting claims, filing objections, attending creditors' meetings and voting.

The website will expedite bankruptcy proceedings and support legal procedures in bankruptcy cases, the SPC said.

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## ahojunk

In smartphone technology, China is ahead of USA. 

--------
*China, Not Silicon Valley, Is Cutting Edge in Mobile Tech*
By PAUL MOZUR AUG. 2, 2016





_A cellphone user in Shenzhen, China. China’s tech industry has popularized some technologies that are just getting started in the United States. Credit An Rong Xu_

HONG KONG — Snapchat and Kik, the messaging services, use bar codes that look like drunken checkerboards to connect people and share information with a snap of their smartphone cameras. Facebook is working on adding the ability to hail rides and make payments within its Messenger app. Facebook and Twitter have begun live-streaming video.

All of these developments have something in common: The technology was first popularized in China.

WeChat and Alipay, two Chinese apps, have long used the bar-codelike symbols — called QR codes — to let people pay for purchases and transfer money. Both let users hail a taxi or order a pizza without switching to another app. The video-streaming service YY.com has for years made online stars of young Chinese people posing, chatting and singing in front of video cameras at home.

Silicon Valley has long been the world’s tech capital: It birthed social networking and iPhones and spread those tech products across the globe. The rap on China has been that it always followed in the Valley’s footsteps as government censorship abetted the rise of local versions of Google, YouTube and Twitter.

But China’s tech industry — particularly its mobile businesses — has in some ways pulled ahead of the United States. Some Western tech companies, even the behemoths, are turning to Chinese firms for ideas.

“We just see China as further ahead,” said Ted Livingston, the founder of Kik, which is headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario.

The shift suggests that China could have a greater say in the global tech industry’s direction. Already in China, more people use their mobile devices to pay their bills, order services, watch videos and find dates than anywhere else in the world. Mobile payments in the country last year surpassed those in the United States. By some estimates, loans from a new breed of informal online banks called peer-to-peer lenders did too.

China’s largest internet companies are the only ones in the world that rival America’s in scale. The purchase this week of Uber China by Didi Chuxing after a protracted competition shows that at least domestically, Chinese players can take on the most sophisticated and largest start-ups coming out of America.

The future of online payments and engagements can be found at Liu Zheng’s noodle shop in central Beijing. Liu Xiu’e, 60, and her neighbor, Zhang Lixin, 55, read about the noodle shop on WeChat. Then they ordered and paid for their lunches and took and posted selfies of themselves outside the restaurant, all using the same app.

Liu Zheng, who is not related to Liu Xiu’e, said the automated ordering and payments meant he could cut down on wages for waiters. “In the future, we will only need one waiter to help in the restaurant and one to help with seating,” Mr. Liu said.

Industry leaders point to a number of areas where China jumped first. Before the online dating app Tinder, people in China used an app called Momo to flirt with nearby singles. Before the Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos discussed using drones to deliver products, Chinese media reported that a local delivery company, S.F. Express, was experimenting with the idea. WeChat offered speedier in-app news articles long before Facebook, developed a walkie-talkie function before WhatsApp, and made major use of QR codes well before Snapchat.

Before Venmo became the app for millennials to transfer money in the United States, both young and old in China were investing, reimbursing each other, paying bills,and buying products from stores with smartphone-based digital wallets.

*“Quite frankly, the trope that China copies the U.S. hasn’t been true for years, and in mobile it’s the opposite: The U.S. often copies China,” said Ben Thompson, the founder of the tech research firm Stratechery. “For the Facebook Messenger app, for example, the best way to understand their road map is to look at WeChat.”*

A Facebook spokesman declined to comment. Tencent did not respond to requests for comment.

Executives from companies like Facebook and smaller rivals like Kik are trying to replicate what has emerged in China: dominant online platforms where users will spend much of their time. Much of that effort is focused on chat.

“The cool thing about chat is it becomes an operating system for your daily life,” Mr. Livingston said. “Going up to a vending machine, ordering food, getting a cab: Chat can power those interactions, and that’s what we’re seeing with WeChat.”

China still lags in important areas. Its most powerful, high-end servers and supercomputers often rely in part on American technology. Virtual-reality start-ups trail foreign counterparts, and Google has a jump on Baidu in driverless car technology. Many of China’s products also lack the polish of their American counterparts.

The biggest advantage for China’s tech industry, according to many analysts, is that it was able to fill a vacuum after the country essentially created much of its economy from scratch following the end of the Cultural Revolution, in 1976. Unlike in the United States, where banks and retailers already have strong holds on customers, China’s state-run lenders are inefficient, and retailers never expanded broadly enough to serve a fast-growing middle class.

Many Chinese also never bought a personal computer, meaning smartphones are the primary — and often first — computing device for the more than 600 million who have them in China.

“The U.S. was first to credit cards, and everyone there has a personal computer. But China, where everyone is on their phones all the time, is now ahead in mobile commerce and mobile payments by virtue of leapfrogging the PC and credit cards,” Mr. Thompson said.

Chinese companies also approach the internet in a different way. In the United States, tech firms emphasize simplicity in their apps. But in China, its three major internet companies — Alibaba, Baidu and the WeChat parent Tencent — compete to create a single app with as many functions as they can stuff into it.

On Alibaba’s Taobao shopping app, people can also buy groceries, buy credits for online games, scan coupons and find deals at stores nearby. Baidu’s mapping app lets users order an Uber, reserve a restaurant or hotel, order in food, buy movie tickets and find just about any type of store nearby.

Tencent has opened up WeChat to other companies, allowing them to create apps within WeChat. Ebaoyang — a start-up that enables people to order oil changes for their cars directly on smartphones — was at first almost totally reliant on WeChat to attract business. Gao Feng, one of Ebaoyang’s founders, said the company still relied on the app for 50 percent of its payments and 20 percent of new customers.

“We started from WeChat. So it was our main, original source for getting customers,” he said.

Between fees for its services and money it makes through online games, WeChat manages to generate $7 in revenue per user each year, according to Nomura. The app has roughly 700 million users, more than the total number of smartphone users in China, in part because some users are outside the country and in part because people have multiple accounts.

Much of that comes not from ads, as it might in the United States, but from spending on games, services and goods sold on the app. Those models may not translate from one market to the other, but the two can still borrow from each other, said Carmen Chang, a partner at the venture capital firm New Enterprise Associates.

“China was able to develop a lot of innovative business models, which arose in a different kind of economy,” said Ms. Chang, who spends time in both China and in Menlo Park, Calif. “Whether or not we admit it here in Silicon Valley, it’s had an impact on us and our thinking.”

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## TaiShang

*World's first Tibetan language search engine in trial operation*
By Chen Xia
China.org.cn, August 3, 2016

Cloud Tibet, the world's first search engine dedicated specially to Tibetan-speaking people, has been launched for trial operation, the China News Service reported on Tuesday.

Developed by a Tibetan language research center in Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Qinghai Province, Cloud Tibet will help Tibetan-speaking people access a variety of information in text, graphic and video formats, said Tselo, head of the development team.

Also, the search engine will provide users with encyclopedia information, archive data and a Q&A service in Tibetan, Tselo said.

Search capabilities in Tibetan are not available on China's largest search engines, such as Baidu and Sogou, while foreign search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing only offer simple search results.

"The databases of Google, Yahoo and other foreign search engines are based overseas, so their search results are limited both in terms of quantity and quality," Tselo said. "They fail to provide users with effective, up-to-date news on Tibet, and their search results relating to Tibetan culture are not precise and extensive."

During the trial operation, Cloud Tibet will further improve its search and matching function and expand its database, Tselo said.

It is estimated that Cloud Tibet will attract some 2 million users in Qinghai, Tibet, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan Provinces, which are home to the largest number of Tibetan-speaking people.

The project was launched in April 2013. Of the 150-plus developers, 87 percent are ethnic Tibetans.

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## 艹艹艹

*CNNIC released the thirty-eighth "China Internet development statistics report"
*
August 3rd at 10 am, China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) in the national network information office issued a press release issued the thirty-eighth "China Internet network development status statistical report" (hereinafter referred to as the "report"). "Report" shows that as of June 2016, the size of China's Internet users reached 710 million, Internet penetration rate reached 3.1, more than the global average of 51.7% percentage points. At the same time, shaping the mobile Internet social life further strengthened, "Internet plus" action plan to promote the development of enterprise diversification, mobile service.

Internet users exceeded 700 million, the popularity of the Internet growth steady

As of June 2016, the size of China's Internet users reached 710 million, the first half of 21 million 320 thousand new Internet users, an increase of 3.1%. China's Internet penetration rate reached 51.7%, compared with the end of 1.3 increased by 2015 percentage points, more than the global average of 3.1 percentage points over the Asian average of 8.1 percentage points.

CN domain name is still the number of domestic registered mainstream domain name

As of June 2016, the total number of domain names in China increased to 36 million 980 thousand. China national domain name ".CN" registered 19 million 500 thousand (accounting for 52.7% of the total number of Chinese domain name), the annual growth rate of 19.2%, continued to maintain the country's largest registered top-level domain. With the enhancement of China's Internet culture, the influence of economy, Chinese users are more interested to register and use the ".CN" domain.

Mobile phone Internet users reached 656 million, the dominant position of mobile Internet

As of June 2016, the scale of China's mobile phone users reached 6.56 billion, the use of mobile Internet users in the crowd for than that by the end of 2015 90.1% up to 92.5%, only through the mobile Internet users accounted for ratio reached 24.5%, Internet access equipment further to the mobile terminal. With the continuous improvement of mobile communication network environment as well as the further popularization of smart phones, mobile Internet applications to users of all kinds of life needs in-depth penetration, and promote the growth of mobile Internet usage.

Rural Internet penetration rate remained stable, the difference between urban and rural areas is still relatively large

Rural Internet penetration rate remained stable, as of June 2016 was 31.7%. However, the Internet penetration rate in urban areas is more than 35.6 percentage points in rural areas, the gap between urban and rural areas is still larger. "Won't get to the Internet" and "unwilling to surf the Internet" Internet rural population is still a major obstacle, 68.0% of the rural non users because do not understand computer / network "is not the Internet, that" don't need / no sense of interest "in the rural non internet users accounted for 10.9%.

Online payment under the line scene continues to enrich, the public online financial habits gradually develop

Internet banking applications in the first half of 2016 to maintain growth momentum, online payment, Internet banking user scale growth rates were 9.3% and 12.3%. The rapid development of the electronic commerce application, online payment manufacturers continue to expand and enrich line consumer payment scenarios, and implementation of open chain of social relationship marketing strategy, driven by non payment network user conversion; Internet banking users continues to expand the scale, financial products more and more, product user experience continued to improve, driven by popular online banking habits gradually develop. Platform, scene, intelligent Internet banking has become a new direction of development.

Online education, online government services develop rapidly, the Internet to promote the development of the public service industry

First half of 2016, all kinds of Internet public service applications are to achieve the user scale growth, online education, online booking a taxi, online government services subscribers exceeded 1 billion, diversified and mobile characteristics significantly. Continue to refine the field of online education, expanding the boundaries of user service toward the direction of diversification, and mobile education to provide personalized learning scene and mobile device touch, voice output function advantage, make it become the mainstream of the online education; network about the car in the field, based on the huge market demand and increasingly sophisticated technology, industry continues to expand the scale; the field of online government, government websites and government micro blog, micro channel, combination of client, give full play to the carrier function of the Internet and information technology, to optimize the user experience of government services.

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## ahojunk

*Didi draws concern over monopoly, discount halt after merger with Uber*
2016-08-02 16:19 | Ecns.cn | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_

_



_​_Didi Chuxing and Uber China announced merger on Aug. 1, 2016. (Photo/Chinanews.com)​
_
(ECNS) -- Following its merger with Uber China, homegrown ride-hailing firm Didi Chuxing is well poised to command further domination of the market in the world's second-largest economy, drawing concerns over its abuse of the position, warned an opinion piece by the Beijing Times.

In exchange for its China business, Uber will receive a stake of almost 18 percent in Didi to become its largest shareholder, while Didi will hold a minority stake in Uber.

Cheng Wei, founder and CEO of Didi Chuxing, said the ride-hailing service will continue providing discounts to users who benefited during previous price wars between these fierce competitors.

Although Chen promised the user discounts will exist for a long time, the opinion piece is concerned that the deal may mean Didi Chuxing is now in a better position to adjust its marketing, including raising prices to make up for its heavy spending in the past.

As China finally approved qualified private cars and drivers to provide services in the booming ride-hailing sector, incentives to attract drivers or passengers have declined. Other players in the sector, including Shenzhou Zhuanche and Yidao Yongche, also pose little threat to the market dominance of Didi Chuxing.

From a policy perspective, if Didi Chuxing and its old rival exchange data on Chinese users in future and explore the overseas market by using this massive data set, it's possible that the market leader would face more regulation, the article added.

The opinion piece called for supervisors to be cautious of potential risks following market change and prevent a monopoly, while ensuring public interests are well protected.

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## JSCh

Thursday, August 4, 2016, 09:45
*325 million lured by live streaming apps*
By Meng Jing




The number of live streaming app users in China topped 325 million by the end of June, according to a government-backed industry body.

It attributes this to better internet technology, a greater willingness among young people to share their personal lives online and increased demand for short, real-time entertainment.

These users accounted for 45.8 percent of all internet users, which stood at nearly 710 million, an increase of more than 21 million from six months ago, according to a report on Wednesday by the China Internet Network Information Center.

The apps are mainly used to broadcast sports events, reality shows, online games and concerts, according to the report, which showcases the latest developments in China's internet industry.

Feng Yousheng, chief executive officer of Inke, a widely used live streaming app in China, said more young people are enjoying such "fragmented entertainment" with the help of faster internet connections.

"Rather than spending a lot of money and time on going to the movies, the post-1990 generation watches broadcasts in real time on phones, interacts with show hosts and has a good time during a lunch break or while waiting at bus stations," he said.

Spurred by venture capital investment, the live streaming industry only started to take off at the start of this year. But its strong growth momentum has put it ahead of other emerging internet apps, such as online food deliveries and travel reservations.

A total of 106 live streaming apps secured funding of 2.37 billion yuan (US$350 million) last year. Tan Shufen, an analyst at the Beijing-based center, said the rise of such apps is in line with the growing popularity of video streaming in China.

"For the first time, video streaming overtook online music as the top internet entertainment service at the end of last year. The number of online video users has maintained strong growth in the first half of this year, with 85.7 percent of 514 million online video viewers preferring to look at the small screens on their smartphones to watch videos," Tan said.

With the increasing popularity of live streaming, the Ministry of Public Security has stepped up efforts to tighten control of the sector by carrying out a nationwide campaign to clean up pornographic and vulgar content in cyberspace.

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## ahojunk

_I hope that Yongche can give Didi competition, which will benefit the consumers._

--------
*Yongche steps up drive to do battle with Didi*
2016-08-03 08:48 | China Daily | _Editor: Feng Shuang_

Didi Chuxing and Uber China may not have an easy victory in China, even though their newly announced merger is expected by analysts to create a dominant player in the country's rapidly growing ride-hailing market.

Under the deal, Didi will acquire Uber China while Uber Technologies Inc and Uber China's other shareholders will receive a 20 percent shareholding in the combined company.

Yongche Inc, which has immediately become the No 2 ride-hailing player in China after the tie-up between Didi and Uber, said on Tuesday that it will soon launch a very lucrative incentive program to gear up the competition in attracting users.

Without revealing how much it is going to invest in the program, Yongche, which is majority-owned by the Beijing-based internet major LeEco, said the incentive investment will be "record high".

"The ride-sharing industry doesn't need a monopoly and there will be no place for monopolists to stand in the industry," said LeEco in a Weibo post.

Many industry observers said the main reason for the truce between Didi and Uber China was that the two wanted to end their costly competition. Uber has spent at least $1 billion a year to gain ground in China, while Didi has been offering its own subsidies to drivers and riders to build its business.

Wang Xiaofeng, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc, said the merger of Didi and Uber China could provide more opportunities to second-tier players in the market.

"Because consumers will always want more options and it will never be a monopoly. For example, the Didi-Kuaidi merger gave room for the third player Uber to grow, and this merger will likewise do the same for smaller players," she said.

However, Zhang Xu, analyst with Analysys International, said that with Didi and Uber China joining hands, it would be more difficult for smaller players to gain more market share.

Statistics from internet consultancy Analysys International showed that Didi had 127 million active users by the end of second quarter of the year, while Uber China had 31.07 million and Yongche had 10.5 million in same period.

But the Didi and Uber China merger still needs the authorities' approval.

*The Ministry of Commerce said on Tuesday it hasn't received a business declaration from Didi and Uber though both companies announced their merger on Monday*.

All businesses with a large scale of operations that may monopolize a market must submit a business declaration to the Ministry of Commerce, as well as wait for an antitrust investigation.

Companies without such clearance will not be allowed to carry out a merger and acquisition in China.

Shen Danyang, the ministry's spokesman, said as these two companies haven't submitted a business declaration to the ministry, their merger will not become effective and legal.

Didi Chuxing and its previous rival Kuaidi also didn't submit business declaration to the ministry when they merged last year, according to the ministry.

Didi was not available for comment on Tuesday.

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## ahojunk

Number of Chinese Internet users surpasses 700 mln
2016-08-04 11:37:03 | CRIENGLISH.com | Web Editor: Guan Chao







_Pie charts show 603 million Chinese netizens access the Internet for communications, followed by 524 million for searching information, 518 million for news feeds, 443 million for listening to music, and 440 for watching videos. [Charts: Xinhua]_​

A new report shows that the number of Chinese web users had climbed to 710 million by the end of June this year, ranking the first in the world for nine consecutive years and 3.1% higher than the world average, people.cn reports.

The report on the country's Internet development was released by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) on Wednesday, August 3, 2016.

More Chinese netizens tend to access the Internet through mobile devices. China has 656 million mobile network users, which accounts for 92.5% of the total web surfers and 2.4% higher than in 2015.

The report also indicates that more people manage their wealth through the Internet. By the end of June, netizens who shop online and use online payment services amounted to 448 million and 455 million, respectively. Well over 100 million people had purchased online financial products during the first half of the year.

2016 has also seen a sharp increase of webcast service users. Webcast services for personal use became popular in the first half of 2016. By the end of June, the number of webcast users already amounted to 325 million, accounting for 45.8% of the total number of netizens.

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## Jlaw

TaiShang said:


> Hope nobody got to be listed in here
> 
> **
> 
> *China launches website for bankruptcy cases*
> (Xinhua) 19:13, August 01, 2016
> 
> BEIJING, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- The Information Website for National Bankrupt Enterprises Recombinational Cases went live Monday, according to the Supreme People's Court (SPC).
> 
> The new site provides services to investors, including debtor company information, investment requirement posting and communication channels with bankruptcy administrators.
> 
> Through the website, creditors, debtors, investors and other related parties can exercise their legal rights online, including filing cases, reporting claims, filing objections, attending creditors' meetings and voting.
> 
> The website will expedite bankruptcy proceedings and support legal procedures in bankruptcy cases, the SPC said.



Bankruptcy is not a sign of failure. People who are risk taker and willing to start a business should not be labeled as a failure should their business fail. In fact, bankrupty is just an opportunity for a new start.
In Canada, when one files for bankruptcy there are options that one can use. Most common is creditors will forgive most of the loans as high as 60% or more. So if one cannot pay back 100,000, they can reduce it to 40,000

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## ahojunk

_This merger is facing a hiccup! Its competitors are crying foul._

--------
*Experts say Didi-Uber merger may constitute a monopoly,call for government intervention*
By Yuan Can (People's Daily Online) 14:05, August 05, 2016






Experts at a seminar on Aug. 3 said that the Chinese government should investigate the Didi-Uber merger, as many suspect that the deal may cause a monopoly in the future. Discussions began after Beijing-based Didi, the dominant ride-hailing service provider in China, said in a statement on Aug. 1 that it would buy Uber's China operation.

According to a report by Beijing Evening News on Aug. 2, Didi said that its market penetration rate is only 1 percent in Beijing, which will not cause a monopoly. However, experts attending the seminar argued that it should be made clear whether the market included taxis, buses and the metro.

The government should focus on Didi's relevant market to decide whether or not it will cause a monopoly in the future, rather than focusing only on its market share, said experts at the seminar, discussing whether the merger should be stopped by anti-trust authorities.

Speaking from a law perspective, Cui Fan, a senior advisor at Beijing Dacheng Law Office, said that the key factor in merger cases is not the relevant market but the business volume. Dong Zhongwei, a partner at another Beijing-based law office, said that the Ministry of Commerce should undertake an anti-trust investigation. If the company's market share after the merger is expected to be over 90 percent, authorities should stop the deal, Dong added.

According to Chinese law, all businesses with large-scale operations that could potentially monopolize the market must submit business declarations to the Ministry of Commerce for record, as well as submit to anti-trust investigations. Afterward, companies without clearance are not allowed to carry out mergers and acquisitions in China.

The Ministry of Transport released the country's first nationwide regulation on car-hailing services on July 28, finally offering the booming industry a legal status. The new regulation actually encouraged car-hailing services in China. The merger, meanwhile, may not be in the best interests of customers, leaving them with fewer choices for their car-hailing travel, said Cong Lixian, a law professor from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Cong hoped that the Ministry of Commerce Ministry could do something to help customers.

In the mean time, Fang Xingdong, a professor from Shantou University, said the government should not interfere in matters of the Internet, as "Internet should be a free space." Fang held the opinion that the merger may have a negative impact on global Internet competition. He said that after Uber sells its China operation to Didi, the two companies could partition the global car-hailing market. He worried that two business magnates might rise in the wake of the merger.


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## ahojunk

*Beijing police launch operation against cyber crime*
(Xinhua) 13:36, August 10, 2016






BEIJING, Aug. 10 -- Beijing police have launched a two-month crackdown on cyber crimes, according to authorities.

The operation is being carried out to restore online order and security, Beijing police said in a statement.

It will target cyber crime that damages political security, while also cracking down on online terrorism and other types of illegal information.

Police will pursue crimes related to pornography, gambling, guns, explosives and drugs.

The special operation also targets infringement of private information, telecommunications fraud, hacking, the spread of violence and terrorism, and damage to the social order.

Websites, online service providers and employees will also be subject to police inspection, it said.

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## TaiShang

*Alibaba Cloud to build new headquarters in Singapore for global expansion*
By Shi Jing (People's Daily Online) August 11, 2016






On Aug. 9 and 10, Alibaba Cloud held a cloud computing conference in Beijing. At the conference, Alibaba announced *its plan to build an additional headquarters in Singapore to manage overseas business.* The company already has a headquarters in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province.

Now, Alibaba will found a local group to follow various data security rules set by other countries across the world and establish an Internet Data Center (IDC) in Singapore. Together, the two headquarters will be in charge of all data on the Alibaba cloud.

“Data from all countries and the oversight of networks will be operated by the two hubs,” explained by Yu Sichen, vice president of Alibaba Group and general manager of Alibaba Cloud Global.

* “Alibaba Cloud’s services need to meet the standards of different markets since most customers tend to adopt local data. EU, Southeast Asia, Japan, North America and even China—different countries apply different standards. Dual hubs can better manage these rules. ” explained Li Jin, director of R&D for Alibaba Cloud, in an interview with thepaper.cn.*

As for the location of the new hub, Li explained that although the North American and European markets are relatively mature, the largest emerging market is Asia, and especially India. Alibaba Cloud hopes to reinforce its presence in emerging markets. Singapore is a place with strict rules for cloud computing and data management. Given this strict foundation, Li said, it will be easier to enter other countries.

Singapore may be just a beginning, with more hubs for Alibaba Cloud to come in the future. At present, Alibaba Cloud has Internet Data Centers in Hong Kong, Singapore, and the west and east coasts of the U.S. By the end of the year, Alibaba Cloud will launch new IDCs in Europe, Australia, the Middle East and Japan.

Hu Xiaoming, president of Alibaba Cloud, sees an opportunity to provide service for enterprises at home and abroad since so many overseas companies want to come to China, while many Chinese companies want to compete in international markets. In the next year, Alibaba Cloud plans to invite over 50 international software service providers to their platform, including SAP and SUSE, to diversify Alibaba Cloud’s software service. The company also plans to help over 100 Chinese service providers enter international markets.

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## TaiShang

****
*HTC, Alibaba Cloud to work together on virtual reality*
CNA
August 11, 2016, 12:11 am TWN

TAIPEI -- Taiwan-based smartphone brand HTC Corp. (宏達電), which has intensified its efforts to broaden its product portfolio, *has teamed up with China's Alibaba Cloud in a strategic partnership to explore the booming virtual reality (VR) business.*

Under the bilateral cooperation agreement, the two partners will leverage the advanced computing technology commanded by Alibaba Cloud to make a breakthrough in innovative solutions for the VR business. Alibaba Cloud is the cloud computing arm of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group (阿里巴巴集團).

HTC said that the two companies are expected to tackle bandwidth allocation, data transmission and data processing needs in a wide range of areas, such as VR video production and VR broadcasting.

In addition, HTC said, its alliance with Alibaba Cloud is expected to bring together developers in the VR industry to build a VR cloud ecosystem. HTC added that Alibaba Cloud will provide cloud services in HTC's VR Viveport app store.

Just on Saturday, HTC announced the launch of the Viveport for its VR headset HTC Vive to provide users with a wider range of content.

The HTC Vive is one of HTC's gambits to diversify away from its core smartphone market, which is saturated and intensely competitive, and create an additional revenue stream to turn around its business.

The VR headset, jointly developed by HTC and U.S. video game supplier Valve, was unveiled at the Mobile World Congress show in March 2015.

Released globally in April, it is equipped with tracked controllers that allow wearers to inspect objects from every angle and interact with their surroundings. HTC reportedly will unveil the next generation HTC Vive by the end of this year or in early 2017.

"We are excited to partner with Alibaba Cloud, as we believe it will be a landmark collaboration between the VR and cloud computing industries," HTC's China regional president of HTC Vive Alvin Wang Graylin said in a statement.

"By utilizing the cloud computing expertise and enabling a 500,000-strong developer community built on Alibaba Cloud, HTC Vive will be able to provide more reliable resources to VR content developers, while delivering smoother access and richer content to VR consumers on our Viveport content store in China," Wang said.

HTC has made a big push for the Vive in several major consumer markets in the world, including China, the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, Japan and its home market of Taiwan.

According to HTC, Alibaba Cloud has successfully helped a VR development team at Zhejiang University render a three-minute 360-degree 3D VR video in only three days. The video required a computing capacity of 100,000 processor cores, which was equivalent to non-stop processing by a 12-core high performance server for more
than 8,000 hours.

**

One China!


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## ahojunk

_I wonder if this will impact those selling home cooked food from their house._

--------
Watchdog orders massive cleanup of unlicensed online restaurants
2016-08-11 10:58 | Ecns.cn | Editor: Mo Hong'e

(ECNS) -- The Beijing Food and Drug Administration has urged online food-delivery platforms to make aggressive efforts to clear out unlicensed restaurants, the Beijing News reported.

The newspaper disclosed that many illegal restaurants lacking necessary hygiene and safety approvals offer takeout services via online platforms such as Baidu Waimai and Meituan.

Following the report, the food and drug watchdog published information on 60 restaurants that failed to provide licenses, with 20 each on Meituan, Baidu Waimai and ele.me.

Those restaurants were asked to suspend services immediately, and by Oct. 1 all restaurants on the three food-delivery platforms must publish their licenses, according to the administration.

Tang Yunhua, spokesperson for the administration, said it will provide information on unlicensed restaurants to the media every week and strengthen supervision through cooperation and technical means.

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## ahojunk

_These guys have so much money. I wonder how they spend it._

--------
*19 Chinese among world's 100 richest tech tycoons*
2016-08-12 13:46 | chinadaily.com.cn | _Editor: Xu Shanshan_

Forbes released its 2016 annual list of the 100 richest tech billionaires in the world on Wednesday. Worth a combined $132.7 billion, 19 tech tycoons from the Chinese mainland are on the list, one fewer than last year.

Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, and Pony Ma, founder and CEO of Tencent Holdings Ltd, are ranked at 8th and 9th on the list, worth an estimated $25.8 billion and $22 billion respectively.

Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft Corp, remains the world's richest tech billionaire as well as the world's richest person, with an estimated fortune of $78 billion.

Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com Inc, and Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook Inc, are ranked second and third on the list.

Out of the world's 100 richest tycoons in tech, 51 are from the U.S., accounting for nearly two-thirds of the group's total wealth, while China has the second highest number of tech tycoons (19).

Ding Lei, founder and CEO of NetEase Inc, climbed from 26th to 17th, having an estimated net worth of $11.7 billion.

Lei Jun, CEO and founder of smartphone maker Xiaomi Corp, is ranked at 22th, worth $9.8 billion.

Liu Qiangdong, CEO of JD.com Inc, has an estimated fortune of $5.6 billion, ranked at 37th on the list.

Jia Yueting, chairman and founder of LeEco Holdings Ltd, is ranked at 45th, worth $4.7 billion.

==============================
*Americans, Chinese dominate Forbes' 2016 list of 100 Richest In Tech*
2016-08-12 13:33 | Xinhua | _Editor: Gu Liping_

Against the backdrop of weak global economic recovery, the world's tech industry seems unaffected, especially in the United States and Asia.

Forbes' newly released 2016 list of 100 Richest In Tech shows that 75 percent of the titans on the list are from the United States and China, with 51 and 24 tech founders and investors respectively.

The combined worth of the list is estimated at 892 billion U.S. dollars, representing a 6-percent growth on a year-on-year basis.

Microsoft founder Bill Gates continues to be the richest billionaire in tech, as well as the richest person in the world, with a fortune estimated at 78 billion dollars.

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos is listed as the second with 66.2 billion dollars, followed by Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who climbed from fourth to third place with 54 billion dollars.

Jack Ma, the founder of China's e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, retains his title as Asia's richest tech billionaire with 25.8 billion dollars.

With Ma Huateng, the founder and CEO of the internet media company Tencent, the two Chinese tycoons are the only two non-American citizens among the top 10 on the list.

*There are altogether 24 tech entrepreneurs from China, including 19 from China's mainland, three from Hong Kong and two from Taiwan*.

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## ahojunk

_That's good news from Alibaba._

--------
Alibaba reports fastest growth since IPO
2016-08-12 08:57:54 Xinhua/CRIENGLISH.com Web Editor: Guo Yan



_Founder and CEO of the internet company alibaba Group, Jack Ma delivers a speech at the opening of Cebit 2015 technology fair in Hanover, Germany, 15 March 2015. [Photo: Imagine China]_

China's e-commerce giant Alibaba has announced revenue growth of 59 percent in the first fiscal quarter ending June, the fastest since its Initial Public Offering.

The report says the higher-than-expected increase in revenue gives testament to the overall acceleration of Alibaba's different businesses such as e-commerce, entertainment, as well as new start-ups.

Total revenue reached over 32 billion yuan or 4.8 billion U.S. dollars.

Cloud calculation, in particular, grew 156 percent in the first quarter thanks to a hike in the number of paying clients and an increasing demand for using the service.

Another milestone for the group is that mobile clients' gross merchandise volume surpassed that of non-mobile clients for the first time, a big win for the group's strategy tilting toward mobile clients.

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## ahojunk

AI to reserve business potential in Chinese market
2016-08-13 08:18 | chinadaily.com.cn | Editor: Mo Hong'e



_A companion AI robot named Boyan dodo is on display during the China Computer Federation Global Artificial Intelligence & Robotics Summit (CCF-GAIR) held on August 12, 2016 in Shenzhen. (Liu Zheng/chinadaily.com.cn)_


Artificial intelligence, or AI - recognized as an international "geeky" buzzword - once again drew the Chinese media's attention on Friday at the ongoing Global Artificial Intelligence & Robotics Summit held in Shenzhen.

Zhang Hongjiang, chief executive of Kingsoft, told China Daily the market' s potential and bonus in the country would continue in coming years, while more capital would be expected to flow into the AI sector, despite over-heated investments.

"Minorities' business failure or homogeneity competition hit on the market somehow reveal the technology's strong forward momentum," Zhang said.

"The innovation and leaping development reserve in China's mobile internet sector have generated attentions from both western media outlets and overseas investors, such as the latest tech magazine Wired's story about Xiaomi and New York Times' WeChat coverage."

According to Zhang, algorithms, big data and computing are the three major, but basic, technologies that can enable the implementation of AI.

Progress achieved in technology such as machine learning, which is associated with AI, reflects the rapid growth of the country's AI industry.

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## TaiShang

*Peoples Daily counters social media threat through multimedia integration*
By Fredrick P. W. Gaye (People's Daily Online) August 15, 2016


The traditional media all over the world today faces one threat – the new or social media that attempts to send it out of existence.

But while the world fears for the future of the sector, China’s largest print media, the People’s Daily (Ren Min Ri Bao) has been advancing and pushing the frontiers to remain not just in business but also relevant.






_The People’s Daily Tower_

At the People’s Daily Tower and campus, the resilience of the group has led to spawning various and diverse platforms that keep abreast with the trend of the times and still place the organization ahead of the challenge and advancements of media communication. The first was the online people.cn.

Two years and two months ago, the media organization took another step to stay on the beat by establishing the Peoples Daily mobile app in Chinese language and has yet another plan to soon commence the English language version of it.

*Currently, the media group apart from the traditional newspaper, the flagship of the organization, has fanned out into 29 products or publications, including subsidiaries and also operates about 44 online platforms in nine international languages including English, French, Dutch (German), Russia, Japanese, Korean, Spanish, Arabic and Portuguese.*

It also publishes in seven Chinese minority languages apart from the major medium, the Chinese Mandarin,

The advancement into online after its social media pages in the Twitter, Facebook has also been sustained over time with mega million followership.

At an interactive African journalists on internship at the organization had with Mr. Liang Changjie, Associate Editor of the mobile app medium, he explained that the app has been formidable success since its debut.

*In the diversification pursuit, People Daily Online, the English platform (*_http://en.people.cn_*) has been on for almost 20 years, and one of the many efforts to integrate various technologies - traditional or new media to get the news to the largest possible audience.*

People.cn, beyond the varied language reach is not only disseminating news but presents it in text, picture, video, Weibo and Apps round the clock. So far, it has created extensive readership consisting of users from countries and regions around the world.

It also has corporate blogging, corporate WeChat Public Accounts and People’s Daily Online Mobile. It has been giving attention to innovative technologies and their applications. As a result, it reports with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drone cameras, to record important footage for documentaries.

*Additionally, on April of this year, People’s Daily Online (*_people.cn_*) established a virtual reality project, which explores the prospect of “virtual reality plus news.” And in May it conducted its first live broadcast that included virtual reality. This success confirms the prospects for the integration of virtual reality in future news delivery.*

And there is a melting pot for the integration of all these resource platforms that is stylishly tagged Media Kitchen. With such appetizing name mentioned to you, you would be expecting a treat of Chinese meals, but that is wrong, the only meal prepared and served here is just news in the diverse forms.

Multimedia integration at the People’s Daily Online has been successful under a hardworking team led by media minds and experts.

One of the brains that push the innovations include Mr. Wang Yibiao, Deputy Editor-in-Chief and Secretary General of People’s Daily, who has been stressing and stretching the use of modern technologies to bring peoples and institutions together. Speaking at a media forum hosted by People’s Daily in July, Wang, who is also the Chairman of People’s Daily Online said: “Media from around the globe should join hands and take full advantage of Internet technologies. In doing so it is possible to bring governments, companies and media closer together, so as to further assist the Belt and Road Initiative and serve the people in Belt and Road countries.”

People.cn was founded on Jan. 1, 1997, and it is a large-scale news platform built by People’s Daily, one of the top ten newspapers in the world.

As a media organization with international influence, People.cn owns a number of subsidiary companies and has established 31 local branches across China. It strives to promote globalization by setting up bureaus and studios in Tokyo, New York, San Francisco, Seoul, London, Moscow, Johannesburg, Sydney, Paris, and Sweden, which significantly boost its influence abroad and its ability to disseminate internationally. The People’s Daily Facebook (_@PeoplesDaily_) and Twitter (_@PDChina_) accounts, both operated by People.cn, have exceeded 23 million and 1.88 million respectively.






_The People's Daily app news room_

The mobile app Associate Editor, Mr. Liang said that technology allows for information to get to many people as fast as possible. So far, Liang said readership on the mobile apps has grown up to 137 million because of the real-time and interactive dissemination of information, news and entertainment in about two years of its existence.

The success of such media integration, Liang said, is based on the creativity of his department in producing appealing information and graphics, especially of interest to the younger generation that constitutes the highest percent of the platform readership. The innovation, largely mobile applications, has attracted many people who use the platform for advertising; which has boosted revenue generation by the department, which he put at about 100 million RMB.

According to him, about 300 journalists contribute to the platform while it gets news and information from other credible sources.

As the new media is outweighing traditional media, Liang pointed out that traditional platforms are still important and have their audience. “Yes, the traditional media is shrinking and will even shrink more in ten years, but will not be completely forgotten as feared,” he assured.

People.cn went public at the Shanghai Stock Exchange (code: 603000) on April 27, 2012, becoming the first news website in China listed on the A share market.

_Gaye is the News Editor of the In Profile Daily Newspaper in Liberia, a fellow at the China Africa Press Center (CAPC) and an intern at People’s Daily Online.(fgaye.inprofile@gmail.com) _

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## JSCh

Tuesday, August 16, 2016, 09:30
* PBoC plans clearinghouse for online transactions*
By Wang Yanfei and Jiang Xueqing
*Goal is to prevent fraud, increase transparency and guarantee funds*

China's central bank is building a clearinghouse for online transactions to tame online finance risks and better regulate the expanding industry.

The People's Bank of China has approved preliminary plans for the establishment of the platform and the management plan submitted by the Payment and Clearing Association of China, the nation's regulatory body for the industry, the central bank said.

The platform is expected to be launched early next year, said Cheng Shigang, a senior official with the payment and settlement department of the central bank.

The clearinghouse for online payments would reduce settlement risks by disconnecting the direct clearing business made between third-party payment firms and banks, and by regulating a guarantee fund that can be used to cover losses, the central bank said.

All third-party online payment providers will be under regulation of the clearinghouse, according to the central bank, including Alipay, the largest mobile payments provider of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, and foreign payment providers, if they intend to step into the Chinese online payment sector.

The move comes after the central bank issued a regulatory guideline in July for internet finance, including online payment services, peer-to-peer lending and crowdfunded equity finance.

Officials and analysts said it is a timely and necessary step, taken at the time when the online payment industry, while expanding, is not mature and faces rising risks.

IRsearch Consulting Group, a Beijing-based research firm, estimated that the size of third-party online payments in 2015 reached 11.8 trillion yuan (US$1.8 trillion) in 2015, up by nearly 70 percent compared with the previous year.

In the meantime, about 326,000 new payment viruses emerged and more than 25 million users were affected in China, almost equivalent to the population of Australia, the group said.

Zhao Ying, a senior official with the central bank's Chengdu branch, said that the move would help improve information transparency and security.

"A unified platform would do a better job and will verify the identity of clients," she said, citing concerns about rising risks of fraud and money laundering made by online transactions.

Echoing her statement, Zhao Yao, a research fellow of Hengfeng Bank Co Ltd, a joint-equity commercial bank based in Shandong province, said that such a platform would help develop a standardized payment market and restore market order.

"Currently, the use of money deposited in the third-party payment institutions lacks standardization and transparency. How the money flows remains unknown to commercial banks and regulators, thus leading to risks of embezzlement and capital chain ruptures.

"Establishing a centralized depository system will fundamentally prevent payment institutions from misappropriating the money and using it for loans, investment or wealth management," said Zhao who has been doing research on this subject since 2012.

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## TaiShang

*Cyber security expert: Chinese Internet highly vulnerable, yet slow to respond*
By Jiang Jie , August 17, 2016






(File photo)


*China has so far demonstrated poor awareness of its Internet vulnerabilities, a cyber security expert said on Aug. 16.*

The warning came from Yan Hanbing, a senior engineer and deputy director of the National Computer Network Emergency Response Coordination Center, at a Tuesday forum on the sidelines of the 2016 China Internet Security Conference in Beijing. The conference was organized by IT company Qihoo 360, the Internet Society of China and the Cyber Security Association of China.

Citing data from China's National Vulnerability Database (CNVD), a government-backed Internet security monitoring platform, *Yan said that over 200,000 vulnerabilities in general software or individual cases were found between 2009 and 2016. That number saw an especially steep rise between 2009 and 2014.*

Yan added that non-governmental security monitoring platforms have been especially active in recent years, as the top three monitoring platforms were not associated with the government.

In April 2015, Qihoo 360’s monitoring platform, butian.360.cn, discovered that tens of millions of Chinese residents registered in the national social security system were at risk of personal information leaks due to system vulnerability, Global Times reported.

Meanwhile, a report published by a security center affiliated with Qihoo 360 showed that 43.9 percent of 2.3 million monitored websites were found to have vulnerabilities, and 12.3 percent had high-risk vulnerabilities as of November 2015, according to Global Times.

“It should be noted that the rising numbers do not indicate a less safe cyberspace, but rather demonstrate that China is now paying more attention to cyber security, dedicating more effort and investment to detecting vulnerabilities,” Yan noted.

*However, many experts believe that the response to this large-scale detection of vulnerabilities has been inadequate. According to Yan, many Chinese Internet users and operators are slow to take action to fix the detected problems. Specifically, some 40 percent of government websites’ high-risk vulnerabilities were left unprotected even one month after their detection.*

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## ahojunk

*Tencent overtakes Alibaba as China's biggest tech company*
18 August 2016





_Tencent has overtaken its rival Alibaba to become China's most valuable tech firm after strong results._

The operator of the WeChat messaging app is worth $249bn compared with $246bn for Alibaba.

Tencent shares jumped by over 6% to a record high in Hong Kong after reporting strong quarterly earnings on Wednesday.

The internet giant said profit rose by 47% to 10.9bn yuan ($1.6bn; £1.2bn) in the three months to June.

Revenues surged due to growth in its online gaming business and advertising.

Out of China's three internet giants, the online gaming and social media company Tencent is now the biggest, but still least known in the West.

Tencent has not attracted the same global attention as its rivals: Alibaba, with charismatic entrepreneur Jack Ma at the helm, and Baidu, the local equivalent of Google.

"Revenues jumped, platforms are booming and it runs the Twitter and Facebook of China," an IG analyst said. "Investors are hoping that, like Facebook, they can turn active users into revenues."

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## ahojunk

Alipay to roll out across Europe for Chinese tourists
2016-08-19 19:30:54 CRIENGLISH.com Web Editor: Meng Xue





_A file photo shows the logo of Alipay. [Photo: sxdaily.com.cn]_

Chinese tourists in Europe will soon be able to use the Alipay payment app to make purchases.

The Paypal-style system is being made available to Chinese travelers thanks to a deal signed between Alipay and the French-based global leader in seamless payments, Ingenico Group.

The agreement allows Alipay to deepen its mobile-payment push into Europe.

Ingenico says the new partnership would allow Alipay to be embedded into Ingenico's in-store payment gateway.





_A QR code can be shown on the user's device which the merchant can scan. [File Photo: mydigit.cn]_

The Alipay system will recognize where its Chinese users are in Europe and send notifications about where they can spend their money. QR codes or barcodes will be shown on the users' devices which the merchant can scan, just as in China.

As one of China's biggest payment services, Alipay is massively popular among Chinese consumers. It is used to pay for items in-store and for goods and services online, such taxis, food delivery, and also in restaurants.

Currently, Alipay has over 450 million active users. Its parent company Alibaba is hoping that they will continue to use the app abroad allowing it to tap into the spending power of an increasing number of Chinese tourists traveling overseas.

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## ahojunk

Baidu sues Tencent, Sohu for reputation infringement
2016-08-19 20:20:09 Xinhua Web Editor: Huang Yue






_
Undated photo shows Baidu Waimai's delivery men. [Photo: 163.com]_​
Chinese search giant Baidu is suing internet juggernauts Tencent and Sohu for reputation infringement.

The operators of Baidu Waimai, a takeout service under Baidu, have filed lawsuits against Tencent and Sohu for posting articles infringing on the reputation of its takeout service, according to a Friday statement by the Beijing Haidian District People's Court, which has accepted the cases.

Baidu Waimai complained that some public accounts on Tencent's messaging service WeChat posted stories about employees of Baidu-owned restaurants using toilet water to wash food. Stories on Sohu's platform also claimed that Baidu Waimai's restaurants used expired food.

The company said the stories are completely untrue and have badly hurt Baidu Waimai's reputation and credit. It demanded Tencent and Sohu shut down the public accounts and provide information about the account operators. It also filed a lawsuit against an e-commerce company that posted an untrue story about Baidu Waimai on WeChat, demanding the closing of its WeChat account, a public apology and compensation of 500,000 yuan (75,000 U.S. dollars).

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## ahojunk

_By scraping the domestic roaming fees, the mobile internet (smartphone) industry will be a big winner.
More growth for the mobile industry and ecommerce._

--------
China's telecom operators to scrap domestic roaming fees amid restructuring
2016-08-21 00:43:24 Xinhua Web Editor: Min Rui




China's major telecom operators have announced plans to cancel domestic roaming charges as they are instead turning to 4G services as a major source of profit.

China Mobile Communications Corp, the country's largest telecom operator, recently said they will stop charging domestic roaming fees by the end of this year.

Since July, they have stopped selling new service packages that include domestic roaming charges on cross-province phone calls.

Mobile users are currently charged 0.6 yuan (9 cents) to 0.8 yuan per minute for the roaming service under different payment schemes.

This nearly doubles costs for subscribers, which angers consumers. Industry regulators have also urged operators to gradually abolish fees.

With 4G services developing rapidly, China's major telecom operators saw their net profit grow at remarkable pace in the first half of this year thanks to fast growth in 4G subscribers.

In July, China Telecommunications Corp, China's third largest mobile telecommunication provider, announced it will cancel roaming fees this year. On Thursday, China Unicom, another telecom heavyweight, said it will scrap such fees from October.

Analysts said that eliminating roaming fees will not incur big losses for operators, as the data flow business has become a major source of profit for them.

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## TaiShang

*China launches first Tibetan-language search engine*
August 23, 2016

Developers launched China's first Tibetan-language search engine on Monday in Northwest China's Qinghai Province.

*The search engine (yongzin.com) will serve as a unified portal for all major Tibetan-language websites in China, said Tselo, director of the Tibetan Language Work Committee of the Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Qinghai.*

Yongzin means "master" or "teacher" in the Tibetan language.

It will also be a major global source for information in Tibetan online, he said.

*The search engine has eight sections for news, websites, images, videos, music, encyclopedia, literature and forums.*

"The search engine will meet the growing needs of the Tibetan-speaking population and facilitate the building of Tibetan digital archives and the expansion of databases in the Tibetan language," he said.

*The project, which costs 57 million yuan (about $8.7 million), is supported by the government. Work began on the project in April 2013.*

More than 150 people were hired for the project, said Dora, technical director of the search engine and a professor with the Digitization Institute of Tibetan Literature of Northwest University for Nationalities.

People of Tibetan ethnicity make up 80 percent of the team, said Dora.

"Popular search engines such as Yahoo and Google enable searches in Tibetan, but they mainly support searching with single characters," he said.

Yongzin.com enables searches using words and phrases to yield more accurate results, he said.

Yongzin also leads to more web resources than its competitors, said Dora. "For example, the news function leads to more than 200 domestic Tibetan-language websites in China," he said.

It is expected to gain around 1.2 million users in its initial stage, Dora said.

Contents are also categorized according to different local dialects such as Amdo, Kamba and U-Tsang, he added.

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## ahojunk

*China has 710 million netizens, more than 20 million under 10 years old*
2016-08-26 11:26 | Ecns.cn | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_


(ECNS) -- China had 710 million netizens at the end of June, among whom 23 percent were under 19 years old, with more than 20.59 million under the age of 10, according to the latest data from the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC).

The number of children surfing the Internet saw a slight increase compared to data released at the end of last year, indicating that the Internet continued to penetrate into lower-age groups.

Parents, content providers, game producers, schools and regulators are suggested to make concerted efforts to protect children from potential physical and mental harm that may result from surfing the Internet.

Experts have proposed an Internet grading system to protect children in China. A previous survey also showed that 72.4 percent of those interviewed supported an Internet grading system.

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## 艹艹艹

*New Alibaba book chronicles rise of China's Internet, private sector and its largest e-commerce company*





2016-08-25 16:17Xinhua_Editor: Mo Hong'e
_
At first glance, little may set Duncan Clark apart from other foreign business executives in Beijing's CBD, with his dapper appearance and Mandarin-peppered English. But in fact, he has worked as an adviser for Jack Ma, the maverick founder of Alibaba Group, when China's largest e-commerce company was founded in a small apartment back in 1999.

Now Clark, who comes from Britain, has written a book about Ma and his monolithic company, "Alibaba: The House That Jack Ma Built."

Clark, in a crisp blue business shirt, sat down with Xinhua recently for an exclusive interview in the office of his consulting firm next to the CCTV "big pants" building to talk about his book on the eve of the G20 summit to be held in the Chinese city of Hangzhou -- incidentally, Ma's hometown in Zhejiang Province. Ma, who chairs the B-20 SME Development Task Force, is expected to attend the summit.

So what is the book about? Clark put it in a nutshell. "The book is really about two things: the Internet coming to China, the rise of the private sector. The combination is like an explosion, and Ma Yun is the guy with the match," Clark said.

Then of course there is "Jack" himself, as Clark mostly referred to Ma Yun, Alibaba's larger-than-life founder and chairman. After all, what good would a book on Alibaba be without mentioning Jack?

"His sense of humor is the first thing you notice," Clark said, adding that Jack would say "crazy things," for example that his company would be bigger than Amazon's or that he would rule the world -- all big visions while sitting in a little room. "You had to laugh. But somehow you didn't laugh at him, you were laughing with him ... but somehow, there was something about him that just seemed different."

Though he appeared to be a bit of an oddball, Clark said Jack proved himself to be "a team leader and a great communicator." Also, Jack had a knack for telling stories and "making people feel relaxed ... he makes you feel like he's talking to you, even if you're in a room of 3,000 people." Yet behind his Forrest Gump-like facade, Jack is actually "very strategic," a man who is always "looking, learning, building ideas."

In fact, Jack is a pragmatist at heart. Born into a modest background in China's Zhejiang Province, one could say that Jack was also born right into China's merchant culture. Bad in math, he "turned to his sense of imagination and his ability to be a performer" while hawking plastic carpets to supplement his income from teaching and translating. "He understands what it is to be a small merchant," Clark said. Also, he said, Jack understands his customers. "The success of Alibaba is really Taobao (Alibaba's consumer-to-consumer portal). The key to understanding Taobao is understanding the customer." A true-blooded business tycoon, "he'll do anything to get the deal."

And Jack is ambitious. "The strongest thing about him is ambition. The weakest thing about him is his ambition," Clark said, citing Alibaba's massive money market fund, Yu'e Bao, as an example, which shocked banks and had people turning against him. Still, thanks to Jack's strong communication and motivation skills, others "follow him into battle."

Clark mentioned Tencent as a foil to Alibaba. "Tencent is much more strategic, is much more cautious, and more focused. Alibaba is doing big things in finance, in media, in global... so ambition is the strong point and the weak point of the company." A double-edged sword indeed. "Investors sometimes love too much ambition, sometimes they're afraid, so it's a balance."

Clark said he was brought on board to advise Alibaba on its international expansion during the company's infancy as a contractor and "foreign friend." Clark also indicated that Alibaba was to a certain extent supportive in his writing the book, yet he emphasized he had worked independently on it.

"I did not have that sit-down with him," Clark said. In other words, he didn't conduct lengthy interviews with Jack, but he did have some time with Jack's number two, Joe Tsai.

Clark said he talked to current and former Alibaba employees as well as competitors. It was hard to find critical voices because Jack has "a very different management style" than Steve Jobs, Clark said, referring to the founder of Apple who wasn't known for his people skills. He wanted to steer clear of gossip about Alibaba's founder while making sure he was not producing a "puff piece."

Clark said his book is now being translated into 14 languages. "Brazil, Russia, Ukraine, Indonesia, Vietnam, Mongolia -- a lot of people actually buy stuff on Alibaba's websites, so they are interested in the company and also his story," he said.

Yet his book is not only about technology. "People don't love technology, they love people," the author said, and as such, a story about Alibaba's charismatic leader would attract more readers.

Clark aims to both entertain and inform. "I think Alibaba is a window into a deeper understanding of China," he said, hoping his readers can learn more about what is going on in China, for example as regards the Internet, its entrepreneurs and Zhejiang Province. Clark said that Jack had helped make Hangzhou, China's Silicon Valley, a major tech hub and further raised commerce in Zhejiang. "I hope one of the things of this book is it kind of opens people's eyes to the power of Zhejiang. The G20 will do that even more."

For Clark, finding some old Australian friends of Jack's -- the Morley family who had come to China in 1980 -- was a highlight. To track down David Morley, who is now running a Yoga studio in Australia, Clark conducted some "investigative journalism." "Nobody had told that story," Clark said. Now, Jack's friend David is also Clark's.

"The most fun part was building a friendship with David Morley. Actually, we've never met, but we send messages all the time," he said, adding that Jack has now started talking about the Morleys as well.

Another surprise that his book had in store for him after its publication was receiving a call from Wall Street Journal that a pirated copy of his book was available -- on an Alibaba marketplace. "The funniest thing was when my book was copied on Taobao," Clark said, amused. Alibaba later removed the links.

When asked how Jack benefited from the development of the Internet and China's opening-up, Clark suggested that Jack was born in the right place at the right time, as Hangzhou opened early to tourism and has a long tradition of commerce. Moreover, Jack "has benefited from certain crises. Actually, if you look back, crisis has been his opportunity."

Clark cited SARS as an example, when many people had to stay home and used their new broadband connection to shop online. That was exactly the time when Taobao was launched in 2003. The 2008 global financial crisis helped open up the Chinese market for him, as a lot of factories could not export to the United States.

Now, Clark said Jack can help facilitate China's shift from a manufacturing to a consumer-driven society. "Jack is offering a solution to China ... how to move from a made-in-China to a consumed-in-China or designed-in-China," he said. "Ma Yun can sell Alibaba as a way to actually move up the development of the middle class, give them more choice ... and create more innovative products. That's a dream."

Clark also addressed the subject of innovation and said that there has always been a history of copying among nations. He said while the private sector has to lead innovation, governments can create the conditions for it, such as education and intellectual property laws. "People in the West want to understand what is happening in China that might be original, or might be not just copycat," he said. Actually, he said Alibaba's Taobao and Tmall platforms are themselves innovative to a certain extent.

As for Alibaba's foray into overseas markets, Clark said there would have to be a wait-and-see approach. Although its e-commerce website AliExpress has taken off in Russia without Alibaba's even opening a single office, Clark is not so sure that success can be replicated in the United States with its highly sophisticated retail sector. He mentioned Amazon.

"Amazon is doing things differently from Alibaba. Amazon buys products and sells them, so they have inventory; Alibaba is just a market place, so they just connect buyers and sellers." However, Clark said that Amazon is now building its own products, which might pose a threat to its biggest customers yet harbor opportunities for Alibaba to compete with Amazon.

Looking forward, Clark said Alibaba's top future challenge is human resources, so it is trying to recruit its own foreign talent for its expansion through the Alibaba Global Leadership Academy. Young foreigners work for Alibaba in Hangzhou, become immersed in the company culture and are then dispatched overseas.

Ironically, Clark called Jack, the homegrown Hangzhou entrepreneur, "more of a global player" than Baidu's U.S.-educated Li Yanhong and said Jack has been actively involved in the globalization debate. Alibaba's founder has also been visiting Davos. "Jack was one of the earliest to start talking about corporate social responsibility, environmental responsibility because he tends to be ahead of where other people are," Clark said. So far, this has been a smart move for Alibaba's PR.

"For Alibaba going overseas, we will learn do they make the same mistakes that the West made coming here (to China)," Clark said. He suggested that a key to Alibaba's past success lies in Jack's flexibility, which may also serve him well in the future. "He tries to be all things to all people, and he's doing pretty well."






*High-speed trains in China to get Wi-Fi in Dec.*
(CRI Online) 14:32, August 26, 2016






　　File photo shows high-speed rail in China. [Photo: Xinhua]

Chinese passengers taking high-speed rail are soon to end their days suffering from weaknetwork signals as Wi-Fi is to be installed on the trains in December, Xinhua News Agencyreports.

Satellite transceivers, devices used for transmitting Wi-Fi signals, have been installed ontrains for further testing.

It is estimated that the Wi-Fi will be officially up and running by December.

The transceiver was developed by the 29th research institute of China ElectronicsTechnology Group Corporation (CETC).

Zhang Jie, a senior engineer from the institute says that the highest speed of high-speedtrains in China now runs at 350 km per hour, and their technology helps the Wi-Fi signal tobe uninfluenced by a train traveling under 500 km per hour. However, the number ofusers should not surpass 700, but since current high-speed trains have a capacity ofaround 560 people, the technology is fine for now.

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## ahojunk

*Microsoft and Cisco join Chinese cyber security programme*
Alexander Sword | 14:57, August 26 2016

*News: Chinese government signals greater cooperation on cyber security standards*.

Cyber security tensions between China and the West may be thawing as US technology companies are invited to join the country’s technical committee.

Technical Committee 260 (TC260), which is in charge of the Chinese government’s cyber security standards, will now include Microsoft, Cisco, Intel and IBM as members, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal.

The companies will now be taking a role in drafting rules rather than simply participating as observers.

The committee aims to decide whether China will use standards deviating from international norms.

The Wall Street Journal reported that this means defining what technologies are “secure and controllable”.

This includes looking at sectors such as cloud computing and big data.

The committee originally comprised 48 members but was expanded in January to 81 members.

Including Western companies on the committee signals that China may be seeking greater cooperation with other countries.

The news comes after the Cyberspace Administration of China, which TC260 reports to, issued new guidelines urging stricter controls on cyber security but emphasising setting common standards.

The distrust has gone both ways. One of the world's largest telecommunications companies, Huawei, which is based in China, was banned from the United States networking equipment market due to alleged concerns that the company might undertake spying for the Chinese government.

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## ahojunk

_More news on cyber-security._

--------
*Foreign firms take part in drafting cybersecurity rules in China*
BY EVA DOU AUGUST 26 2016, 16:04

CHINA is taking a more inclusive tack in instituting cybersecurity standards for foreign technology companies, allowing them to join a key government committee in an effort to ease foreign concerns over the controls.

The committee under the government’s powerful cyberspace administration is in charge of defining cybersecurity standards.

For the first time, the body earlier this year allowed select foreign companies — Microsoft, Intel, Cisco Systems and IBM — to take an active part in drafting rules, rather than participating simply as observers, said people familiar with the discussions.

How much influence the foreign companies will have over committee deliberations remains to be seen, these people said.

Over the past few months, the committee’s seven working groups — which focus on encryption, big data and other cybersecurity issues — have each met at least once.

Representatives from Microsoft and Cisco confirmed the companies are members.

IBM and Intel did not immediately comment.

Taking a more consultative approach marks a shift for Beijing after nearly two years of battling the US and other Western governments, as well as foreign business groups, over its effort to tighten controls on information technology — in part, by pressuring suppliers to transfer technology and disclose proprietary information.

"It’s still early days, but there are encouraging signs that China is recognising the international nature of the tech supply chain and working more broadly to align its strategy with the market realities," said Bruce McConnell, vice-president of the EastWest Institute, a New York-based think tank.

McConnell, who is not involved with the Chinese committee, formerly served as a cybersecurity expert for the US Department of Homeland Security.

Beijing has been intensifying efforts to secure its technology supplies since Edward Snowden’s revelations in 2013 about the US government’s use of US products for espionage.

US trade groups and other critics have said that China is using security issues as a way to favour domestic tech companies.

China’s new approach is not likely to vent the heat over technology controls.

Earlier this month, 46 trade associations sent a joint letter to Chinese Premier Li Keqiang saying a draft law on cybersecurity that would increase government monitoring, and mandate data be stored locally, would "weaken security and separate China from the global digital economy", according to a copy of the letter reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

The committee that the foreign companies are a part of is at the front of the struggle over whether China will adopt standards that deviate from international norms.

Known as Technical Committee 260, or TC260, it has the task of defining what technologies are "secure and controllable", said the people familiar with the committee.

The term "secure and controllable" appears in a number of recently adopted and proposed security regulations, but has yet to be defined in detail.

US companies are concerned that the term will be used to discriminate against nonChinese products.

Western companies have already found it harder to sell to Chinese government agencies and state-owned companies since the cybersecurity push began a few years ago.

Other standards TC260 is grappling with include those for rapidly evolving sectors like cloud computing and big data, according to the people familiar with the discussions.

Originally comprising 48 members, TC260 was expanded in January to 81 members, mainly consisting of Chinese officials and representatives of domestic technology companies.

The Cyberspace Administration of China, the internet regulator that TC260 reports to, signalled a change in tone in its latest cyber-directives, issued on August 22.

As with previous ones, the new guidelines urge stricter controls on cybersecurity, but they place new emphasis on setting common standards across China’s national and local governments and in influencing global rule making.

"We should energetically participate in the development of international rules and standards for the internet space, to strengthen our power of discourse and our influence," the administration said.

Aside from opening up the committee, Beijing has tried to show it is responsive to foreign concerns on cybersecurity in other ways.

It suspended rules that would have required the financial sector to prove its equipment is "secure and controllable" through intrusive testing and information disclosure.

National security and counter-terrorism laws that were passed last year and that require tech companies to support government security efforts rolled back some requirements such as encryption code handover.

In July, China took the unusual move of releasing its draft Cybersecurity Law for a second round of public comment.


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## TaiShang

*Australian products selling like hotcakes on Alibaba*
Xinhua, August 26, 2016

A host of Australian companies are increasingly using Alibaba and reaching out to a growing, well-healed number of middle-class Chinese, who have a penchant for Aussie supplements, food and cosmetics products.

Chemist Warehouse chief operating officer Mario Tascone, which operates an online store on Alibaba's shopping site called Tmall.com, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation on Friday that any type of product in the health and nutrition sphere is very desirable in China, especially among the nation's thriving middle class.

Chemist Warehouse sells a variety of vitamins, cosmetics and health products on Tmall, and has reached a record of 2 million Australian dollars (US$1.53 million) in sales within the first 46 minutes of trade on China's singles' day on Nov. 11.

"We don't look at promoting brands that are going to be popular in China and second guess what the Chinese market does," said Tascone.

Alibaba, which Forbes say is worth US$157.7 billion, is set to open its first Australian office in Melbourne this year.

To date the conglomerate has already formed partnerships with Woolworths and in May 2015 it signed a deal with Australia Post to connect Australian consumers with Chinese manufacturers while at the same time boosting Chinese consumption of Australian products.

Demand for Australian products has also been spurred by the rise of "daigou" or buying agents, effectively a Chinese person overseas who purchases goods for a customer back home in China.

Tascone said the company had seen a rise in tourists buying stock off shelves because of the lower price.

"The future for us is making sure we can co-exist in China and get products to that market but, all the while, making sure we don't miss our supply chain to what made us where we are today and that's the local customers," he said.

Tmall currently features 1,300 Australian brands of which 80 percent had entered China for the first time through Alibaba.

Alibaba's Australia and New Zealand managing director Maggie Zhou however cautioned that not everything from Australia sold well in China.

"You need to find the right products, and then you'll sell very well. But if the product is not right, you cannot be successful," she said.

"Price, what kind of right price is also very important. If you have several channels you need to manage the price very well, otherwise it would be a chaos."

**

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## ahojunk

*China to toughen regulation on online ads*
2016-09-01 08:17 | Xinhua _Editor: Mo Hong'e_ 

China will intensify efforts to regulate online commercials following public ire over deceptive online advertising.

A temporary regulation will take effect on Sept. 1, requiring publishers to clearly mark all online commercials as advertisements to warn netizens, according to Gan Lin, vice head of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC), on Wednesday.

A college student died in April after he followed allegedly deceptive information promoted by search engine Baidu and signed up for medical treatment at a Beijing hospital.

The upcoming regulation makes it clear that paid promotion of information on search engines is classed as advertising.

According to Gan, a department tasked with monitoring online commercials will also be established.

From September 2015 to August 2016, the SAIC and other market regulators discovered around 3,200 cases of unlawful online advertising and issued fines in the region of 67 million yuan (10 million U.S. dollars).

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## TaiShang

*China's manufacturing IoT spending to hit 128 bln USD by 2020: IDC *
Source: Xinhua
Published: 2016/9/1 16:49:47

* Chinese manufacturing enterprises' spending on the Internet of Things (IoT) is expected to grow by an annual average rate of 14.7 percent and hit 127.5 billion US dollars by 2020, a report showed Thursday.*

"During the process, software and services will lead the way for fast growth with a combined market share of over 60 percent," according to the report by research firm International Data Corp. (IDC).

*IoT is a strategic emerging industry in China, and was included in the 13th Five-year Development Plan. "Made in China 2025" is a 10-year action plan that aims to build China into a manufacturing powerhouse. *

Promoting smart manufacturing -- raising the level of networked, collaborative manufacturing and expediting the manufacturing industry's transformation into services -- is the way forward for the industry, said the IDC report.

"Many Chinese manufacturers have started to implement an IoT strategy to improve production, efficiency and evolve their business models," said Wang Yue, senior research manager at IDC China.

With the promotion of smart manufacturing, the fast integration of information technology and operational technology (OT), and the prevalence of the "digital twin" concept, there is plenty of room for development in the manufacturing industry, according to Wang.

In the next two years, three major trends will lead IoT development in China's manufacturing industry -- IoT platform competition will intensify, manufacturing IoT applications will accelerate innovation, while edge computing will become the next area to be expanded, IDC forecast.

IoT will see tangible objects connected to the Internet, allowing them to interact with other devices.

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## 艹艹艹

Three young men sit on a bench, with their heads buried in their smartphones, in Xianyang, North China's Shaanxi province, November 6, 2014. [Photo/IC]

The number of Chinese using internet rose to 710 million as of June, accounting for 51.7 percent of the country's total population, exceeding the global average by 3.1 percent, according to a report released by China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) on August 3.

As internet penetration level keeps rising, some trends in internet development are visible, according to a report by 199it.com. Here are the top 10 trends.

*Trend 1: The group of phubbers is expanding*

Phubbers are people who engage in phubbing, "the act of snubbing someone in a social setting by looking at a phone instead of paying attention".

The number of people using their mobile phones to surf the internet reached 656 million, increasing from 90.1 percent of the total internet users at the end of last year to 92.5 percent as of June.

In addition, people surfing the internet only via mobile phones account for 24.5 percent of the total internet users.




A baby watches an animated cartoon on a smartphone in Jinan, East China's Shandong province, May 25, 2016. [Photo/IC]

*Trend 2: Video-streaming websites are getting more users*

The number of internet users watching video online increased to 514 million as of June, up 10 million from the end of last year, with 440 million using mobile phones to watch videos online.





Thomas, nicknamed "Afu", a German who has become an internet celebrity in China, uses his smartphone to pay a bus fare through Alipay, the mobile payment service of Alibaba's Ant Financial, during a no-cash one-day tour in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang province, August 22, 2016. [Photo/IC]

*Trend 3: The lifestyle of "no cash" becomes popular*

People using online payments rose to 455 million as of June, with 64.7 percent of them having the experience of paying via smartphones.




An internet user browses the website of Taobao.com of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group in Tianjin, March 22, 2016. [Photo/IC]

*Trend 4: The number of online shoppers keeps rising*

A total of 448 million internet users shopped online as of June, with 61 percent of them shopping via smartphones.




An internet celebrity live broadcasts shopping in a mall in Taiyuan, North China's Shanxi province, August 6, 2016. [Photo/VCG]

*Trend 5: Online live broadcast is rocketing*

The number of online live broadcast users reached 325 million as of June, accounting for 45.8 percent of internet users.





Customers play online games in an internet café in Qingdao, East China's Shangdong province, June 1, 2016. [Photo/VCG]

*Trend 6: More than half of internet users play online games*

Online game player amounted to 391 million as of June, accounting 55.1 percent of internet users. The number of internet users playing online games via smartphones reached 302 million, up 23 million from the end of last year.




Visitors walk past the stand of Chinese online travel agency Tuniu.com during an exhibition in Beijing, June 27, 2015. [Photo/IC]

*Trend 7: Online travel services are attracting more users*

A total of 264 million internet users used online travel services as of June, with the number of people using smartphones to reserve tickets, hotels or tourism products reaching 232 million, a10.7 percent increase from the end of last year.




The icons of the mobile apps of taxi-hailing apps Didi Chuxing (upper) and Uber on a smartphone are pictured in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang province, August 1, 2016. [Photo/IC]

*Trend 8: Online ride-hailing services are getting more customers*

As ride-hailing services have been granted legal status in China, it has been used by 159 million users as of June, which means 22.3 percent of internet users have tried the service.

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## 艹艹艹

Food delivery man Fang Liang hands the food to a customer in Taicang, East China's Jiangsu province, July 30, 2016. [Photo/VCG]

*Trend 9: Online food ordering and delivery services are prospering*

Food ordering and delivery service apps users increased by 40 percent in the first six months of this year, with 146 million people using their phone to order food.




A woman uses Yuebao, a fund management app under Alipay of Alibaba Group, on her smartphone as she counts yuan banknotes at home in Zhengzhou, Central China's Henan province, October 2, 2014.

*Trend 10: Internet financing is booming*

The number of people purchasing internet financing products reached 101 million as of June, increasing by 11 million from the end of last year.

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## AndrewJin

I am not a fan of online mobile games, but cashless life and Internet financial products are my things. I have 100,000 yuan in Alibaba's Alipay...not much, but their interest rate is quite high and more flexible.





Annual interest I receive can pay my Lijiang trip!

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## cirr

I use my phone for none of the above.

Heck, I must be old! A dinosaur really.

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## 艹艹艹

cirr said:


> I use my phone for none of the above.
> 
> Heck, I must be old! A dinosaur really.


*Can't keep up with the times.*


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## cirr

long_ said:


> *Can't keep up with the times.*



I use my phone for

(1) taking and making calls
(2) surfing the net(from time to time) and
(3) wechatting

Yes, I am a laggard no doubt in the era of digital/cyber economy.


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## ahojunk

August 31, 2016, 11:30 AM
*A leading investor in China’s Xiaomi and other e-commerce firms talks about global opportunities*




BY FRANK TONG Senior editor, China

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung, who has witnessed highs and lows in internet business financing, talks about recent investments, including a cross-border e-commerce app and Airbnb.

Hans Tung is managing partner at GGV Capital, a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm that has invested in many e-commerce companies, including China’s Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and India’s Snapdeal. Tung ranks No. 21 in the 2016 top technology investors listed by Forbes magazine as he led the investments in Xiaomi at a very early stage.






Internet Retailer sat down with Tung during the recent China-U.S. Investment Summit in Silicon Valley to talk about the latest opportunities and trends in cross-border e-commerce. Here is an edited version of that conversation:

*What’s your opinion regarding the current fundraising slowdown?*

I experienced the internet bubble between 2000 and 2002, and I also went through the financial crisis in 2008. It is definitely a good time to invest or to create a startup when most people say winter is coming.

Great companies always stand out when the winters are going to end. Facebook was founded in 2004 and Xiaomi was created in 2010. Also, Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent all have gained strong momentum after the first dotcom bubble.

In the winter, startups will find that raising money is difficult, but there are fewer competitors as well since poor-performing companies, which often burn money on marketing, find it hard to access financing from VCs.

*Can you tells about your recent investments?*

The first one is a mobile-based shopping marketplace, Wish, which is based in here San Francisco. They help Chinese merchants sell products to mobile shoppers in the U.S. and Europe. In the beginning, they didn’t have a China team and only sold ads. I suggested they expand into China and start to sell products. Two years ago, Wish’s users could only select from 100,000 products; now 30 million products sell on Wish.

The second one is cross-border e-commerce app RED. Charles Mao, a Stanford graduate, created this app to sell overseas products into China through an online community. When I invested in RED, users could only share shopping experiences and the app didn’t sell any products. I have invested into 10 cross border e-commerce companies, and RED is the most inexperienced in e-commerce operations. But Mao is the smartest founder I’ve ever seen, and he knows how to connect people closely by their interests. Now we all know an online community is very important for e-commerce startups because it acts as an economic moat.

I also invested in music social app musical.ly recently. The lip-sync app has attracted more than 100 million users and followers on social media and even appeared on the popular TV show “Good Morning America.” Musical.ly is a rare example since it is popular in America but the development team was based in Shanghai. They have a cross-border team as one of their founders and are native Chinese who worked in Silicon Valley for many years.

*I know you invested recently into Airbnb and online messaging app Slack. Why?*

We invested in Airbnb [the online marketplace for vacation property rentals] in the past year because we plan to help them expand into China.

Slack also got our funding. The app has become a popular enterprise communication tool in the U.S. Lots of companies, including Microsoft, eBay, Jet.com, are using this app to transfer messages or information smoothly across different departments. The app also has global users in Japan and Europe. In China, Alibaba has a similar app, Dingding, which is actually learning the business idea from Slack.

Almost all the companies I invested in have become or are close to becoming unicorn companies, which are private companies valued at more than $1 billion.

*Why did you invest in so many cross border e-commerce companies?*

I believe cross-border e-commerce is a trend in the next 10 years. I was lucky in many ways: I invested in China’s internet companies in 2005 while the broad-band internet was rising. In 2010, after I bet on Xiaomi, smartphone demand was taking off in China. In 2013, I know cross-border e-commerce and globalization of mobile companies would become the largest wave in the near future.

When I went to China in 2005, the value of Alibaba increased to $5 billion, up from $170 million when GGV invested in it earlier. Now Alibaba’s value is $200 billion. Why? Online markets grew dramatically because China lacks an advanced retail system like having Wal-Mart and Target in the U.S. Chinese shoppers like to buy online, although there were fake or counterfeit products on marketplaces. Now people are increasing buying authentic products as living conditions improve in China. 

*It seems China is tightening its cross-border e-commerce policies for imported products. Your opinion?*

For China’s cross-border e-commerce, export is also important. China has many good products, which can be sold at a higher price. Although Wish mainly helps Chinese merchants export, it also works with JD.com to establish a small business division to sell imported products.

*Wish features mostly low-ticket products. Is it a good time for Chinese manufacturers to consider creating their brands in the U.S.?*

Branding in the U.S. is not easy. First you need to create great products. Over time, consumers will recognize you. Currently, many Chinese sellers lack a long-term plan. I think their mindset will change and good sellers will focus on meeting consumers’ needs in the future.

*The old stereotype for Chinese companies is they often copy the business idea from U.S. tech companies, but now more Chinese internet companies are expanding in the U.S. market.*

This is a latest trend in the past three years. The reason behind it is that China’s internet sector has enough development. 

From 2000 to 2010, the trend is to copy the ideas from the U.S. to China. However, China is quite different from the U.S. China has many more users and demands from consumers in China are very different. China’s market is much more complicated than the U.S., so localized companies that provide unique online services could win in China.

For example, Didi competes with Uber in China in the same taxi-hailing market, but Didi knows more about China. Uber has a more advanced IT system with only 100 technology workers, while Didi operates a less-competitive IT system with 5,000 workers. The result is clear: Didi can cover 500 Chinese cities, while Uber only operates in 50 cities. That type of know-how allows Chinese internet companies to expand into other markets, especially in developing countries. But the successful cases like Musical.ly are still rare. In the next 10 years, with more Chinese-Americans going back to China and working with local talent, those cross-border teams have huge potential in the global market as they can learn from best practices in the world’s two largest markets: China and the U.S.

*Why does China have WeChat, a super app where millions of people can chat and shop in an app, and nothing like it has taken off in the U.S.?*

Yelp is a good example [of potential]. If Yelp could allow users to make reservations, it could be a super app like WeChat. But they didn’t do so. Most U.S internet companies would like to direct traffic to a retailer rather than handle the transaction themselves.

Another example is Pinterest. Five years after launching, they started to allow users to buy products from the app. But the timing is a big problem because their users are used to discovering things on the app but not shopping on the app. 

*What is your focus in the next several years?*

I will strengthen investment on cross-order e-commerce and also invest in consumer product brands in a specific category, like Dollar Shave Club.


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## TaiShang

*Unmanned vehicles developed by JD.com to begin trial operation*
September 02, 2016
People's Daily





The vehicle can plan the delivery route and avoid traffic jam.

*The first unmanned distribution vehicles independently developed by Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com will began trial operation this October, the company announced on Sept. 1.* The statement also said that such vehicles are expected to be in large-scale commercial use in the near future.

At 1 meter long, 0.8 meters wide and 0.6 meters high, the unmanned distribution vehicles are capable of independently planning routes, avoiding congested roads and identifying traffic lights.






It notifies buyers using APP or text message.

*Some netizens commented that the devices will threaten the jobs of delivery people.*

Discussing the original intent of the project, Xiao Jun, head of JD.com's intelligent logistics research, explained that Chinese logistics systems in urban areas are entirely dependent on manpower, requiring a large number of employees to make deliveries spanning small distances. According to Xiao, this results in inefficiency.

*Jack Ma, founder and executive chairman of Alibaba, another e-commerce giant in China, dismissed JD.com's test of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) in June, laughingly stating that the company might as well be attempting to deliver packages to Mars.*

Nevertheless, as the first group working toward UAV delivery in China, JD.com is confident that such measures can not only resolve distribution issues in rural areas, but can also reduce operation costs, according to analysts.

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## ahojunk

*Top 10 trends in China's internet development*
By Zhu Lingqing (chinadaily.com.cn) Updated: 2016-09-02 07:15

The number of Chinese using internet rose to 710 million as of June, accounting for 51.7 percent of the country's total population, exceeding the global average by 3.1 percent, according to a report released by China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) on August 3.

As internet penetration level keeps rising, some trends in internet development are visible, according to a report by 199it.com. Here are the top 10 trends.

*Trend 1: The group of phubbers is expanding*

Phubbers are people who engage in phubbing, "the act of snubbing someone in a social setting by looking at a phone instead of paying attention".

The number of people using their mobile phones to surf the internet reached 656 million, increasing from 90.1 percent of the total internet users at the end of last year to 92.5 percent as of June.

In addition, people surfing the internet only via mobile phones account for 24.5 percent of the total internet users.

*Trend 2: Video-streaming websites are getting more users*

The number of internet users watching video online increased to 514 million as of June, up 10 million from the end of last year, with 440 million using mobile phones to watch videos online.

*Trend 3: The lifestyle of "no cash" becomes popular*

People using online payments rose to 455 million as of June, with 64.7 percent of them having the experience of paying via smartphones.

*Trend 4: The number of online shoppers keeps rising*

A total of 448 million internet users shopped online as of June, with 61 percent of them shopping via smartphones.

*Trend 5: Online live broadcast is rocketing*

The number of online live broadcast users reached 325 million as of June, accounting for 45.8 percent of internet users.

*Trend 6: More than half of internet users play online games*

Online game player amounted to 391 million as of June, accounting 55.1 percent of internet users. The number of internet users playing online games via smartphones reached 302 million, up 23 million from the end of last year.

*Trend 7: Online travel services are attracting more users*

A total of 264 million internet users used online travel services as of June, with the number of people using smartphones to reserve tickets, hotels or tourism products reaching 232 million, a10.7 percent increase from the end of last year.

*Trend 8: Online ride-hailing services are getting more customers*

As ride-hailing services have been granted legal status in China, it has been used by 159 million users as of June, which means 22.3 percent of internet users have tried the service.

*Trend 9: Online food ordering and delivery services are prospering*

Food ordering and delivery service apps users increased by 40 percent in the first six months of this year, with 146 million people using their phone to order food.

*Trend 10: Internet financing is booming*

The number of people purchasing internet financing products reached 101 million as of June, increasing by 11 million from the end of last year.

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## ahojunk

*China's Ministry of Commerce investigating Didi-Uber merger*
2016-09-02 16:15 | chinadaily.com.cn | _Editor: Feng Shuang_

The mega merger between the top two ride-hailing service providers in China may hit a roadblock as the country's antitrust watchdog says it is investigating the case.

The Ministry of Commerce said at a news conference in Beijing on Friday it was investigating whether the merger deal between Didi Chuxing and the China unit of the US-headquartered Uber Technologies Inc suggested a potential monopoly.

Shen Danyang, spokesman for the ministry, said that Didi and Uber China completed the merger deal on August 2; right after the two announced their agreement to tie-up on August 1 without filing any application to the ministry in advance.

"So far the antitrust bureau of the ministry has asked Didi to explain the reason of not filing application and required the company to submit related documents," Shen said.

According to him, the bureau has talked to related government organizations and enterprises to understand the market competition of the ride-hailing industry brought by the deal and will push the investigation forward to make sure the playing field is leveled and the interest of consumers is protected.

The Beijing-based Didi Chuxing was not available to comment on Friday.

Didi announced at the beginning of August its decision to acquire Uber's China operations, creating a ride-sharing titan estimated to take about 90 percent of the market.

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## TaiShang

*Indonesian President Joko Widodo and his wife visit Alibaba Xixi headquarters*






Indonesian President Joko Widodo (left) and his wife visit Alibaba Xixi headquarters, accompanied by Jack Ma (center), chair of the B20's SME development taskforce and chairman of Alibaba Group, in Hangzhou, East China's Zhejiang province, on September 2, 2016. [Photo by Wei Zhiyang, Zhejiang Daily/Provided to chinadaily.com.cn]





Indonesian President Joko Widodo (first from left) and his wife visit Alibaba Xixi headquarters, accompanied by Jack Ma (second from right), chair of the B20's SME development taskforce and chairman of Alibaba Group, in Hangzhou, East China's Zhejiang province, on September 2, 2016. [Photo by Wei Zhiyang, Zhejiang Daily/Provided to chinadaily.com.cn]


en.people.cn

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## ahojunk

_Wow! I am surprise. I thought Alibaba is bigger, but I was wrong._

--------
*Tencent Is Now the Most Valuable Company in Asia*
by David Meyer
SEPTEMBER 5, 2016, 6:59 AM EDT






It’s also one of the top 10 public corporations in the world by market cap.

The web firm Tencent TCEHY 5.27% has become the most valuable company in Asia, and one of the top 10 in the world by market capitalization.

It wasn’t so long ago that Tencent was racing neck-and-neck with Samsung — their share prices were both up by a third on the year — to overtake state-owned China Mobile and steal the title of the most valuable company in Asia.

Samsung has flagged over the last few days, however, after it had to issue a recall for its flagship Note 7 handset because of reports about battery fires. But stock in *Tencent has continued to surge, rising 3.8% in Hong Kong on Monday. That took it to a valuation of HK$1.976 trillion ($255 billion)*.

That jump takes Tencent narrowly past the market cap of China Mobile, and into the same *premier league of public corporations as U.S. tech giants Apple AAPL -0.03% , Alphabet GOOG 1.12% , Microsoft MSFT -0.10% , Amazon AMZN 2.13% and Facebook FB 2.55% *.

The Chinese e-commerce group *Alibaba BABA 4.56% is not far behind, with a current valuation of around $250 billion*.

Tencent is best known for its gaming operation, its QQ and WeChat social networks, and its online ad business, although it also offers services in the realms of payments (a likely growth area), cloud storage, and entertainment.

The company became China’s most valuable tech company last month. So far this year its stock price has risen by more than 40%.

*Tencent’s success can largely be attributed to China’s current boom in consumer spending*, and the firm has in the last couple years become a major investor in the venture capital scene.

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## TaiShang

*JD.com going into VR battle with Alibaba*
China Daily, September 7, 2016

China's second-largest B2C online platform JD.com Inc is gearing up to use virtual reality technology on its online shopping platform in a bid to catch up with its archrival Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.

On Tuesday, the Nasdaq-listed online retailer announced its ambitious plan to build a virtual reality and augmented reality-enabled online shopping experience that can beat those offered by brick-and-mortar stores.

"We don't want to miss the future development of VR and AR technologies. They could provide better shopping experiences and bring convenience to our lives. At the same time, innovative technologies can drive the development of JD's future business," said Long Yu, chief human resources officer at JD.com.

Together with third parties, the company will launch the AR home decoration product. With the AR shopping app, users can "see" virtual items in a real environment, such as the position of a sofa and the color of the wallpaper. At the same time, users can have a real-time conversation with designers to discuss the interior layout of their home.

Apart from AR, JD currently uses VR technologies on 3C (computer, communications and consumer electronics), home appliances and other fields. Putting on a VR headset, users can pick up the selected product and view it in 360 degrees.

In February, JD's rival Alibaba invested in US-based mixed reality startup Magic Leap. Then it announced the establishment of its own VR research lab, GnomeMagic Lab. And in July, Alibaba provided a preview of its "Buy+" virtual store at the Taobao Maker Festival in Shanghai.

According to a jointly issued VR & AR market analysis report by JD and international data group IDG, as the VR market develops rapidly, the fourth quarter will usher in full-blown competition.

"With JD's key business lying in online shopping malls, VR and AR technologies will help improve the impact of commodity displays, and boost the company's business. As a representative of B2C platforms, JD's main users are people aged between 20 to 35 with medium to high incomes, who are aware of VR and AR technologies," said Zhao Ziming, an analyst at Beijing-based internet consultancy Analysys.

However, James Yan, research director at Counterpoint Technology Market Research, said in an earlier interview that the application of VR in e-commerce would need more time to take off because it is difficult to make people form the habit of using VR technology to shop. "And VR content for shopping is also in desperate need," he said.

On Tuesday, JD also announced its cooperation with domestic VR manufacturer Beijing Baofeng Mojing Technology Co Ltd over the next three years, to sell 15 million VR headsets.

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## ahojunk

_Besides beef and iron ore, we (Oz) also have good quality wine and lots of fresh air!
Tonight, we are opening a bottle of Cab Sav._

--------
*Alibaba Launches Aussie Wine Store*
5 SEP 2016 JULIAN THUMM

*Alibaba has launched a flagship Australian wine store through its Tmall platform, providing an opportunity for Aussie winemakers to tap into the lucrative Chinese market.*






Australian winemakers are set to benefit from Alibaba’s latest offering — a flagship B2C wine store offering Australian wines through the Tmall.com platform.

The new wine store, which is supported by Wine Australia and operated by Chinese online wine retailer Vinehoo.com, will initially stock 10 brands from eight wine regions. Initial brands include Brokenwood, Coriole, John Duval, Pikes and Voyager Estate.

Vinehoo.com will support the venture, facilitating fulfilment of all orders. It will also provide a platform to build the profile of Australian wines and regions among Chinese consumers. A further 20 brands are to be listed in the coming months.

The store opening will be supported by the inaugural Tmall 9.9 Global Wine and Spirits Festival, an online event aimed at introducing global wine and spirit brands to Chinese consumers.

“The opening of the store is a landmark moment that builds on a year of strong growth for Australian wine in the Chinese export market,” said Andreas Clark, CEO of Wine Australia. “It opens up another commercial opportunity for Australian wineries to tap into China’s growing appreciation for our fine wines.”

Australian wine exports have grown to $2.1 billion per year. The global trend of increased demand for Australia’s finest wines was reflected on the Chinese mainland, with exports priced A$10 or more per litre destined for China, increasing sharply by 71 per cent to $169 million.

“The food and wine culture in China continues to evolve, and there is increased demand from Chinese consumers for premium quality products online. Our support of Tmall’s flagship Australian wine store helps us capitalise on this growing interest in Australian wine and gives us the opportunity to further reinforce the message with consumers that wines of Australian provenance are of the highest quality,” said Clark.

Maggie Zhou, Managing Director of Australia and New Zealand markets for Alibaba said: “The partnership between Tmall and Wine Australia will allow local winemakers to access the 434 million active consumers across our China retail marketplaces. As the domestic wine sector in China is yet to reach maturity and Australian wines are considered world-class and come at varied price points, the opportunity to sell to China’s burgeoning middle class is significant.

“Beyond established, well-recognised Australian wine brands, there is also strong potential for smaller producers to gain traction internationally. With the opening of Alibaba’s Australian office in late 2016, our local team will be helping winemakers of all sizes effectively market their products, navigate distribution channels and align to overseas preferences,” Zhou said.

Late last year Alibaba partnered with Australia Post to help Australian businesses sell wholesale into China through the company’s 1688.com platform, with a range of Australian winemaker getting on board.

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## TaiShang

*Alibaba to expand investment in ASEAN*
Xinhua, September 11, 2016

Alibaba will boost investment and development in ASEAN, according to founder and chairman Jack Ma on Sunday.

*The e-commerce giant will "participate in the development of local small- and medium-sized enterprises and young people," said Ma at the opening ceremony of the 13th China-ASEAN Expo in Nanning, which runs from Sunday to Wednesday.*

He did not, however, elaborate or share any specific plans.

China-ASEAN trade has exploded, it is now 58 times larger than when the two sides established dialogue relations 25 years ago, which translates into great business opportunities and social development, according to Ma.

If hundreds of millions of young people and small businesses participate in globalization, the world economy and trade will be changed in a greater way, he said, adding that the Belt and Road Initiative is the start of inclusive globalization.

***
_
Get on the development train, folks!_

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## TaiShang

*Alibaba opens its first self-built data center*
China Daily, September 13, 2016

​
An aerial view of Alibaba's data center in Zhangbei County, Hebei Province, Sept. 11, 2016. [Photo by Chen Weisong/China.org.cn] 

E-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd launched on Monday *its very first self-designed, self-built data centers in Hebei Province*, beefing up its cloud computing capability to better serve online shoppers and entrepreneurs in northern China.

The two newly launched data centers in Zhangbei County in Zhangjiakou are expected to become Alibaba's key computing infrastructure in northern China, providing services to the giant's core businesses in cloud computing, big data and e-commerce.

Jeff Zhang, chief technology officer of Alibaba Group, said that the e-commerce giant had previously teamed up with telecom operators in building data centers.

"The two centers in Zhangbei are the first centers we have exclusively designed and built to support our business," he said, adding that he estimates the centers will shoulder about half of the computing tasks of the company in the future.

*According to Zhang, the new centers will soon provide services during Alibaba's upcoming Nov 11 shopping festival, the biggest annual online shopping event in China. The centers are also expected to provide clouding computing and big data services to 2 million small and medium-sized companies.*

"Alibaba has become one of the world's leading big data companies. We are fully committed to building our platform, at the heart of which are efficient data centers that are highly available and robust, of large enough scale to match our growth and make use of a reproducible IT infrastructure," said Zhang, adding that the company may build another data center in the future.

*The launch of the new data center is in line with Alibaba's "going North" strategy.*

The move is aimed to help Alibaba gain an increased market share in northern regions in the intense competition with its biggest online shopping rival, Beijing-based JD.com Inc.

Lu, an e-commerce expert, said "computing infrastructure is important for Alibaba to enable users in north China to enjoy more and better services".

​
An engineer examines equipments at Alibaba's data center in Zhangbei County, Hebei Province, Sept. 11, 2016. [Photo by Chen Weisong/China.org.cn]

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## ahojunk

Digital economy to be new engine of growth
By He Yini (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2016-09-09 15:22


Digital technologies are changing the game of doing business by increasingly penetrating into consumer markets, business models and decision-making in large and small companies alike across the world.

It begs a question for young entrepreneurs, though, of how to survive and scale up their businesses in a disruptive age, as they are often lack funds and experience, among others.

This is especially true in China. Statistics show more than 30,000 startups are emerging on a daily basis in the country, a number that's expected to grow with the massive push for policies to support innovation and economic transformation.

"Policy can play a critical role in turning digital disruption into a powerful opportunity for young entrepreneurs," said Rohan Malik, strategic growth leader of global industry in Ernst & Young, on Thursday.

It's very important to create an entrepreneurial environment that encourages young people to establish, grow and scale their businesses, he said during a news release of the company's latest report on digital economy.

Meanwhile, access to funds and mentorship on management, among other factors, are crucial for a new company to survive and maintain a business, but also the biggest challenge in the first year or two, said Malik, citing the report.

According to the report, for high-performing young Chinese entrepreneurs, their approaches to operations management are shifting – from relying on personal experiences to adopting innovative management models that focus on digital technologies, big data analytics and applications.

China has rolled out a slew of measures to boost mass entrepreneurship and innovation, a program initiated in 2014, to reinvigorate the slowing economy by encouraging more people to start their own businesses and unleash their innovation potential.

The latest guidelines were issued on Sept 1 at the State Council's executive meeting presided over by Premier Li Keqiang, in a bid to ensure the healthier and more sustainable development of venture capital that underpins the growth of small businesses and new innovation-driven engines, including the digital economy.

"Venture capital can finance small business startups that have promising markets. Promoting the form can boost economic vitality and help create more opportunities for employment," Huang Qunhui, director of the Institute of Industrial Economics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, was quoted as saying in an earlier China Daily report.

According to the National Development and Reform Commission, the number of newly registered enterprises exceeded 2.62 million in the first half of 2016, up 28.6 percent from last year.

"Start-ups need to improve their own comprehensive competitiveness in order to reduce the risks for investors. Good projects and good companies will see no shortage of funding," said Benson Ng, an advisory partner of Ernst &Young Advisory Services Ltd.

During the 13th Five-Year Plan period (2016-20), enterprises in China and around the world will see more strategic opportunities arising from the implementation of policies to encourage innovation and entrepreneurship, he said.

Digital, which equals inclusive growth, is the new way the government should do business, said Malik. "The future is bright. Young entrepreneurs should seize the time and take the initiative to innovate."

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## ahojunk

*China's top 5 internet ecosystems*
chinadaily.com.cn, September 14, 2016

Competition in China's internet market has turned into a fierce contest among ecosystems, market research firm International Data Corporation wrote (IDC) in a report released on Thursday.

IDC analyzed the strong growth of internet giants Alibaba and Tencent in the second quarter, saying the two "have formed complete and solid ecosystems, thus helping startups achieve rapid growth and enhance their own competitive advantages."

According to the IDC, Alibaba's ecosystem is based on its core business - ecommerce, while that of Tencent's centers on social networking and online gaming.

An internet ecosystem is a concept that has gained increasing popularity in the industry. As defined by economist Song Qinghui, an internet ecosystem is a brand new system evolved from the internet, enabling a comprehensive restructuring of value chains across industries.

Xue Yu, an analyst with IDC, endorsed the idea in a note, saying an internet ecosystem featured openness, innovation and win-win solutions and that there would be many more such systems across different industries in the future.

Currently, Baidu Inc, Xiaomi Corp and Le Holdings Co Ltd have all made headway in building their ecosystems.

Tencent and Alibaba's ecosystems are more developed in comparison with other companies Baidu and Xiaomi, who lag behind in user interactivity because their core businesses, namely search and mobile phones respectively, serve more as tools, Xue said.

Le Holdings' ecosystem is not built on a certain core business, but on a combination of platforms that seek to satisfy customers' various demand including TV, films, sports, among others, he noted.

Besides these companies, JD.com and Didi Chuxing also have the tendency to build their ecosystems based on their strengths, he said.

Let's take a look at the top five most influential internet ecosystems in China.


*5. LeEco*





_*Le Holdings Co Ltd unveils its Internet electric battery driverless concept car called LeSEE during a launch event in Beijing, capital of China, April 20, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]*_ 


*4. Xiaomi*





_*Reporters visit the first Xiaomi store opened in Taipei, China's Taiwan, Aug 6, 2015.[Photo/Xinhua]*_ 


*3. Baidu*





_*Sign of Baidu forum seen at an exhibition in Shanghai on May 28, 2015. [Photo/Xinhua]*_


*2. Alibaba*





_*Logo of Alibaba Group. [Photo/Xinhua]*_ 


*1. Tencent*





_*Photo taken on Jan. 14, 2013 shows the headquarters of Internet firm Tencent in Shenzhen, south China's Guangdong Province. [Photo/Xinhua]*_

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## ahojunk

*China launches cyber security talent training nationwide*
2016-09-20 08:32 | Global Times _Editor: Li Yan_


Authorities from Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei Province on Monday pledged to increase the number of scholarships to attract students pursuing cyber security, and run special recruitment for "maverick geniuses," which constitutes a part of nationwide efforts to train cyber security talent.

Li Shuyong, Wuhan government publicity department head, told the Cybersecurity Technology Summit during China Cybersecurity Week that the city government will cooperate with companies to cultivate the world's top cyber security talent.

Li said the local government will double the number of scholarships for cyber security majors and recruit top cyber security graduates in Chinese and overseas schools as well as from competitors at cyber security contests. She added it will also open a class for minors and run special recruitment for "maverick geniuses."

She also said the city government will establish an innovative evaluation system. Instead of taking exams, cyber security majors will be evaluated based on their performance and given priority to practical and entrepreneurship training.

The Wuhan government will also offer twice the salary and research funds to the best cyber security experts than those from other fields. They will also receive 2 million yuan ($299,823) in subsidies and a high of 100 million yuan in funding if they have typical technologies and can create a significant impact on the economy. China needs at least 500,000 cyber security talents, but only about 8,000 such majors graduate each year, said an education official at the 4th China Internet Security Conference in August.

In January, a training center for cyber security and communication talent was established in Sichuan Province, aiming to provide training for students and faculty in Sichuan and Hong Kong.

In February, China launched its first special fund for cyber security with an initial capital of 300 million yuan. The fund will be used to provide financial assistance to experts and teachers who specialize in cyber security.

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## onebyone

*Why China is the next proving ground for open source software*

China is starting to adopt and contribute to open source projects, especially around big data infrastructure, and tech companies should pay attention.

By Matt Asay | September 20, 2016, 4:00 AM PST





Image: iStockphoto/William_Potter

Western entrepreneurs still haven't figured out China. For most, the problem is getting China to pay for software. The harder problem, however, is building software that can handle China's tremendous scale.

There are scattered examples of success, though. One is Alluxio (formerly Tachyon), which I detailed recently in its efforts to help China's leading online travel site, Qunar, boost HDFS performance by 15X. Alluxio CEO and founder, Haoyuan Li, recently returned from China, and I caught up with him to better understand the big data infrastructure market there, as China looks to spend $370 million to double its data center capacity in order to serve 710 million internet users.

This could get loud.

*Open sourcing China*

One of the most interesting things about big data is that all of the best data infrastructure is open source. As Cloudera co-founder Mike Olson has made clear, "No dominant platform-level software infrastructure has emerged in the last ten years in closed-source, proprietary form." This is particularly true in the world of data infrastructure.

Historically, China would have benefited from such bounty but in the area of big data, China is not merely consuming the West's best software: It's open sourcing its own. Baidu, for example, has just announced the open sourcing of its machine learning platform, PaddlePaddle, under an Apache license. According to Li, "This is as significant as when Google open sourced its machine learning platform, Tensorflow."

Baidu's action suggests a shift in how China thinks about software. In December 2014, China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) declared its support for OpenStack for state-owned enterprises. Not long after, Tencent embraced the Open Daylight Foundation's SDN instead of developing its own proprietary distributed cluster SDN controller, as Neela Jacques uncovered. Across China, similar efforts to use, and increasingly contribute, open source code have flourished.

This is critical because, as Li told me, China's scale puts all software to the ultimate test.

*Hitting China scale*

As Li stressed, "Many of our largest production deployments are in China, and that's on purpose." That "purpose" is to stress-test Alluxio's software under the most demanding situations.

For example, Baidu has started speaking publicly about the open source infrastructure powering their driverless car initiative. Huawei, for its part, actively promotes its FusionInsight product, which heavily depends on a variety of open source technologies (to which it increasingly contributes).Tencent offers a range of open source infrastructure projects, covering everything from data warehousing to mobile network acceleration.

These represent China's efforts to open up. But as my conversation with Li makes clear, Western companies (and the open source projects they back) need to be promoting their code in China, too—not only for potential commercial gain, but also to encourage China's best enterprises to stress-test one's code, even as we encourage China's best developers to adopt it. That's a big reason MongoDB has worked closely with a variety of organizations in China, winning plaudits from China's largest car-hailing service, Kuaidi, among others.

Because, if you can meet China's scale demands, everything else is easy.



 *About Matt Asay*
Matt Asay is a veteran technology columnist who has written for CNET, ReadWrite, and other tech media. Asay has also held a variety of executive roles with leading mobile and big data software companies.

http://www.techrepublic.com/article/why-china-is-the-next-proving-ground-for-open-source-software/

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## ahojunk

_Catch all these criminals and punish them._

--------
China launches first police center dedicated to cyber and telecom fraud
By Kou Jie (People's Daily Online) 15:42, September 21, 2016

_*





[File photo]*_​
On Sept. 20, China established its first police center focused specifically on tackling cyber and telecom crimes nationwide.

Founded by the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Public Security, the police center aims to supervise and control bank accounts involved in fraud cases. The center will also cooperate with financial institutions nationwide to block illegal funds, according to an announcement released by the Ministry of Public Security on Sept. 20.

The establishment of the center was authorized by the Ministry of Public Security in January. As of press time, the center has blocked 400,000 accounts in connection with fraud, and over 1.1 billion RMB of illegal funds. More than 10,000 fake base stations and fraudulent network links have been shut down, with over 130,000 mobile phone numbers banned for their involvement in fraud cases, People’s Daily Online reported.

Telecom and cyber fraud have become fast-growing criminal fields in China, causing serious damage to social stability and public security. In August, Xu Yuyu, a college-bound student, died from a heart attack after her tuition money was stolen by telephone scammers.

In addition to the supervision and control center in Beijing, the Ministry of Public Security has also established six research centers nationwide to study cyber and telecom crimes, as well as two prevention and control centers in cooperation with Tencent and Alibaba, Chinanews.com reported.

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## ahojunk

_This will help to address some data privacy & security concerns._

--------
*China plans to release private info protection standard soon*
By Cao Siqi in Wuhan | Source:Global Times | Published: 2016/9/20 23:43:40


China will soon release a national standard for personal information protection, regulating access to, storage and publishing of personal information, an expert said during China Cybersecurity Week on Monday.

Chen Xingshu, professor of information and technology at Sichuan University and among those who drafted the standard, said "data controllers," including government departments, universities and Internet businesses, are required to follow the standard in collecting, treating and storing personal information.

The standard also defines responsibilities of data controllers and safety measures in dealing with personal data, she said.

China faces the risk of personal information leaks. In April 2015, Qihu 360's Internet security monitoring platform butian.360.cn found that tens of millions of Chinese residents registered in the country's social security system face the risk of personal information leaks due to system loopholes.

Moreover, the personal information of over 200,000 children, including their names, age, address and parents' telephone numbers in Jinan, Shandong Province were sold in April, triggering public outrage. The leak of personal information has also led to rampant telecom fraud, which has led to fraud and tragedies.

"We are discussing how to implement the standard and to promote a comprehensive real-name system," she said, adding that the standard will be released online in late October for public feedback.

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## ahojunk

_The life of rural folks are getting better thanks to the Internet, Alibaba and JD.com._

--------
Internet technology giants eyes vast market in rural China
(People's Daily Online) 17:00, September 22, 2016




_*
Internet technology giants eyes vast market in rural China*_​
Internet moguls have pledged to further promote entrepreneurship and boost innovative growth in rural China, where netizens top 195 million.

E-commerce giant Alibaba signed cooperation agreements with the Ministry of Agriculture at a national conference on Sept. 6 and 7, which was chaired by Minister of Agriculture Han Changfu. The agreement aims to boost e-commerce in rural China through education and registration initiatives, which will also help to alleviate poverty in those areas.

More than 20,000 people are currently employed by Alibaba in over 300 counties across 29 provincial regions of China.

Addressing the conference, Liu Qiangdong, CEO of JD.com, said that some 90 percent of his employees come from rural China, and he himself grew up in a small village in Jiangsu province. To promote rural e-commerce, JD.com has established more than 1,000 local specialty shops and invited Party chiefs from 100 counties to advertise their county specialties.

With freezer storage in 10 cities, JD.com is now capable of delivering fruit and other fresh food within 24 hours in 20 cities, including Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu. Liu added that the company has also invented multiple e-finance products to boost entrepreneurship among farmers. These advances include more accessible loans and e-commerce education.

The population of netizens in rural China had climbed to 195 million by 2015, with 170 million rural residents surfing the Internet via smartphones. Of the 350 Chinese counties that were responsible for more than 100 million RMB of trade on Taobao in 2015, 120 were located in central and western China.

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## ahojunk

_Nowadays, I don't have much time for TV._

========
*Internet TV brings new opportunities to programmatic advertising*
2016-09-23 09:34Global Times _Editor: Li Yan_ 

By drawing people back to the living room, Internet TV has brought new marketing value and potential for China's programmatic media buying business, an industry report showed on Thursday.

While personal computers and mobile phones remain the most important information channels for many, the development of smart TVs has driven a growing number of users back to big-screen TVs, and some traditional TV watchers who have little access to the Internet have also shifted to Internet TVs, according to the China Programmatic TV Buying Trends report jointly released on Thursday by consulting firm SocialBeta and Yoyi Digital, a provider of multi-screen programmatic buying and marketing solutions for advertisers and media publishers.

The report also said people tend to spend more time watching Internet TV these days, taking back the time stolen by PCs and mobile phones gradually.

In 2015, more than 40.55 million smart TVs were sold in China, representing 100 percent growth in users, it noted.

The development has brought new opportunities for programmatic buying, which refers to the algorithmic purchase and sale of advertising space in real time. That process can match advertisers with selected content providers who can target the relevant audiences.

Programmatic advertising on mobile terminals may easily lead to impulse purchases of small goods, but marketing of high-price or high value-added products requires more convincing platforms.

Consumers trust TV advertising more than online ads, which is the advantage of smart TV, the report said, citing Li Xixiang, vice president of third-party marketing information provider Miaozhen Systems.

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## ahojunk

World's highest delivery service station established in Tibet
Saturday, Sep 24, 2016

*




Chinese courier and station chief Yang Tao poses at the Qomolangma delivery service station 
of Alibaba's Cainiao Logistics in Tashi Dzom township, Tingri county, Shigatse, 
Southwest China's Tibet autonomous region. Photo: Sina Weibo*​
Alibaba's logistics arm, Cainiao Network, set up the world's highest delivery service station in Southwest China's Tibet to expand businesses and services to far remote areas.

Located in Tashi Dzom in Tingri county with the altitude of 4,119 meters at the foot of Qomolangma, the station is managed by young Chinese man Yang Tao and his father who ran a vegetable store in the town.

Yang, born in 1990s, has to drive his pickup for hours to the county seat of Tingri and back periodically to fetch parcels from online shopping, mainly from Alibaba's shopping sites Taobao and Tmall, as delivery of packages stops in Tingri after being sent by air to Shigatse. And then parcel recipients come to his station to pick up their packages.

The service station brings much convenience and more products to the small town with a population of about 7,400.

- See more at: http://news.asiaone.com/news/asia/w...tation-established-tibet#sthash.5ABRYVRR.dpuf

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## cirr

*China Endeavors to Build a Big Data "Smart Ocean"*

QINGDAO, China, Sept. 28, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- China, on its way of implementing the strategy of building a maritime power, is endeavoring to promoting the development of maritime big data and building of "*Smart Ocean*".

The 2016 China Qingdao International Ocean Summit Forum was held in Qingdao on September 26th. Experts participating expressed that big data is the emerging strategic resource, maritime big data is the scientific application of big data technology in maritime field and maritime science has entered a new era driven by both data and knowledge.

Wu Lixin, academician of Chinese Academy of Science, pointed out that maritime big data involves various fields including physical oceanography, marine geology, marine biology, marine ecology, marine chemistry, marine remote sensing and deep-sea observation, and physical oceanography alone has waves, humidity, salinity and other 200 data variables.

According to sources, Tsinghua University is building a remote sensing big data center to support the development of maritime big data including ocean storm surge and inland flood monitoring and early-warning system, marine remote sensing big data mining and analysis and innovative application of navigation satellite in maritime fields.

Wang Lei, from Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Science, introduced that his institute, cooperating with Qingdao Bangbang Information Co., Ltd., has developed CAS Scientific and Technical Service Network Project which has been operating in fish and crab farming for about 3 years with over 400,000 users. Experts said this project has built a smart aquaculture and big data platform which can collect and analyze all major influential factors in farming in a comprehensive way and achieve process monitoring, environmental early-warning, data processing and technical guidance.

*Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology is also dedicated to maritime big data development and building petaflop supercomputers which will be fastest supercomputer in maritime field for China.*

Wu Lixin, Director of Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology, proposed the "Transparent Ocean" project, which uses the satellite sensing, intelligent buoy, underwater glider, underwater robot, deep-sea space station and other equipment to acquire in real-time or regular time the general information of marine environment at different depth in certain areas and support channel safety, marine ecological environment and resources safety, maritime disaster prevention and relief and weather forecasting.

SOURCE China Economic Information Service

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...o-build-a-big-data-smart-ocean-300335481.html

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## ahojunk

*China steps up inspection of online games*
2016-09-29 10:25 | Xinhua | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_

The Ministry of Culture is planning to check 200 randomly-selected online games operators, after giving dozens of warnings for various violations.

The ministry will personally examine 50 operators, while authorities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Hangzhou will review 30 each, the ministry said Wednesday.

The 200 targets account for about 13 percent of online game operators in the country.

The checks will focus on operators that *use banned content, import games without approval, are unlicensed, or fail to use real-name registrations for players*.

Last month, the ministry urged 26 operators to rectify violations, such as providing games using pornography, gambling, or that going against social ethics, as well as failing to take measures to prevent children becoming game addicts.

In China, *online game operators must prevent minors from playing too long*, and use measures such as reducing or even invalidating their in-game gains after a set time-limit.

The ministry said it planned to launch similar inspections on a regular basis, covering all game operators within two years, with more frequent checks on repeat offenders and targets of multiple public complaints.

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## TaiShang

ahojunk said:


> *China steps up inspection of online games*
> 2016-09-29 10:25 | Xinhua | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_
> 
> The Ministry of Culture is planning to check 200 randomly-selected online games operators, after giving dozens of warnings for various violations.
> 
> The ministry will personally examine 50 operators, while authorities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Hangzhou will review 30 each, the ministry said Wednesday.
> 
> The 200 targets account for about 13 percent of online game operators in the country.
> 
> The checks will focus on operators that *use banned content, import games without approval, are unlicensed, or fail to use real-name registrations for players*.
> 
> Last month, the ministry urged 26 operators to rectify violations, such as providing games using pornography, gambling, or that going against social ethics, as well as failing to take measures to prevent children becoming game addicts.
> 
> In China, *online game operators must prevent minors from playing too long*, and use measures such as reducing or even invalidating their in-game gains after a set time-limit.
> 
> The ministry said it planned to launch similar inspections on a regular basis, covering all game operators within two years, with more frequent checks on repeat offenders and targets of multiple public complaints.



It is very good. Online ads are flooding Taiwan, currently, taking up most of the commercial air time on TVs. I see no value in this. People's attention must be directed to more constructive pastimes.

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## ahojunk

*WeChat upgrade exposes click farm industry*
2016-09-30 15:43 | Ecns.cn | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_

(ECNS) -- The wildly popular social media app WeChat developed by Tencent has updated its system again to fight false clicks, dealing a heavy blow to accounts that once claimed to have massive readership.

WeChat's move came after a series of false clicks, as influential public accounts on WeChat with subscriber numbers exceeding 100,000 each day could attract big investment.

On Alibaba's e-commerce website taobao.com, hundreds of sellers provide services offering to increase the number of clicks and subscribers on WeChat.

A public account can increase its readership to more than 100,000 at a cost of 5,000 yuan ($750). The influential account usually charge 50,000 to 100,000 yuan for embedded advertisements or endorsements, thus forming an industry chain.

To prevent false clicks, WeChat upgraded its system on Sept. 28, causing the number of readers on some influential public accounts to plummet.

In future, the app will not display precise views for stories with more than 100,000 pageviews, Tencent said.

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## ahojunk

*E-wallet services bloom at airports*
2016-09-30 09:01 | China Daily | _Editor: Feng Shuang_

International airports have become the new battlefield for the country's top internet companies as they gear up for over-seas expansion by providing Chinese outbound travelers with more e-wallet services.

The timing is ideal, as millions of tourists pack their bags right before the National Day holiday, from Oct 1 to 7.

China's online search giant Baidu Inc announced on Thursday a partnership with Israeli startup Travelers Box to provide a convenient way for Chinese travelers to exchange their unused foreign money before returning home.

Through the service, travelers can choose to credit their Baidu Wallet accounts by depositing money at Travelers-Box kiosks at airports in some of the most popular countries for Chinese tourists, including Japan, Italy and Canada.

The service, which charges 7 percent of the total deposit as a service and exchange fee, is available at five international airports, with six more by year's end.

Whitney Yan, a Baidu spokeswoman, said the service will save people the trouble of taking their spare foreign money home, then having to exchange it into yuan.

"Sometimes, you don't want to waste your spare money buying goods you don't really want. If you don't have time to go to a bank, the money is likely to sit in your drawer," she said. Li Chao, an analyst with iResearch Consulting Group, said that the rising number of Chinese outbound travelers and their increasing spending overseas are only part of the reason companies are looking to airports for business.

"Fierce competition has dragged down the profits of digital payment services in China. Looking abroad is in line with their internationalization strategy and the goal to be more profitable. And the best way to start is with Chinese outbound travelers," he said.

Alipay, China's largest online payment service, struck a deal on Tuesday with 10 overseas airports to introduce its payment services starting in October. Included are airports in Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand and Thailand. The company said it will include more services at airports in the future.

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## ahojunk

*Tencent Creates a New App Service to Support WeChat*
Ana Ablaza | Sep 30, 2016 11:05 PM EDT

_*




Ma Huateng is Tencent's CEO. (Photo : Getty Images)*_​
Tencent, the creator of WeChat, announced recently that they have started developing another service to support the famous messenger app. This service is called Xiaochengxu.

It provides tools for businesses to build sub-apps within WeChat. Users can now make services simpler to use without leaving the messenger.

The new WeChat app becomes an operating system because users would not need to leave to use other mobile apps.

According to Wang Xiaofeng, an analyst with Forrester Research in Beijing, "With everybody coming in to launch Xiaochengxu, WeChat will be much more than an app. It will become the entry point of the Chinese mobile Internet."

WeChat currently has 806 million users. However, the developers at Tencent want to make these users stick to using the app.

Internet users increased by only 34 percent in the first half of the year compared to 55 percent last year. This figure is causing developers to tightly compete for a market that is slowing down.

An analyst in Hong Kong believes that Tencent's new app will eventually lead to an app distribution business for the company, which is similar to the Apple Store.

Yan Zhanmeng, director of technology research firm Counterpoint Research, said, "With the advantage of more than 700 million active users, WeChat will be a strong newcomer to affect and even change the mobile app distribution market."

Morningstar's senior equity analyst Marie Sun thinks differently. She believes that Apple and Tencent are looking at two different markets.

She said, "The apps in WeChat will be more lightweight apps, and hence will not replace the need for app stores."

Feng Dahui, a former developer of health platform DXY, thinks that Tencent's new app will be a big help in the health sector and medical institutions because health care apps are too expensive.


Read more: http://en.yibada.com/articles/16393...-app-service-support-wechat.htm#ixzz4M03zoDYj

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## ahojunk

*Alipay’s New Feature Brings Help to You, Even on the Loo*

Alibaba’s payment app allows users to find each other for paid services.

Kevin Schoenmakers
Sixth Tone
Sep 30, 2016

Chinese tech giant Alibaba has launched a new program: a platform on which users can hire a helping hand, whether they need someone to repair their phone, repaint their house, or even grab them a roll of toilet paper in an emergency.

The program, called “Daowei,” initially started as an April Fools’ joke but launched officially on Thursday. It can be accessed through Alibaba’s mobile payment app Alipay, but for now it’s only available in Shanghai — it’s expected to roll out to more cities soon.

Daowei, meaning both “to be in position” and “to be adequate,” opens to a split screen that reads: “I help others, others help me.” When a user clicks through, they’ll see a map showing others nearby who are offering services. Services can be filtered into groups such as tutors, photographers, handymen, and “running legs” — people who will run errands for a fee.






_*Screenshots from ‘Daowei’ show the split screen (left) and a map with nearby users (right).*_


Alipay revealed the concept for Daowei in an April Fools’ Day video in 2015. The video marketed a program capable of catering to even the most over-the-top needs, such as craving a comforting hug or wanting someone to fetch you some toilet paper when your stall has run out.

Liu Yang, a public relations officer at Alipay, told Sixth Tone that even though Daowei was a joke then, the company later realized the idea actually had potential. A team started working on the project in early 2016. 

The Daowei project fits into Alipay’s mission to become a “one-stop” app for all everyday needs, Liu said. The app already allows users to order food, play games, pay bills, call taxis, and more.

Daowei is only available to users whose Sesame Credit score exceeds a set level. Alipay’s Sesame Credit system is based not only on credit history, but also behavioral preferences, social connections, and other data gathered and analyzed by Alipay.

A user’s Sesame score can range from 350 to 950, and only those whose score is above 650 — rated as “excellent” — are eligible to offer services on Daowei, while requesting services will be available to users whose score is above 600 — or “good.”

Liu explained these conditions are necessary because Daowei doesn’t mask users’ real identities. The app shares Sesame Credit score data beforehand, allowing users to judge whether the other person is reliable before they proceed with a transaction. He also said Alipay will invite professionals to offer services on Daowei.

Users on microblog platform Weibo were excited. “I can’t wait to go to Shanghai to try it out,” wrote one user. “In the era of the sharing economy, Chinese apps are so great,” wrote another.

Though Liu said people offering drugs or sex will be banned from Daowei, many net users mocked the program, calling it a new dating tool. Alipay’s rival, messaging and payment app WeChat, has a feature that allows users to find people in their area to chat with, which is often used for dating. “Alipay has become the newest hook-up weapon,” said one user.

_Additional reporting by Dong Heng._

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## ahojunk

Alipay to offer payment services in overseas airports
Xinhua, September 28, 2016

In some overseas airports, Chinese travelers will now be able to pay their bills via Apps on their smart phones instead of using foreign money, said payment platform Alipay.

In a news conference held earlier this week, Alipay said that it had struck deals with ten high-profile airports across the world in its "Airport of the Future" program in an effort to offer convenience to Alipay users.

The international airports are in Germany, Singapore, Japan, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Thailand as well as China's Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macao.

Nine of the airports will start accepting Alipay from the beginning of October, the start of "Golden Week" when most Chinese have a week-long national holiday. The Singaporean airport will start the business at the end of this year.

Travelers will not only be able to pay for their purchases using Alipay, but can also find local shopping and dining information about merchants partnered with Alipay.

Services such as indoor navigation, wi-fi connection, hotel reservation and flight reminders via the Alipay app will also be provided.

"Alipay is built into the daily lives of over 450 million users when they are in China, and we want to replicate the experience for them when they travel abroad," said Douglas Feagin, Senior Vice President of Ant Financial, which owns Alipay. "Airports are travelers' first stop and by working with the world's most popular airports, we are providing our users with payment and location-based information to make their visits to a foreign city more comfortable."

Alipay said it would not stop at ten airports and hoped that its service would reach 30 airports in the future.

Alipay is one of the country's biggest online payment platforms. It has already expanded to several markets such as the United States, the Republic of Korea and the United Kingdom.

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## endyashainin

http://nextshark.com/china-tests-fastest-mobile-internet-5g/

*China is Testing the Fastest Mobile Internet The World Has Ever Seen*
October 5, 2016

*China has started running trials for 5G internet connection technology. The country is set to distribute equipment across 100 cities in 20 provinces, with more planned.*

The quest for 5G mobile internet connectivity is an ongoing rat race. Estonia, Japan, South Korea, Sweden, Turkey and the United States are contenders, and China hopes to take the lead in its recent attempt.

For those new to the concept, 5G is a wireless connection built to keep up with the plethora of mobile devices that harness the world wide web. “Mobile” does not only refer to smartphones and tablets, but it’s also those appliances, cars and wearables that remind us the future is now.

5G is officially named IMT-2020. With speeds of up to 20 Gbps, it’s technically 20 times faster than today’s 4G tech, letting you download a 25-GB, ultra-HD movie in about 10 seconds.

According to South China Morning Post, China has the world’s largest 4G market, with 30% of 1.3 billion mobile phone users at the end of 2015. This puts the country in a good position to conduct trials. The technologies being tested reportedly include massive multiple-antenna systems.

Chris Lane, senior analyst at Bernstein Research, said:

*“We believe ‘China Inc’ has a strong vested interest in ensuring a significant amount of Chinese technology is embedded in the [5G] standard – finally freeing them of their dependency on foreign technology and the need to pay royalties.”*


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## bobsm

*Asia’s ecommerce spending to hit record $1 trillion this year – but most of that is China*

Steven Millward12:53 PM at Aug 18, 2016
While booming ecommerce uptake in India and Southeast Asia is helping push the tally upwards, China’s much more developed online retail market makes up for the vast majority of that US$1 trillion – *US$899 billion of it, to be precise.*

China is already the world’s biggest ecommerce market, ahead of the US. China’s keen web shoppers accounted for 42.8 percent of worldwide ecommerce spending in 2015, says Emarketer; and that will rise to a projected 47 percent this year.






Asia’s ecommerce appetite, being the fastest growing region in the world, is expected to rocket to US$2.7 trillion by 2020.

“Expanding middle classes, greater mobile and internet penetration, growing competition of ecommerce players and improving logistics and infrastructure will all help to fuel ecommerce growth in the region,” says the Emarketer report.

*China retail spend eclipses US*
China will hit a major milestone this year as its total retail market – both online and offline shopping – will surpass the US for the first time.

*China’s retail spending is set to hit US$4.9 trillion, compared with US$4.8 trillion in the US, according to Emarketer’s analysts.*






Total retail sales across Asia – US$9 trillion this year – account for 20.8 percent of the global purse. “Burgeoning consumer economies in China, India and Indonesia will drive retail sales over the next four years as disposable incomes in those countries continue to rise,” concludes the report.


https://www.techinasia.com/asia-ecommerce-spending-1-trillion-dollars-2016

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## ahojunk

4-day conference themed on "Apsara and Evolution" opens in Hangzhou
Source: Xinhua | 2016-10-13 20:54:41 | Editor: Mengjie






Jack Ma, founder and chairman of China's e-commerce giant Alibaba, makes a speech on 2016 Hangzhou YunQi Conference in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, Oct. 13, 2016. The four-day conference themed on "Apsara and Evolution" kicked off here on Thursday. (Xinhua/Huang Zongzhi)






A girl tries a payment system basing on face-recognition technology at the venue of 2016 Hangzhou YunQi Conference in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, Oct. 13, 2016. The four-day conference themed on "Apsara and Evolution" kicked off here on Thursday. (Xinhua/Huang Zongzhi)






A visitor tries a coffee purchase process basing on biological recognition technology at the venue of 2016 Hangzhou YunQi Conference in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, Oct. 13, 2016. The four-day conference themed on "Apsara and Evolution" kicked off here on Thursday. (Xinhua/Huang Zongzhi)






Visitors try a VR shopping system at the venue of 2016 Hangzhou YunQi Conference in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, Oct. 13, 2016. The four-day conference themed on "Apsara and Evolution" kicked off here on Thursday. (Xinhua/Huang Zongzhi)

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## ahojunk

*Officials, specialists to meet at annual World Internet Conference*
2016-10-12 13:30 | chinadaily.com.cn | _Editor: Feng Shuang_

Internet officials, specialists and activists from home and abroad will get together at an annual world internet conference in China next month, an official from the country's top internet watchdog said on Wednesday.

The *Third World Internet Conference is to once again be held in Wuzhen*, an ancient town in the eastern province of Zhejiang, from Nov 16 to 18, Ren Xianliang, deputy head of the Cyberspace Administration of China, announced during a news conference.

So far, the conference organizer has sent out* invitations to more than 1,200 guests* worldwide, including government representatives from countries and international associations, internet or technology tycoons and network professionals, according to a statement by the administration.

It said that several well-known internet enterprises have confirmed their attendance at the conference, such as Baidu, China's largest online search engine; Alibaba, Chinese largest e-commerce service; and Sina Weibo, China's most popular Twitter-like platform.

The theme of this year's conference will be "*Innovation-Driven Internet Development for the Benefit of All* — *Building a Community of Common Future in Cyberspace*", it said.

Meanwhile, the conference will hold forums on topical issues, such as mobile internet, big data, law-based internet governance and anti-terrorism online, it said.

In addition, advanced technology and network products and services will be shown and issued at the conference, it added.

In Wuzhen, which is hosting the conference for the second consecutive year, free WiFi and other network-related services will be provided for all participants, it said.

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## ahojunk

*Baidu sets up 20-bln yuan fund to finance Internet projects*
2016-10-12 15:57 | Xinhua | _Editor: Xu Shanshan_

Chinese Internet giant decided to set up a new fund to invest in start-ups in their mid-and-late development stages, a company announced Wednesday.

The private-equity-style fund, Baidu Capital, will allocate about 20 billion yuan (2.98 billion U.S.dollars) in its first round of investment, extending about 50 million U.S.dollars to 100 million dollars for each project.

Baidu Capital, chaired by CEO Robin Li, will be operated independently and will invest in projects related to Baidu's industrial chain as well as projects in other Internet sectors.

The world's largest Chinese search engine announced it would establish a venture capital firm called Baidu Venture in September to focus on investing in early-stage projects in artificial intelligence, augmented reality, virtual reality and other innovative fields.

With funding to cover the whole developmental stages of start-ups, Baidu joined the growing trend for Internet companies like Tencent and Alibaba and established funds to expand and improve their business.

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## ahojunk

China promotes e-commerce in rural areas
(Xinhua) 19:57, October 17, 2016


BEIJING, Oct. 17 (Xinhua) -- To boost rural development, China will push for faster growth of the e-commerce sector across its vast under-developed areas.

"*Policy support will be given to small online retailers ... to lower their operational costs*," the Ministry of Commerce announced Monday.

More will be done to support and nurture e-commerce businesses operating in rural regions, and *training programs* will be on offer to small business owners, according to guidance advice posted on the ministry's website.

Cooperation between e-commerce businesses and service providers that deal with rural consumers will be encouraged, infrastructure that supports or facilitates e-commerce in rural areas will be upgraded, and private investors will be encouraged to support the sector, it noted.

The document came as retail sales emerged as a major driver of China's economic growth. The country is transitioning from an export-reliant economy to a consumption-driven one. In 2015, consumption contributed 66.4 percent to China's gross domestic product (GDP), up 15.4 percentage points from 2014.

To further tap market potential, China is looking to exploit the ample retail opportunities in its underdeveloped rural areas and e-commerce sector.

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## TaiShang

*Big data guides poverty alleviation efforts in China*
By Yuan Can (People's Daily Online) October 18, 2016








Map of Living Standards across China (Photo provided by UNDP)

Dynamic statistics that come courtesy of big data to measure poverty in China have been playing an increasingly significant role in targeted poverty reduction in the country, according to a report released on Oct. 17.

* Put out in cooperation with Baidu, China’s largest search engine, the report highlights a measure called the Living Standard Dimension of the Human Development Index, which addresses the complex nature of poverty by selecting eight indicators to evaluate the provision of services in China’s 2,284 counties.*

The report, entitled “The Living Standards Dimension of the Human Development Index: Measuring Poverty with Big Data in China,” was jointly assembled by Baidu and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), with the goal of assisting governments in their decision-making, according to UNDP.

“Big data provides an alternative tool for tackling development challenges, which, however, does not go without constraints. The real-time and dynamic nature of data inevitably leads to potential margin of error. This report touches on some of the weaknesses of using big data, but hopes to illustrate that, despite its limitations, it serves to complement the traditional household surveys that feed the national database,” said Patrick Haverman, deputy country director of UNDP in China.

* The eight indicators used to analyze poverty in China include: access to water, access to sanitary toilets, access to indoor kitchens, access to living services, access to financial services, access to roads, mobile Internet coverage and nighttime light density.*

The Living Standards lndex serves to support income-based measures of poverty, and will hopefully become a supplementary tool to assist policymakers, UNDP said at the press conference. The index ranks eastern China’s Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces in first and second place respectively, followed by Beijing and Shanghai.

In general, the report demonstrates that 19 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions rank above average, including 11 provinces and municipalities from China’s eastern coast and eight from the country’s center. Provinces and autonomous regions in the western part of China all rank below the national average.






National poor counties ranked by Living Standards Index (Photo provided by UNDP)

China has adopted the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including the agenda’s 17 sustainable development goals, which aim to end poverty in all forms by 2030.

China is striving to intensify its poverty reduction efforts and eliminate poverty within its borders by 2020, just before the centennial anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China.

* According to a government paper titled "China's Progress in Poverty Reduction and Human Rights," issued on Oct. 17, China still had 55.75 million people living in poverty at the end of 2015, equivalent to the entire population of a medium-sized country.*

The data collected from the report will be available in the form of an interactive map by the end of October. The map will allow users to zoom in on particular provinces to see how they are doing across all eight indicators, as well to pick one indicator and see its strengths and weaknesses across the country.

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## TaiShang

*China's Weibo overtakes Twitter in market cap *
Xinhua, October 19, 2016




The logo of Sina Weibo is seen in the photo. [File photo]

Chinese social media giant Sina Weibo overtook its U.S. counterpart Twitter in market capitalization for the first time ever during trading on Monday.

*Nasdaq-listed Sina Weibo saw its market value rise to about 11.32 billion U.S. dollars at one point during trading on Monday, while that for Twitter, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, stood at about 11.22 billion U.S. dollars at the same time.* It is the first time the Chinese microblog service has outperformed its U.S. counterpart in market cap,

Sina Weibo's share price closed at 52.91 U.S. dollars per share while that for Twitter stood at 16.73 U.S. dollars, with the former lagging behind the latter by about 600 million U.S. dollars at market close.

Financial reports for the second quarter of this year showed that Twitter raked in about 602 million U.S. dollars in Q2, more than quadruple that of Sina Weibo.

However, Sina Weibo showed stronger growth momentum in revenue and user growth. Twitter had about 313 million monthly active users by the end of Q2, up only three percent year on year, while Sina Weibo boasted 282 million monthly active users, surging 33 percent compared with Q2 2015.

Sina Weibo's share price is expected to reach 70 dollars in mid-2017, according to an estimate by international investment bank J.P. Morgan, thanks to its strong user and revenue growth.

***
_
A practical result of keeping the established US media companies out of the lucrative China market. You end up having national giants. The market was poised to be the largest in the world; the question was who would get the absolute chunk of it. While most other countries gracefully let US companies dominate their home turf, China became the bad boy and insisted on having its own innovation, creation, and employment -- as well as strategic control. This is such a basic understanding of absolute sovereignty, yet, little practiced. Heavens bless China's decision makers for seeing into the future several decades prior.
_
@AndrewJin , @Shotgunner51 , @Economic superpower , @cirr , @Chinese-Dragon , @DCS , @ahojunk _et al._

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## ahojunk

Twitter is still four times more profitable than Sina Weibo but the latter has better growth potential. Potential is just potential, until it becomes reality, it is still potential. There are a lot of hard work ahead. There is no free lunch.

My understanding is China did not keep out foreign companies. China asks the foreign companies to follow its laws if they want to operate in China such as locating servers for Chinese content in China, filtering contents, allowing the government access to requested data, etc. This is no different for companies operating in US or EU. These companies screamed "censorship" in China but that's a lame excuse.

However, for small countries with small markets, these big foreign companies will just ignore them. Is this double standards? Yes, indeed it is but that's the reality as there is nothing much they can do.

Some years ago, Google exit the China market rather than complying with its laws and some said that Google has lost to Baidu. Now, Google is trying hard to get back into the Chinese market but without much success. Google said they didn't exit the Chinese market because they maintain a small office, LOL. To be fair to Google, ten years ago the Chinese market was insignificant.

Another truth - it is impossible for any company to maintain its number one position if it does not have a reasonable market share in China, US and EU. That's why Google is trying to get back into China. I think it's too late as the horse has bolted.

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## ahojunk

*Internet economy driving IT sector's wealth*
2016-10-19 09:07 | China Daily | _Editor: Xu Shanshan_




The booming internet economy is playing an increasingly important role in supporting wealth growth in China's IT industry, according to a report released on Tuesday.

According to the annual Hurun IT Rich List,* the average wealth of the top 50 Chinese IT tycoons hit a record, surging 13 percent year-on-year to 26.9 billion yuan ($4 billion)*.

Jack Ma, founder and executive chairman of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd topped the ranking of China's richest IT people for the third consecutive year, defending his position against rivals including Tencent Holdings Ltd founder Pony Ma.

Jack Ma and his family's total wealth in IT industry was 195 billion yuan, followed by Pony Ma, whose wealth increased by 30 percent year-on-year to 134 billion yuan, according to the Shanghai-based Hurun Research Institute.

Due to the rapid growth of the online gaming sector, NetEase Inc founder Ding Lei doubled his wealth to 96 billion yuan, surpassing Baidu Inc Chairman Robin Li and ranking third in the IT rich list.

Hurun Chairman Rupert Hoogewerf said: "*Those entrepreneurs should be called 'super wealth creators'* instead of simply 'rich people', which could highlight their contribution to China's society and economy. *They've created such a lot of opportunities and jobs*."

"The recent technological explosion provides a better environment for those IT tycoons. In the last two to three years, several technologies have seen breakthroughs, including artificial intelligence, virtual reality and cloud technology. Some have already been integrated into our daily lives, while others will soon be implemented," said Zhao Ziming, an analyst at internet consultancy Analysys.

Compared with an average age of 45, 52-year-old Jack Ma is the oldest among the top 10 IT tycoons.

Among the top 50 IT tycoons, five were born in the 1980s, including 33-year-old Cheng Wei, chief executive officer of Beijing-based Didi Chuxing.


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## JSCh

*Walmart unveils new Chinese investment*
By Ding Yining | October 21, 2016, Friday 



Walmart CEO Doug McMillon announced a strategic investment in New Dada with Philip Kuai, CEO of New Dada. 

WAL-MART Stores Inc said today it will invest US$50 million in Chinese online grocery and delivery crowdsourcing platform New Dada as the retailer seeks to expand its tie-up with local online players as consumers are shifting focus towards online retailers.

Walmart earlier this year sold its subsidiary, Shanghai-based online retailer Yihaodian, in exchange for a minority stake in JD.com.

The investment in New Dada, which is part-owned by JD.com, would also deepen the collaboration between the US retailer and JD.

"We look forward to deepening our cooperation with Walmart as China’s O2O retail industry continues to evolve and grow," said Philip Kuai, CEO of New Dada.

Dada's application, which provides on-demand logistics and grocery delivery, boasts more than 25 million registered customers with 2.5 million crowd-sourced deliverers across more than 300 cities in China.

The announcement came after Walmart said it would launch an exclusive Sam’s Club and Global Imports stores on JD.com, as well as two-hour grocery delivery for orders placed on JD dispatched by New Dada.

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## TaiShang

*Alibaba posts strong revenue growth in 2nd fiscal quarter*
(Xinhua) November 03, 2016


HANGZHOU, Nov. 2 -- China's e-commerce powerhouse Alibaba posted robust revenue growth for its second fiscal quarter ending Sept. 30, according to results announced on Wednesday night.

*The group's revenue growth rose 55 percent year on year to about 34.3 billion yuan (5 billion U.S. dollars) in the quarter, exceeding market expectations.*

Revenue from its core operations of e-commerce increased 41 percent year on year to about 28.5 billion yuan, while those of other reporting segments such as cloud computing, digital media and innovative initiatives all posted impressive performances.

"We expect each of these businesses to drive long-term value for both our customers and shareholders," said Maggie Wu, Alibaba's chief financial officer.

But the company's net income slipped about 69 percent year on year to 7.075 billion yuan in the quarter.

Alibaba's share price in pre-market trading in the United States rose more than 3 percent to 104 dollars after the results were announced.

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## JSCh

* Baidu, China Unicom partner to promote artificial intelligence*
Source: Xinhua 2016-11-03 15:04:01

BEIJING, Nov. 3 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Internet giant Baidu inked a strategic partnership with leading telecom company China Unicom on Wednesday with the aim of applying artificial intelligence (AI) and other leading technologies to future products and services.

The two companies will leverage their expertise and advantages in online and offline services to cooperate on projects in mobile Internet, AI, big data and telecom services.

Baidu will help China Unicom put the services of more than 10,000 brick-and-mortar outlets and 300,000 franchised stores online. China Unicom will offer Baidu stronger telecom infrastructure support such as Internet data centers and information and communication technology.

Robin Li, Baidu board chairman and CEO, said his company already cooperates closely in linking mobile search, mapping and group buying services with China Unicom's services, and Baidu is looking forward to impressive results from AI technology.

Wang Xiaochu, board chairman of China Unicom, called the move an important step for cross-sector cooperation between Internet companies and telecom firms in line with the government's "Internet Plus" proposal to upgrade traditional sectors with IT technology.

The latest quarterly financial statements showed that Baidu had steady profit growth in the third quarter while China Unicom suffered a heavy drop in profit growth year on year in the first three quarters, which put more pressure on the company to upgrade its products and services.

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## TaiShang

JSCh said:


> * Baidu, China Unicom partner to promote artificial intelligence*
> Source: Xinhua 2016-11-03 15:04:01
> 
> BEIJING, Nov. 3 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Internet giant Baidu inked a strategic partnership with leading telecom company China Unicom on Wednesday with the aim of applying artificial intelligence (AI) and other leading technologies to future products and services.
> 
> The two companies will leverage their expertise and advantages in online and offline services to cooperate on projects in mobile Internet, AI, big data and telecom services.
> 
> Baidu will help China Unicom put the services of more than 10,000 brick-and-mortar outlets and 300,000 franchised stores online. China Unicom will offer Baidu stronger telecom infrastructure support such as Internet data centers and information and communication technology.
> 
> Robin Li, Baidu board chairman and CEO, said his company already cooperates closely in linking mobile search, mapping and group buying services with China Unicom's services, and Baidu is looking forward to impressive results from AI technology.
> 
> Wang Xiaochu, board chairman of China Unicom, called the move an important step for cross-sector cooperation between Internet companies and telecom firms in line with the government's "Internet Plus" proposal to upgrade traditional sectors with IT technology.
> 
> The latest quarterly financial statements showed that Baidu had steady profit growth in the third quarter while China Unicom suffered a heavy drop in profit growth year on year in the first three quarters, which put more pressure on the company to upgrade its products and services.



China Unicom 

The provider I use when in Mainland.

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## grey boy 2

TaiShang said:


> China Unicom
> 
> The provider I use when in Mainland.



Same here when i'm back to HK bro

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## TaiShang

grey boy 2 said:


> Same here when i'm back to HK bro





I feel they are more accessible with more service centers although they may be smaller than China Mobile in terms of coverage etc.

Same reason, I use 台湾大哥大 in Taiwan, instead of the larger 中華電信.

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## AndrewJin

TaiShang said:


> I feel they are more accessible with more service centers although they may be smaller than China Mobile in terms of coverage etc.
> 
> Same reason, I use 台湾大哥大 in Taiwan, instead of the larger 中華電信.
> 
> View attachment 348772
> 
> View attachment 348773


Very few people use Unicom in mainland because their 4G signal is not very good. Though all three companies have national coverage of 4G.

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## TaiShang

AndrewJin said:


> Very few people use Unicom in mainland because their 4G signal is not very good. Though all three companies have national coverage of 4G.



I noticed that. I just purchased their prepaid service. Minimum charge per month.


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## ahojunk

*China adopts law on cybersecurity*
2016-11-07 12:47 | Xinhua | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_


China's top legislature on Monday adopted a Cybersecurity Law to safeguard sovereignty on cyber space, national security and the rights of citizens.

The government will take measures to "*monitor, defend and handle cybersecurity risks and threats originating from within the country or overseas sources, protecting key information infrastructure from attack,intrusion, disturbance and damage*," the law reads.

Efforts will also be made to punish criminal activities online and safeguard the order and security of cyberspace.

Individual users and organizations are not allowed to jeopardize security on the Internet or use it to "damage national security, honor and interests," according to the provisions.

Online activities that are attempts to overthrow the socialist system, split the nation, undermine national unity, advocate terrorism and extremism are all prohibited, according to the provisions, which also forbade activities including inciting ethnic hatred, discrimination and spreading violence and obscene information online.

The law was passed at the bimonthly session of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, which concluded Monday, after a third reading.


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## 艹艹艹

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-37932751
*Singles Day: How China's Alibaba wants to change shopping*

9 hours ago
From the sectionChina
Share





Image copyrightALIBABA
Image captionAlibaba customers could use virtual reality to shop
Chinese internet conglomerate Alibaba singlehandedly created the world's biggest online shopping event known as Singles Day. Now it's looking to change how people shop, but this is not without its challenges, reports the BBC's Tessa Wong.

Every year on 11 November, millions in China and across Asia engage in a massive shopping spree online. Many visit Tmall and Taobao - Alibaba's answers to Amazon.

Traditionally customers do their shopping on their websites and mobile apps. But this year Alibaba appears to be piloting several new concepts aimed at changing the way people shop.

*Virtual reality*





Out of media player. Press enter to return or tab to continue.

Media captionHow did a made-up festival in China turn into such a sales bonanza?
One highlight is the Buy+ virtual reality (VR) experience.

Customers either use a VR headset or buy a 1-yuan (12p, $0.15) cardboard frame - similar to Google Cardboard - to slot in their smartphones and explore virtual replicas of stores such as Macy's and Costco.

Those with headsets can "walk" around the shop, "pick up" items to examine them virtually, and make instant purchases by staring at floating buttons.





Image copyrightALIBABA
Image captionShoppers with VR headsets can examine items, pull up information and purchase goods instantly
Observers say VR shopping could take off as it gives online shoppers a more immersive experience - and Alibaba is the first to do it in a big way.

"If brands could do it themselves, it would encroach on Alibaba's eco-system. So this way the company is pre-empting that and building their own VR mall to keep these brands in their eco-system," says Jack Chuang of OC&C Strategy Consultants.

But there is one big problem - the lack of affordable hardware. Not everyone can afford expensive headsets, and smartphones, while widely used, offer a limited and sub-par VR experience.

*Augmented reality and gamification*
Like in previous years, Alibaba has been holding online contests and giveaways of vouchers known as "red packets" in the lead-up to 11 November.

This year it's also using augmented reality - the same technology behind the hugely popular game Pokemon Go.





Image copyrightALIBABA
Image captionLike Pokemon Go, the Tmall game has a virtual map that players can explore
Using agame within the Tmall app, shoppers "capture" Tmall's cat mascot at participating shops and restaurants to unlock and win "red packets".





Image copyrightALIBABA
Image captionUsers have to tap on their phones to capture Tmall's cat mascot
Gamifying shopping, where customers have to make repeat visits to win rewards, helps to "lock" customers into particular retailers, says Andrew Milroy of Frost and Sullivan.

"Pokemon Go has done a lot to accelerate the acceptance of augmented reality and gamification. Both will do well and can be expected to be widely used by online retailers over the next few years."

But shoppers may soon grow tired of the novelty factor. Mr Chuang points to the steep drop-off of players of Pokemon Go several months after its launch, and says businesses will have to figure out how to use augmented reality in more complex ways.

*First mover advantage*
Alibaba has also madelivestreaming introductionsto foreign retailers for Chinese consumers, and held an"interactive television"event with its lavish countdown show on Thursday night featuring celebrities like Kobe Bryant and OneRepublic.

Observers say such attempts to innovate show Alibaba is intent on getting first mover advantage, and these new ways of shopping are likely to take off in Asia first, where the company is aggressively expanding.

"Asian countries like China, Japan, South Korea have more experience leapfrogging technology and their consumers are more willing to adopt these new technologies. But there's nothing to stop them from spreading to other countries as well," says Mr Chuang.

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## ahojunk

*Tencent pilots smart ID cards*
2016-11-11 09:00 | China Daily | _Editor: Feng Shuang_

More than 900 people in the southwestern city of Nanning have obtained a smart ID card as part of a pilot for the new technology.

People have been able to apply for a digital version of their identity card since last week, when internet giant Tencent and the city's public security bureau announced a strategic partnership to accelerate digitization of urban management.

From next month, the smart ID card will be accepted for household registration applications, according to authorities in Nanning, capital of the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region. After that, the pilot could be expanded to include opening bank accounts, booking train tickets or applying for a driver's license.

The service is available through the bureau's smartphone app or its account on WeChat, Tencent's messaging app. Users need to send a photo of their ID card and a selfie for authentication, and in return they receive a QR code, which acts as their smart ID.

"To avoid fraudulent use of the QR code, the code is designed to change every 24 hours," according the head the public security bureau's technology department, surnamed Li.

Tencent has also assured that its facial recognition technology will keep users' personal data safe.

"It's pretty cool to have an ID like this," said Zhang Jie, a 23-year-old university student in the city. "Most people carry a phone with them all day. We can now pay through WeChat, so why not use it as an ID card."

Li said the digital service reduces the risk of residents losing their physical cards, which can be inconvenient.

"With just a quick scan, people can save a lot of time spent searching their pockets," he said.

"But their use still remains a challenge as there's no legal reference yet. It's expected to be first used for household registration, but in the not too distant future, it will no doubt expand to hotel check-ins and security checks."

The ID system is the tip of the iceberg of digital development in China.

The Nanning government has previously worked with WeChat on a wide range of other projects, including emergency and immigration services.

Tencent has also worked with the government in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, to promote a smart driver's license and has said its ambition is to extend its Internet Plus services to 24 provinces and cities through strategic partnerships.


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## 艹艹艹

*How the internet is changing our everyday lives*

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## AndrewJin

VR shopping is the next trend.

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## TaiShang

*Baidu maps out global expansion*
China Daily, November 29, 2016 




A Chinese visitor buys Santa Claus gifts in Rovaniemi, Finland. Baidu Map is expanding into Nordic countries to help Chinese travelers. [Photo/Xinhua]

Baidu Map, a desktop and mobile map service provided by China's online search giant Baidu Inc, is set to become a world mapping service provider covering more than 150 countries and regions.

*On Wednesday, the company will launch its map services for more countries and regions. The new map services will cover countries in Asia, Europe, Africa, North America, South America and Oceania, and provide services for 99 percent of the world population.*

"This signals that we will finally transform from a Chinese map provider to a world map provider and become the Chinese brand that provides global services for mobile travel applications," said Li Dongmin, general manager of Baidu Map.

Currently, Baidu Map claims that it accounts for about 70 percent of domestic market share, with more than 300 million active monthly users and about 100 million car owners using its mapping service, according to the company.

At the beginning of the year, Baidu Map initiated its internationalization strategies and has been expanding rapidly globally.

*On Monday, Baidu Map started strategic cooperation with the tourist administrations of four northern European countries－Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The two sides will exchange data, share resources, and jointly develop more events to improve the traveling experiences of Chinese visitors.*

"The cooperation signals a further step forward in the localization of Baidu Map in the course of its internationalization, following our cooperation with the tourist administrations of South Korea and Thailand," Li said.

In the first half of 2016, Chinese people made 59.03 million trips abroad, up 4.3 percent year-on-year, according to the China National Tourism Administration.

Baidu Map said it has covered 25 percent of Chinese outbound tourists, and, by 2020, it aims that overseas users will account for half of its total users.

"We will strengthen in-depth cooperation with overseas governments and leading enterprises and choose some key countries to provide mapping services in local languages and increase our local impact," Li said.

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## ahojunk

*Alibaba’s YunOS to overtake Apple’s iOS as China’s 2nd-biggest smartphone operating system*
Bien Perez
Monday, 28 Nov 2016 | 12:44 AM ET







YunOS, the mobile operating system developed by Alibaba Group, is on track to corner a 14 per cent share of smartphone shipments in mainland China by the end of this year, pulling ahead of Apple's iOS to become the second-largest operating system for that device in the market, according to analysts.

The forecasts would confirm Alibaba's claim earlier this year that YunOS had initially passed iOS on the mainland in the three months ended March 31.

Despite the strong strides made by the Alibaba platform, Bernstein senior analyst Mark Li told the _South China Morning Post _that growth prospects for YunOS outside of its home market would likely be limited to "cheap or subsidized smartphones".

According to research firm Strategy Analytics, Alibaba-backed Meizu, XiaoLaJiao and Doov are the top YunOS smartphone suppliers.

It estimated the total shipments of YunOS-powered smartphones this year will top 100 million units, echoing the earlier projection made by e-commerce giant Alibaba.

New York-listed Alibaba, which owns the _Post_, has also adapted YunOS to work as an operating system for television set-top boxes, smart home appliances, tablets, internet-connected smart TVs, smart cars and even SoftBank Group's humanoid robot called "Pepper".

At Alibaba's cloud computing conference last month in Hangzhou, YunOS product director Aiden Yong said: "We want YunOS to be the 'go-to' operating system for China's smart industry."

Tsinghua Unigroup semiconductor affiliates Spreadtrum Communications and RDA Microelectronic last month jointly launched with Alibaba's YunOS business unit a new chip platform for hardware manufacturers to create innovative products for the so-called Internet of Things market of smart, connected devices.

In a report on Friday, Bernstein pointed out that the key motivation for hardware manufacturers to adopt YunOS are the subsidies from Alibaba.

Set-top box makers on the mainland, for example, reportedly receive from 20 to 60 yuan per box as a subsidy to encourage the adoption of YunOS.

Li said that figure may sound insignificant, but it is meaningful when put in the context of "the razor-thin margins of these hardware vendors", especially the smaller manufacturers.

The low price afforded by YunOS smartphones has made these devices gain most of their users across the mainland's lower tier cities.

Data from Sino Market Research and Bernstein showed that 54 per cent of YunOS adoption last year was found in tier-4 or smaller cities in the country, compared with 9 per cent in the tier-1 cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.

The smartphones and other devices that run YunOS serve as the conduit through which Alibaba reaches users, as well as learn more about their preferences and behaviour, according to Li.

He said that deeper understanding enables Alibaba to better provide the various online services, content and advertising under its vast ecosystem.

YunOS, an operating system built from the free Linux software, made its debut on July 2011 with the Tianyu K-Touch W700 smartphone, but struggled to find strong handset partners due to the popularity of Android devices. That prompted Alibaba to acquire a US$590 million minority stake in Meizu last year to help ramp up YunOS adoption.

"For China, YunOS addresses the concern that the majority of smartphones in the nation run on an operating system that is ultimately led by a foreign company, Google," Li said.

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## ahojunk

*Alibaba restructures e-commerce business to get ready for 'new retail'*
2016-12-03 11:17 | China Daily | _Editor: Wang Fan
_

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd announced on Friday its plan to restructure its e-commerce business in an effort to get ready for *the era of data-driven new retail*.

Daniel Zhang, chief executive officer of Alibaba Group, said that the company's business-to-customer site Tmall will be merged with its digital marketing unit Juhuasuan.

The decision aims to bring synergy among the company's business, marketing and operation units and explore all kinds of opportunities to *digitalize existing businesses and make new businesses out of data*, a move intended to better empower retailers.

Zhang made the announcement in an internal memo that was later made public on Friday. "We need to unify the service strategies for our customers and make sure the entire retail group can coordinate and act smoothly like one person," he said.

China's biggest e-commerce player earlier announced its plan of re-positioning itself as a service provider to build digital and physical infrastructure for the future of commerce.

"With e-commerce itself rapidly becoming a traditional business, pure e-commerce players will soon face tremendous challenges," Jack Ma, executive chairman of Alibaba Group, said in mid October.

"This is why we are adapting and it's why we strive to play a major role in the advancement of this new economic environment," Ma added.

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## ahojunk

*How big data reveal your behavior*

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## JSCh

*Incentives for younger people to think trash*
By Hu Min | December 13, 2016





PEOPLE can now use Alipay to collect points for gifts by dumping their rubbish in the right bins.

The incentive comes after Shanghai’s greenery authorities teamed up with Alipay in the latest drive to spur interest in garbage sorting among young people, officials said yesterday.

The points collected can be exchanged for various coupons on Tmall supermarkets and businesses, the Shanghai Greenery and Public Sanitation Bureau said.

The list of the first batch of businesses will be announced next month, it said.

Green account holders earn points by dumping dry and wet garbage into different bins in Shanghai’s “green account” scheme. They can redeem the points for milk, soup, toothpaste, phonecards and tickets to tourist attractions — or use them to pay their utility bills.

Volunteers work in neighborhoods to help people to sort their garbage. They also issue the reward points.

Now citizens can redeem the points via an Alipay app on their mobile phones, rather than doing so in person, according to the bureau.

The gifts distributed by the neighborhood committees will also be expanded to virtual coupons. These are considered to be more convenient and attractive for young people, the bureau said.

“The measure aims to attract more young people to join in the city’s garbage sorting efforts, which proved to be more popular among middle-aged and seniors residents now,” said Qi Yumei, deputy director of the sanitation management department of the bureau.

“Green account has been promoted for more than three years, and has raised people’s awareness on garbage sorting, but the incentives are still limited,” said Qi.

Before gifts were not attractive to youngsters, and could not be redeemed immediately, which also affected enthusiasm, she said.

By cooperating with the online payment platform, the points can be redeemed more quickly with a bigger scope of gifts covered, she added.

To date, more than 2 million households in Shanghai are included in the scheme, with more than 900,000 added this year. The target is 5 million households by 2020.

The amount of domestic garbage being treated per day in Shanghai was estimated at 16,435 tons last year, compared with 18,902 tons in 2011.

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## JSCh

*South Korea Approves Alibaba Affiliate-Backed Internet Bank - Caixin*
By Coco Feng

(Beijing) — A group that includes Alibaba's Ant Financial Services Group affiliate has won permission to open South Korea's first online bank, marking an important overseas move into a market that hadn't approved a new lender in 24 years.

The new K-Bank, which will provide services without brick-and-mortar branches, will begin operating in January or February, South Korea's banking regulator, the Financial Services Commission, said in a statement on Wednesday.

Ant Financial, whose main asset is the Alipay electronic payments service, is among about 20 shareholders that will back K-Bank. The consortium is led by leading local telephone company KT Corp., and also includes local partners Woori Bank and Hanwha Life Insurance.

A second online lender, Kakao Bank, has obtained preliminary approval to open a similar bank in South Korea, and is preparing for a final review. The group behind that bank is led by Kakao Corp., operator of South Korea's leading messaging app, and includes Chinese internet giant Tencent Holdings Ltd.

South Korea had last issued new banking licenses in 1992. The country started to ease restrictions on the sector last year with a goal of facilitating convenience, bringing in competition and innovation, and expanding globally.

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and Tencent are China's largest internet companies, and have become two of the most aggressive as Beijing opens up the financial services sector to private investment. Alipay was originally part of Alibaba, but was later spun off as Ant Financial's primary asset due to restrictions on foreign ownership.

China's financial services sector was traditionally dominated by big state-run banks, and only a handful of the largest players ever ventured overseas. A new generation of private firms has been far more aggressive and quickly expanded at home.

Ant is one of the few to venture abroad so far, moving into markets where it mostly targets Chinese travelers. It currently has about 400 million users, and is eying an IPO in Hong Kong or the Chinese mainland as soon as next year.

Most of Tencent's payment services are still confined to China, and are connected to its popular QQ and WeChat social networking platforms.

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## 艹艹艹

https://www.chinainternetwatch.com/19415/wearable-devices-2016/

*Wearable devices reached 47% penetration in China in 2016*
December 19, 2016ByCIW TeamLeave a Comment

The penetration rate of wearable device in China increased to 47% in 2016 from 32% in 2015, closing in on that of tablets.


















Smart watches (49%) are the most popular wearable devices in China to be purchased by Chinese consumers in the next 12 months, followed by smart bands. Consumers between 25 years old and 44 y-o are the main target age group for buying smart watches in China, accounting for 65%.

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## 艹艹艹

*China retail consumer goods market overview Nov 2016*

December 15, 2016ByCIW TeamLeave a Comment





The total retail sales of consumer goods in China reached 3,095.9 billion yuan (US$448.36 billion) in November 2016, up by 10.8% YoY according to National Bureau of Statistics of China.






Of the total, China’s retail sales of consumer goods of units above designated size was 1,479.2 billion yuan, increased by 9.5%.


From January to November in 2016, the total retail sales of consumer goods reached 30,056.0 billion yuan, up by 10.4% YoY. Of the total, the retail sales of consumer goods of units above designated size was13,720.3billion yuan, increased 7.9%.

Retail sales of consumer goods in China urban areas was 2,674.8 billion yuan in November 2016, up by 10.8% YoY; while that in rural areas was 421.0 billion yuan, up by 11.0% YoY. From January to November, the retail sales of consumer goods in urban areas was 25,858.1 billion yuan up by 10.3% YoY while that in rural areas was 4,197.8 billion yuan, up by 10.9% YoY.

China’s online retail sales of goods and services were 4,599.0 billion yuan, increased by 26.2% YoY. Of which, the online retail sales of physical goods was 3,747.0 billion yuan, increased 25.7%, accounting for 12.5% of the total retail sales of consumer goods. Of the online retail sales of physical goods, food, clothing and other commodities went up by 28.4%, 17.9%, and 28.8% respectively.

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## 艹艹艹

*Alibaba Double 12 promotion focuses on social commerce in 2016*

December 13, 2016ByCIW TeamLeave a Comment






One month afterAlibaba Double 11 online shopping festivalonSingles Dayin China, Alibaba launched Double 12 online shopping festival on its C2C websiteTaobao.

Alibaba’s Double 11 is more focused onTmallfor brands on Tmall while Dobule 12 is more towards social commerce for smaller merchants and individual sellers via blogs, live-streamed videos and other promotional content.

MobileTaobao has been developing new social commerce features within its mobile app, such as the hosting of special interest groups called Quanzi (circles) where like-minded individuals communicate. One of the most popular social functions on Mobile Taobao is a Q&A feature that enables shoppers to ask questions and get answers from the community.

*How Taobao Primes shoppers for Double 12 Promotion*
Taobao Headline, a news aggregator within the Mobile Taobao app with over 100 million MAUs, has been featuring a “topic of the day” to encourage users to tell personal stories.

More than 30 million consumers make purchasing decisions based on feedback offered from their peers on Taobao through Wendajia, Taobao Mobile app’s Q&A feature.

According to Taobao, video bloggers, retailers and others broadcast more than 20,000 live-stream video sessions in the lead-up to Double 12. A live broadcast hosted by fashion blogger Zhang Linchao, who has about 3 to 4 million followers onWeibo, on 6 December 2016, attracted more than one million viewers.







Double 12 promotion viaAlipayKoubei started on 10 December drives huge promotion in offline retail stores; over 1 million retailers have registered their participation this year. Shoppers can enjoy special discounts and offers if they make payment with Alipay.

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## 艹艹艹

*China* Mobile 4G subscriber base reaches 509 mn in Nov

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## TaiShang

long_ said:


>



This also corresponds perfectly well in the decline of the share of exports in China's national GDP.
*
Exports of goods and services (% of GDP)*






The share is still higher than that of the US, but the US consumption rests on debt; so, potentially unhealthy. In the meantime, Germany's export to GDP ratio is over 40%.

@Shotgunner51 , @AndrewJin , @Zsari

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## ahojunk

China moves to regulate e-commerce
(Xinhua) 17:21, December 19, 2016





_[File photo]_​
China's top legislature is deliberating a draft law that will regulate and facilitate booming e-commerce in the country.

The draft law was submitted for review by legislators at the bimonthly session of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, which runs from Monday to Sunday.

It is the first reading of the draft by the top legislature.

Explaining the draft to lawmakers on Monday morning, Lyu Zushan, deputy director with the NPC's Financial and Economic Affairs Committee, said booming e-commerce in recent years had served to reveal loopholes in China's legal system and commercial rules.

The draft law *will facilitate e-commerce growth, help maintain market order and protect consumer rights*.

The draft law said the nation should put online and offline commercial activities on an equal footing and protect the safety of e-commerce transactions.

All e-commerce operators have an obligation to pay taxes and should acquire the necessary business certificates, under the draft.

Operators must also ensure personal information security for consumers. Those that fail will face fines of up to 500,000 yuan and could have their business certificates revoked.

They must also work to protect intellectual property, the draft said.

The draft requires third-party e-commerce platforms to offer technical support for "law enforcement activities by relevant authorities."

*China is the world's largest e-commerce market*.

According to Lyu, *e-commerce trade amounted to over 20 trillion yuan (about 2.87 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2015, with online retail sales totaling 3.88 trillion yuan*.

Last month, Chinese e-commerce giant *Alibaba saw 120.7 billion yuan in gross merchandise volume during its 24-hour Singles' Day event*, an annual online shopping spree on November 11.

In addition, the draft law said China will work to facilitate cross-border online shopping and push forward exchange and communication on cross-border e-commerce with different countries and regions.

The Ministry of Commerce predicted the *volume of cross-border e-commerce in 2016 will reach 6.5 trillion yuan and will soon account for 20 percent of China's foreign trade*.

"Promoting e-commerce is conducive to China's opening-up strategic layout and the optimization and upgrading of its foreign trade," Lyu said. "It is also *conducive to building the Belt and Road Initiative and to implementation of the FTA (free trade area) strategy*."

China will *improve efficiency in customs clearance for cross-border online shopping*. It will also take part in formulating international rules on cross-border e-commerce, and work to set up dispute settlement mechanisms with countries and regions involved, the draft said.

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## TaiShang

*China's online sales of farm produce jump 46%*
Xinhua, December 20, 2016

Online retail volume of China's farm produce is expected to grow by about 50 percent in 2016 as more farmers use e-commerce platforms to sell their produce.

*Online produce sales might reach 220 billion yuan ($32 billion) this year, up over 46 percent over the previous year, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.*

Agricultural e-commerce has been developing fast in recent years, reaching 150 billion yuan in 2015, more than triple that of 2013.

The government started a pilot program in 2014 to digitalize agriculture and aims for internet cover in almost all villages by 2020.

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## TaiShang

*Payment services make global expansion push*
China Daily, December 26, 2016







When 33-year-old Shanghai resident Xu Lei walked into the Santa Claus Village tourism office in Rovaniemi, Finland, he was surprised to spot a sign with the Chinese word zhi.

That's the logo of Alipay, the fast-growing mobile payment service of China's e-commerce giant Alibaba.* It meant Xu could use the Alipay mobile app on his phone to scan a QR code provided by the tourism office to pay for his Arctic Circle visit certificate, just like he would do in China.*

"I was shocked, and felt that I now truly understood what a powerful and global organization Alipay is," Xu said.

*In Japan, Li Yiying, a 25-year-old Chinese woman traveling in Tokyo, also benefited from payment services provided by Chinese companies.*

"I often prefer to use Alipay or WeChat Pay (mobile payment provided by China's Tencent) instead of cash so I don't need to take a lot of paper money with me. It is also easier to keep track of transactions with the app," Li said.

From buying luxury bags to paying Uber bills, from convenience stores to theme parks, China's top wireless payment providers are tapping into the international market in the footsteps of globe-trotting and big-spending Chinese visitors.

Alipay has emerged a front-runner. Created in 2004 as a tool to facilitate transactions on Alibaba's Taobao e-commerce site, it is now accepted by more than 100,000 merchants overseas, according to a report from Ant Financial, the division of Alibaba that owns Alipay.

Ant Financial banks on its 450 million users in China as it rolls out business abroad. Alipay handled around half the estimated $738 billion Chinese spent online last year by offering an escrow service in collaboration with overseas partners such as banks, financial institutions and online payment providers, according to iResearch.

In Finland, Alipay is accepted by over 100 merchants, including hotels, shops and restaurants, through a partnership with local mobile payment firm ePassi. In Germany, its partnership with payment processing service Concardis gives it access to more than 200,000 local merchants.

Alipay also works with BNP Paribas, Barclays, Yusin Bank, SIX, Wirecard, Ingenico Group and other agencies in Europe, which helps it cover some 930,000 merchants in the continent.

In Japan, where Chinese tourists often buy expensive household electronics products, jewelry and cosmetics, Alipay is available at nearly 3,000 vendors.

To quench the thirst of wealthier Chinese buyers, Alipay was introduced to 10 major overseas airports across Germany, Japan and New Zealand in October. Departure tax refund services processed by Alipay are also available in 23 countries. It can be used to pay for Uber and Grab ride services in 70 countries.

Other domestic wireless payment provides like WeChat Pay and Baidu Wallet are also expanding overseas.

Tencent Holdings, a social networking giant, has allowed foreign stores since late 2015 to apply to be part of its WeChat payment system as long as they have a trading license and a website or an app. So far, the WeChat mobile system has been accepted in over 10 countries and regions.

Online search giant Baidu announced in September that it would join with Israeli startup Travelers Box to provide a convenient way for Chinese travelers to exchange their unused foreign money before returning home.

Travelers can choose to credit their Baidu Wallet accounts by depositing money at Travelers Box kiosks at airports in some of the most popular countries for Chinese tourists, including Japan, Italy and Canada.

The collaboration between Chinese and foreign companies is benefiting both sides. Shops that accept Chinese wireless payment systems, for example, see more Chinese customers.

But the ambitions of payment providers does not stop there.

Ant Financial intends to serve 2 billion customers over the next decade globally, with more than 60 percent of those users from outside the Chinese mainland.

Apart from setting up six branch offices -- in the United States, Singapore, South Korea, the United Kingdom, Luxembourg and Australia -- the company picked ex-Goldman Sachs banker Douglas Feagin to smooth the way for its global push.

Through signing pacts with financial institutions and distributing technology to retailers, the company is preparing the ground for what could become a major rival to banking monopolies and the likes of Visa.

In the US, Ant Financial teamed up with payment technology providers First Data Corp and Verifone to expand its presence through their extensive merchant networks.

"We aim to have at least 1 million merchants outside the Chinese mainland accepting Alipay in three years. Working with our network of global partners like First Data and Verifone will help us achieve the goal," said Feagin, senior vice-president of Ant Financial and head of Alipay International, in a speech at the Money 2020 event in Las Vegas.

Jeongwen Chiang, a professor of marketing at China Europe International Business School, praised the potential of online payment by comparing Alipay with China's UnionPay, the world's third-largest payment network by value of transactions processed. UnionPay trails only Visa and MasterCard, according to November statistics compiled by the US research service BI Intelligence.

"UnionPay is great in helping Chinese travelers make payments overseas, but it still requires consumers to carry a card," Chiang said.

"Alipay is amassing a large amount of data on its customers' spending habits, and its big data capabilities are currently greater than UnionPay's. It helps European merchants more efficiently target Chinese shoppers."

China's BigData-Research found that transactions via mobile payment services, worth 9.3 trillion yuan ($1.3 trillion) in 2015, are expected to increase to 15 trillion yuan in 2017.

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## TaiShang

*Big data apps help Toutunhe farmers fit market demand *
2016-12-28 

Farmers in the Xingjiang region have reduced the amount of waste crops being produced every year thanks to the application of big data.

By collecting merchant and consumer orders in advance through an online platform, farmers have been able to plant the right amount of crops and prevent over supply in the market.

"I received an order for next year's cottons with down payment through an agriculture online platform and I can grow cotton according to a plan which will help me avoid stockpiling risk," said a farmer from Aksu in the Xinjiang region. One such platform is the Laodao Agriculture Online Platform, which was launched by Xinjiang Laodao Science and Technology Enterprise. Through the platform, farmers can grow plants in accordance to orders and can purchase wholesale raw materials from other vendors to reduce costs.

"At present, we have served more than 100,000 people with annual sales revenue of approximately 1 billion yuan," said Jiang Xiaoyang, general manager of Xinjiang Laodao.

The practical application of big data in traditional industries has become an importand part of Toutunhe district's smart city construction plan in recent years.

According to the merchant office of Xinjiang Software Park, 232 enterprises have registered in the park, and 75 enterprises have opened offices in the park.

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## ahojunk

*China's e-commerce transaction value to exceed 38 tln yuan by 2020*
2016-12-28 09:19 | Xinhua | _Editor: Wang Fan_

China said on Tuesday it aims to expand e-commerce transactions to more than 38 trillion yuan (5.5 trillion U.S. dollars) by 2020, up from 21.8 trillion in 2015.

By 2020, China's online population will pass 1 billion, growing by 7.8 percent a year from 2015, according to a State Council five-year informatization plan.

Information industry revenue is expected to grow by an average of 8.9 percent each year from 2015 to hit 26.2 trillion yuan by 2020.

By then 90 percent of villages in poverty will be covered by internet services, 12 percentage points more than that in 2015.

Online retail sales will more than doubled from 3.9 trillion yuan recorded in 2015 to 10 trillion yuan by 2020.


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## ahojunk

*Wall St stays bullish on Alibaba*
2017-01-03 11:22 | China Daily | _Editor: Feng Shuang_

Wall Street remains bullish about China's internet giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd amid a spate of stock selling by its principal stakeholders in the past six months.

Among the latest moves was the share sale plan adopted by Joe Tsai, which allows the firm's executive vice-chairman to sell up to 6.5 million shares of the company's stock through October.

The shares represent approximately 8 percent of Tsai's holdings, the company said in a filing to the United States Securities and Exchange Commission last month.

Tsai's affiliated entities, including the Joe and Clara Tsai Foundation, Parufam Ltd and MFG II Ltd, have adopted the prearranged sale plan in accordance with Rule 10b5-1 of the SEC Act of 1934, the statement said.

Based on Alibaba's annual report in March, Tsai holds a 3.2 percent stake in the company.

Alibaba Chairman Jack Ma unlocked 5 percent of shares under his beneficiary ownership through a similar plan in September, allowing for the sale of up to 9.9 million shares over a 12-month period commencing in September 2016.

These plans have been put in place to meet philanthropic commitments and for ordinary wealth planning purposes, the company told China Daily on Monday.

In 2014, the duo established a charitable trust that is designed to be funded by share options they own, representing around 2 percent of the shares in the company, Alibaba said.

"Rule 10b5-1 allows major holders to sell a predetermined number of shares at a predetermined time, as long as the sale isn't set to bring about major effects to the company. Many corporate executives use such plan to avoid accusations of insider trading," said Ling Xiao, partner of Hui Ye Law Firm specializing in overseas investment and financing.

The e-commerce giant's largest shareholder Softbank Group Corp said it would sell $7.9 billion of its shares in June, marking the first such sale since the Japanese company began investing in Alibaba in 2000. Its holding in Alibaba were reduced to around 28 percent, from 32.4 percent as of June 2016.

But a potential snowball effect shorting Alibaba is unlikely to occur. In November, rating agency Fitch Ratings Inc affirmed Alibaba at A+ with a stable outlook, and Morgan Stanley gave a "Buy" rating last month and a $130 price target, more than 40 percent up from its current price.

"We believe that Alibaba is in the early stages of unlocking the value from what we view as its most valuable asset－a rich database that continues to accumulate from its well-controlled and extensive closed-loop ecosystem, through advances in data technology," Morgan Stanley's Grace Chen and her team said in a report in December.

Selloffs don't necessarily reflect a shift in confidence among major investors, according to an analyst tracking Alibaba stocks at an investment bank who wished to remain anonymous. The institution also maintains a buy rating and had raised its target price to more than $130.

"In the case of Softbank Group Corp, the selloff is targeted at trimming debts and saving up to acquire the semiconductor and software design company ARM Holdings Plc," said the analyst.


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## ahojunk

*WeChat still dominates sector, makes inroads on payments*
By Liang Fei Source:Global Times Published: 2017/1/3 18:58:39

*Alipay’s social networking dream*
_It is no secret that domestic e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding wants to be stronger in social networking. The company has made several major investments in the sector, but none has born much fruit. Meanwhile, Tencent Holdings, whose popular instant messaging app WeChat dominates the field, is encroaching on Alibaba's lead in mobile payments. Nonetheless, Alibaba isn't ready to give up on social networking, which remains an effective way to capture user loyalty._




Alibaba Group Holding's payment app Alipay is mulling over improvements for its social networking feature, according to recent media reports.

It has recently appointed a new executive to oversee its social feature, called Circles, media reports said. 

Alipay declined to comment on these media reports on Monday. 

Still, the news has received a great deal of attention, as Alipay's Circles stirred up something of a controversy when it was launched on November 24, 2016.

The controversy focused on two Circles groups open to all users: Campus Diary and White Collar Diary. Inexplicably, only female users were allowed to post photos in the two groups and only male users were allowed to comment under the posts. 

There were more rules for male users, who were divided into two groups depending on their scores on Alipay's credit-rating system, Sesame Credit. Those with credit scores above 750 were allowed to comment under posts in the two groups, while those with scores below the threshold were limited to "liking" photos.

Soon after the launch, the two groups were flooded with racy photos. Users complained, accusing Alibaba of turning Alipay into a dating service. 

Alipay responded on November 28, 2016 that its real-name registration system allows it to easily spot and deal with inappropriate content, according to a statement the company posted on the microblogging site Weibo.

On November 29, Peng Lei, CEO of Ant Financial, the Alibaba arm that runs Alipay, apologized for the suggestive content on Circles, and promised to shut down any offensive groups on the platform.

*A social laggard
*
It is no secret that Alibaba, a leader in e-commerce and online payments, wants a stronger social networking platform. In has made several major investments in the industry over the past few years. It invested in the social networking app Momo in July 2012, and bought an 18 percent stake in Weibo in April 2013. 

When voice-messaging became popular in China in 2013, Alibaba launched a platform called Laiwang in September 2013 to compete with Tencent's WeChat. 

Later, in December 2014, Alibaba rolled out Ding Talk, a messaging app geared for corporate users. None of the apps has come close to being as successful as WeChat, which boasts around 768 million active users.

In the wake of the criticism, Alipay put Circles on hold. But with its reemergence, there is once again buzz about what Alipay might do in social media.

Because the credit score was the primary way that Alipay divided users into different groups in Circles, the app will try to capitalize on users' credit scores as it moves forward, said Tao Chuanliang, an industry analyst at the Beijing-based CCID Consulting.

"It is not yet clear how it will be done, but I think [Alipay's social networking effort] is all about the credit data," Tao told the Global Times on Monday.

The Chinese central government has been trying to build a nationwide credit score system, but it has yet to succeed, Tao said. But Alipay, with its access to the credit records of millions of users, has the potential to build one.

"People say that [Alibaba founder Jack] Ma Yun has always had a social networking dream, but I believe that social networking is not the ultimate goal," said Zhang Yi, CEO of Internet consultancy iiMedia Research. "User loyalty is."

Social networking has proved an effective way to gain users for services such as payments and e-commerce, Zhang noted.

Although Circles has received criticism, that criticism has also given it a lot of attention, which is a good thing for Alipay's future plans for social networking, analysts said.

*Unexpected move 
*
Alibaba and Tencent are rivals on many fronts in the tech industry, including social networking and payments. While Alibaba is pushing hard in social networking, Tencent has been making inroads on payments.

Over the past few years, the two companies have sought to promote their payment tools by launching promotion campaigns featuring virtual red envelopes containing money during the Spring Festival holidays. 

During the 2015 Spring Festival holidays, with a strong red envelop promotion, WeChat users connected 200 million bank accounts to the app in two days - a feat that took Alipay eight years to accomplish.

This year, WeChat founder Zhang Xiaolong announced during a company event on December 28, 2016 that WeChat would not hold a red envelop promotion for the upcoming Spring Festival holidays, which will start on January 27 and end on February 2, 2017. The news surprised many, considering how successful the promotion had been in the past.

This doesn't mean that WeChat is placing less importance on payments, which remain crucial to WeChat's business. 

"The purpose of the red envelope promotion was to gain users, but the promotion is no longer as effective because it can't gain as many users as it had in the past," Tao said.

Tao noted that it was a "reasonable" decision to drop the red envelope promotion in 2017.

Zhang from WeChat also said at the company event that the red envelope promotion has accomplished its "mission."

Although it appears that Tencent no longer cares enough to compete with Alipay during the Spring Festival holidays in 2017, it is still too early to say that Tencent has secured a leading position in both social networking and payment, analysts said.

In the third quarter of 2016, Alipay still held a 50.42 percent share of the mobile payment market. 

Tencent's payment tools had 38.12 percent, according to a report released by Analysys International on December 27, 2016.

Besides, Zhang from iiMedia noted that Alipay still has advantages of its own. For instance, Alipay is better at building offline payment infrastructure, Zhang said. 

The rivalry of the two companies in the areas of social networking and payments will be "long and tense," Zhang noted.

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## ahojunk

*Mobile wallets becoming way of life: Study*
2017-01-05 09:31 | China Daily | _Editor: Feng Shuang_

Mobile wallets have grown into a lifestyle choice embedded into daily activities and interactions, as more Chinese embrace third-party services to pay back credit cards and run errands, a latest study has found.

*Alipay users from five municipalities and provinces made average transactions of more than 100,000 yuan ($14,400) via Alipay last year*, the country's top online payment provider said on Wednesday.

Users in *Shanghai topped the ranking with average spending of 148,000 yuan in 2016*, 1.5 times that of 2015.

In terms of total transaction volume, *Guangdong province grabbed the top spot by claiming 16 percent of the payment pie* nationwide.

The study also found that mobile gadgets have become the mainstream vehicle for payment. In 2016, about *71 percent of all transactions conducted via Alipay went through mobile devices*, up from 65 percent from the previous year.

Digital wallets have gained tremendous popularity in inland provinces, the firm said, where residents rely exclusively on their smartphones and mobile carrier coverage to access the internet.

For example, 90 percent of Alipay transactions were conducted on mobile devices in the Tibet autonomous region and 88 percent in Qinghai and Gansu provinces.

According to Worldpay's 2016 Global Payments Report, *Alipay accounts for 44 percent of global mobile wallet spending and is on pace to reach 60 percent by 2020*.

It also gained steam by integrating its payment functions into public service platforms. *With a few taps on the app, its 450 million users can pay utility bills, settle traffic ticket fine payments and make medical appointments*.

Online access to these services is made available in 357 cities in China. Such services were accessed over 1 billion times last year, up 218 percent from the end of 2015.

Chinese people are increasingly willing to make purchases with borrowed money. Powered by a credit-scoring service from Alipay's parent Ant Financial Services Group, some 2.3 billion transactions on Alipay were made with loan service Ant Check Later, up 344 percent year-on-year. Around 40 percent of Ant Check Later users were born in the 1990s.

Chinese payment tools have become an essential part of consumers' day-to-day lifestyle, years ahead of their Western counterparts, said senior IT analyst Yang Yaqiong from consultancy Analysys.

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## ahojunk

*Square dance craze might mean big bucks for web firms*
Source: Agencies Published: 2017/1/5 18:58:39





People dance in the streets when there aren't squares available. Photo: Li Hao/GT


_A cellphone app that targets square dancing dama (middle-aged and elderly women) has received tens of millions in investment._

_The square dancing industry in China is growing larger and larger, with more and more firms seeking to profit from these dance groups._


As soon as the music starts to play, everything else stops. For a few hours, it's just the women and their routines.

Every night at 6:30 pm, Chen Hua, 41, from Fujian Province, and her fellow dancers gather at an empty space outside a community center in Donggezhuang village, Beijing's suburban Shunyi district.

Dressed in a blue and black one-piece and black sneakers, Chen is the lead dancer of a group of women who are all migrant workers at a small curtain-making factory. _Guangchangwu_ (square dancing) is more or less their only entertainment. They wave their hands, shake their hips, swirl, turn and jump under the pale fluorescent streetlights.

There are tens of millions of women like Chen. They all love dancing in squares, plazas, parks or any other public places. They are referred to as square dancing _dama_ - a word used to describe middle-aged and elderly women. While for these women, and sometimes men too, it's just a bit of fun, for others it represents a huge business opportunity. Even Internet startups have gotten into the square dancing game, making apps to cater to the middle-aged twirlers.

*Tango and cash
*
There are an estimated 100 million square dancers in China, according to a report on the hobby issued in 2015, and they don't think twice about opening their purses to get gear. These middle-aged women represent major purchasing power, as has been seen in the luxury fashion sector.

One of the groups, the Red Maple dancing group was founded in 2003 in a northern Beijing community. The 31-member team performed about 30 times in 2016 at competitions held by banks or nursing homes and at shopping mall grand openings. They spent thousands of yuan on each performance, mainly on outfits.

"The most important thing about these square dancing _dama_ is that they control the purse strings. They are the decision makers on everything from healthcare and financing, to travel and other purchases," wrote Fang Hui, founder of square dance app Darfoo and author of the 2015 report. "So square dancing is only a starting point to expand our business to other areas."

The square dancing market currently amounts to about 2 billion yuan per year, Fang told the National Business Daily in November 2015.

Banks also see the potential profits and many now sponsor square dancing competitions to get deposits and sell financing products.

Chen's troupe often use an app called Tangdou Square Dance. At the end of 2015, the app launched new features including a community and tools for making short videos. And that changed Chen's life.

"I watch videos of dancers on Tangdou every day. They are so professional," said Chen. She has bought over a dozen dancing outfits in under a year. She said her husband calls her "addicted."

She has uploaded over 40 video clips onto the app so far. "Sometimes I upload three or four videos a day; sometimes I take a video with a selfie stick at night at home," said Chen, who has a 20-year-old son.

She reads all the comments on her videos and said that this approval has helped her gain self-confidence. She dreams of becoming a square dancing "celebrity" someday.

Tangdou is one of many apps for square dancers. These websites and apps offer free tutorial videos and communities for dancers to connect with each other.

Tangdou has over 2.5 million daily users and close to 40 million monthly users, according to a November China Daily report.

It started out as just another video-sharing site, but began to focus on square dancing around 2012 and launched a virtual dance studio. They also teach dancers how to make their own videos.

The dancing _dama_ dollar has drawn in venture capitalists too. In 2015, Tangdou got a round of $5 million financing. In November 2016 it announced a new round of $5 million financing, which followed a $15 million round of financing in September.

"Almost all of the top 100 or so square dance teachers are on Tangdou," Zhang Yuan, founder and CEO of Tangdou told Blog Weekly.

But these apps have yet to work out how to make money from their users. As with many other kinds of apps, their main focus is gaining traffic.

In the beginning Fang, founder of Darfoo, came up with a tablet especially for square dancers with a simple operating system and extra large screen but the project was a failure. So he changed direction and focused on creating online dance communities by hosting offline activities and competitions. He could then sell advertisements to banks, financial companies, and travel agencies.

Wudong Shidai was founded in May 2015 and its main platform is a WeChat public account with 120,000 followers, according to Entrepreneur magazine. The company plans to launch an app in February and to shoot a sit-com about square dancing grannies. Founder Liu Yinglong told Entrepreneur they are also not too worried about turning a profit at the moment but are focusing on attracting users through good dance teachers.

*Renegade rumba
*
Gao Jingxuan, a dance teacher, has become an online celebrity among square dancers. After joining Tangdou as a choreographer in 2011, she found herself facing students who were not young kids, but women from 40 to 70 years old. She was surprised and amazed at their enthusiasm. The women would complain if they took a break for too long and were very competitive and constantly trying to improve, she said. Other people might think square dancing is boring and repetitive, but it's a source of joy for these women, said Gao.

Although she has never met most of her students or fans, she receives grateful text messages all the time and is often recognized on the street, in supermarkets or at highway service stations.

But despite the friendly community, square dancing does not have a good reputation. Over the years disputes over noise between residents and dancers have often grabbed headlines. In 2013, a Beijing man was arrested for firing a gun into the air and setting three mastiffs onto dancers. The same year, angry residents of Wuhan, Hubei Province had had enough of loud music and threw feces at dancers.

One of the reasons square dances do not enjoy a good reputation is because their - often blaring - music is usually considered tacky. But that seems to be the way they like it. The first few videos Gao made were not well received. While Gao personally prefers to dance to ballads, her fans want something with a strong beat. "You have to pick the most popular tunes," Gao told Blog Weekly. 

In March 2015 the central government issued "standards and regulations" for square dancing so the dance representing the "collective aspect of Chinese culture" isn't ruined by disputes over noise and venues.

Huang Yongjun, an associate professor at Hubei Normal University, believes that square dancing has its roots around the founding of the People's Republic. "People upholding the spirit of collectivism often danced and sang in squares," he told Blog Weekly magazine. "We can see the enthusiastic people in the pictures and video clips from that time."

He also sees the recent surge in enthusiasm for square dancing as a result of migration, urban changes and social convergence over the years. Dancing is these women's way of expressing themselves and getting engaged in society, said Huang. "It makes them feel stable, safe and noticed, and therefore realize that there is so much passion, dreams and inspirations still to enjoy at this late age," he was quoted as saying.

That seems to be the case for Chen. She and her fellow dancers like to have people guess how old they are, in the hope of being complimented on how much younger they look. She's upset that they are often called "_dama_" by the media and other people. "We don't like that name. Its as if you must be very old if you dance in squares," Chen told Blog Weekly. "What does it mean to be old? For me, I just want to do whatever I like and whatever I want, at this moment."

Chen hasn't always been able to do whatever she wanted. She started working at a garment factory at the age of 17, after graduating from a vocational school. She had to take care of her parents and younger sister. "I've done everything," she said. "For people like us, who are from the countryside, if you are 17, 18 and still aren't working, there's no meal for you at home."

When she finishes dancing everyday and goes back to her small apartment, that's when reality hits.

"We have to make more money so that we could live a better life when we get back. I just hope I can feed myself without having to work, that's not too much to ask," she said. "We have to go back to the countryside, maybe when we are older."

But for just for few hours she can take a break from her monotonous factory work and dream of something different through square dancing and video sharing.

Agencies

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## ahojunk

*Big data discloses China's sports preferences*
2017-01-07 09:30 | Xinhua | _Editor: Wang Fan_

More Chinese people online searched for popular and grassroots sports in 2016, according to big data analysis released Thursday.

In a statistical analysis, China's leading searching engine Baidu showed the popular sports of running, swimming, ping-pong, badminton, and cycling were more common in searches for 2016.

Online search volume of the sports increased by 27 percent compared with 2015.

Chinese netizens last year searched for information about sports 1.6 billion times, Baidu said

"This means the daily retrieving volume went up by 4.4 million hits," said Zhang Wan, a Baidu executive.

"The statistic shows China is witnessing sports heat now," Zhang said. Basketball was Chinese netizen's most popular search among competitive sports, accounting for half of sports searches, followed by football with 40 percent.

The Chinese Football Association Super League received 1.4 times more searches than the English Premier League (EPL), which is the most popular European football league in China.

It is noticeable that EPL fans in China paid more attention to club performances, while fans of Spain's La Liga were more interested in world-class footballers such as Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi.

The data shows that Messi has three times more fans than Ronaldo in China.

"The data could help sports brands precisely find their niche markets and target-consumers by analyzing fans' behavior and preferences," Zhang said. "We discovered that supporters of Ronaldo prefer the brands of Audi and IWC watches, while Messi fans like Mercedes-Benz and Tag Heuer."

Zhang pointed out that the Chinese sports market was pushing brands to develop deeper interaction with consumers.

The data also found that sports fans also like information about fitness, entertainment, online games, education, automobiles, and fashion.

"We can see that extending the sports market could benefit many other potential industries," Zhang said.


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## ahojunk

*Tencent launches WeChat 'mini apps'*
(China Daily) 09:13, January 10, 2017





_Chinese people check their WeChat 14.5 times on average and spend 48 minutes
on social media per day. [Photo/IC]_

Chinese internet giant *Tencent Holdings Ltd launched "mini apps"* on Monday, which let users interact with app-like services within its instant messaging app WeChat, without having to download and install them.

Users just need to scan the QR code or search from their WeChat accounts to open these apps, where they could book tickets or do shopping, Tencent said.

They *can exit the apps easily without downloading them*, these apps won't disturb users, such as by sending notifications and subscription messages, according to Tencent.

This is an important step in Tencent's commercialization of its messaging service. *WeChat now has 846 million users worldwide*, according to Tencent's fiscal 2016 third-quarter earnings report.

Lu Zhenwang, CEO of Shanghai-based Wanqing Consultancy, said: "The launch of *mini apps can solve some of the problems caused by apps, but it won't take the place of AppStore or Android Market.*"

"Some 'lightweight' apps, which possess fewer functions and more simple algorithms, and apps that are not commonly used, are more suitable as WeChat's mini apps. However, the commonly used ones should still be downloaded to your phone," Lu added.

Dong Xu, an analyst with Beijing-based consultancy Analysis, said: "With the mini apps, users could find and use them whenever they need, and won't receive any advertising when they stop using them."

The aim is to ensure users spend more time on WeChat and extend Tencent's lead as an app vendor. Mobile app developers are vying for users in the fiercely competitive and lucrative market.

*Chinese people check their WeChat 14.5 times on average and spend 48 minutes on social media per day*, according to a report released by Chinese tech startup Kika.

Wang Qian, an employee of an IT company, has tried the "mini apps" since they were launched on Monday.

"The design of these apps is very clear, and will increase the utilization rate of the WeChat wallet. Maybe it could replace some apps, but I still prefer to download apps from my app store."

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## ahojunk

*China to invest 1.2 trillion yuan in information infrastructure*
2017-01-12 19:19 | Xinhua | _Editor: Wang Fan_

China will invest big in information infrastructure in the next three years as a way to help develop the new economy and foster growth momentum.

*About 1.2 trillion yuan (around 170 billion U.S. dollars) will be channeled into Internet projects, mainly broadband and mobile network improvement*, according to guidelines released Thursday by the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

The document sets a number of goals.

*By 2018, a total of 90,000 km of high-speed fiber-optic trunk cables will be built, expected to expand the broadband network coverage to all urban areas and 90 percent of the countryside*.

*China will add 2 million 4G base stations, mainly for townships and villages*, and boost the proportion of *mobile network users to 75 percent of its population*.

The number of* points of presence connected to overseas networks will be increased to 120, up from the current 80*, in a bid to enhance connectivity to the rest of the world and satisfy rising demand for international exchanges.

The country will also *promote IPv6 networks, support R&D for 5G technology, and encourage businesses to use cloud computing and big data*.

The government will cut red tape, strengthen financing support, and attract private capital to join the program.

Confronted with sluggish traditional sectors, China is vigorously developing and applying information technology to upgrade industrial models and create new growth points.

The "Broadband China" strategy was floated in August 2013 to improve Internet service.

.

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## ahojunk

*8,000 apply for Baidu Map collector vacancies*
2017-01-16 08:29 | Xinhua | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_





_A Baidu Map information collector operates an unmanned aerial vehicle in Dukezong, an ancient Tibetan town in Yunnan province. (Photo/China Daily)_

Baidu Map, a desktop and mobile map service, recently advertised vacancies for map information collectors.

The job requires collectors to gather detailed road data, such as the location of ditches and overpasses, with collectors spending most of their time on roads and mountains as well as by the sea. The role of *chief map information collector offers an annual salary of 1 million yuan ($145,200)*.

Within two days of posting the vacancies in early December, Baidu received about 8,000 applications.

*Collectors are provided with a sport utility vehicle and an unmanned aerial vehicle to carry out their job*, in addition to high-tech equipment for information collection and professional photographic equipment. Furthermore, they are given summer and winter vacations, insurance and a high-temperature allowance.

The collective distance the collectors have covered has already surpassed 6.7 million kilometers, involving more than 700 million panoramic photos, with one collector having visited 215 cities in the past year, according to Baidu Map.

Tang Qiying, 21, has been working as a map information collector at Baidu for more than a year. He has traveled more than 30,000 km and visited five provinces in the past year.

"Because of the job, I have been *able to experience the most beautiful scenery*," he said

"However, *the job can be lonely*. One time, in a sparsely populated desert area in Qinghai province, I felt really lonely, as there was no one around. I kept driving until I saw a few antelopes, who I viewed as my friends. I think there is always a price to pay for getting what you want."

Zhu Zhaohui, a 24-year-old from Anhui province, has been working for Baidu Map for about 18 months. "My parents didn't understand my job at first, as I am away on business trips year-round, but I told them I want to visit more places while I am young," Zhu said.

"Sometimes, I encounter difficulties and feel afraid, but when I think about the more than 500 million people who are using the data that I have collected, it makes my efforts seem worthwhile."

Baidu Map is set to become a world mapping service provider covering more than 150 countries and regions, including Asia, Europe, Africa, North America, South America and Oceania, providing services for 99 percent of the world's population.

It said it holds about 70 percent of the domestic market share at present, with more than 300 million active monthly users and about 100 million car owners using its mapping service.


********

_If you like travelling, this is a good job._
.

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## ahojunk

*China encourages more use of mobile Internet service*
2017-01-16 08:15 | Xinhua | _Editor: Gu Liping_

China's central authority has issued a guideline on mobile Internet service management, calling for *more efforts to develop the sector* in a healthy and orderly manner.

The guideline calls for *increasing the use of mobile Internet service in sectors including transport, tourism, education, medical service, and public security*, to better serve the public.

It says that mobile Internet service could play a *big role in poverty relief*, as it provides an efficient means to connect these regions with the outside world.

The guideline, issued by the general offices of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council, also urges cultivating an orderly environment for development of mobile Internet service.

"With the rapid evolvement of Internet technology, threats and risks posed by mobile Internet service are prominent and must be addressed," according to the guideline.

China will resolutely *crack down on criminal activities such as instigating overthrowing state power and inciting religious extremism* through mobile Internet service, it says, adding that promoting *ethnic separatist ideology and instigating violence and terrors will also be targeted*.

In addition, more efforts will be made to *investigate and punish those involved in defamation, telecom fraud, infringement and illegal sale of personal information*, it says.

It urges regulating the order of competition and optimizing the environment for the development of the mobile Internet service to unleash energy for innovation and market potential.

It urges preventing and eliminating risks caused by the development of mobile Internet service to ensure security of network data, technology and apps.

It says that market access rules of mobile Internet service should be perfected and the upgrade of information infrastructure should be accelerated, urging efforts to make breakthroughs on core technologies.

The guideline urges making more efforts to *strengthen intellectual property protection and boost international exchange and cooperation* in this sector.


********

_China is already the world leader in mobile internet and this will strengthen its position._

.

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## ahojunk

*Chinese Net users top 731 million in 2016: report*
(Global Times) 08:36, January 23, 2017







China has 731 million Internet users as of December 2016, roughly the size of Europe's population, according to a report released by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) on Sunday.

The number of Web users grew by 42.99 million in 2016, or 6.2 percent from the previous year, accounting for 53.2 percent of China's total population, the report said.

Li Yi, a Shanghai-based independent IT expert, told the Global Times the surge in the number of smartphones was the primary reason for the growth in Net users. Some 695 million netizens used mobile phones to access the Internet in 2016, with a growth rate exceeding 10 percent for the third straight year, the report said. Smartphone-based Internet use accounted for 95.1 percent of all Internet users, up from 90.1 percent in 2015.

The report noted that 201 million people or 27 percent of Internet users were from rural areas, or a gap of 45.2 percent in the Internet penetration rate between urban and rural areas.

"Poverty has stunted further growth in Internet users, which has kept the Net user population to around 50 percent," Li said.

Meanwhile, domestic Internet users have formed a mobile payment habit, with the number of users making payments through smartphones skyrocketing to 469 million last year, up by 31.2 percent from the previous year.

The report said searches, online music and videos, and online payments were among the most popular mobile applications.

Users of food delivery apps rose by 83.7 percent in 2016, the fastest increase. The report found that 208.6 million Chinese use their phones to order food.

However, most Internet users remain concerned about cyber security issues, according to the report. Only 28 percent of netizens said they believe the Internet was safe, while more than 70 percent said they experienced cyber security threats, of which Internet fraud is the main concern.

The Cyberspace Administration of China released its first cyberspace security strategy in December 2016, prioritizing cyberspace sovereignty ahead of the implementation of the Cyber Security Law, which takes effect in June 2017.

The government will protect cyberspace sovereignty and national security, key information infrastructure and crack down on cyber terror and crimes, according to the strategy.

"More micro regulations will be formulated in 2017 after macro policies on cyber security were introduced last year," Li said.

Li said he expects draft regulations on online shopping platforms, personal information protection and social media security.

*Internet giants*

Meanwhile, the report said the combined value of domestic Internet giants Tencent Inc and Alibaba Group Holdings surpassed 3 trillion yuan ($436.5 billion), or 57 percent of all domestic public Internet firms.

Ninety-one domestic Internet companies are listed on domestic and overseas stock markets, valued at 5.4 trillion yuan as of December 2016, according to the report.

Chinese companies' adoption of information technology has quickly grown over the year, with Internet use reaching 95.6 percent in 2016, up 6.6 percentage points from the previous year, the report said.

Domestic companies' online sales and purchases reached 45.3 percent and 45.6 percent, respectively, in 2016, both expanding by more than 10 percentage points.

Additionally, over 60 percent of Chinese companies have established their own information systems in 2016, up 13.4 percent from the previous year.

.

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## cirr

*China pools 100b yuan internet investment fund*

By Dai Tian | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-01-22





A representative of Huawei introduces Kirin 960 processor during a release ceremony of world leading internet scientific and technological achievements at the 3rd World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, east China's Zhejiang province, Nov 16, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]

The Chinese government launched a 100 billion yuan ($14.5 billion) internet investment fund on Sunday, as the country works to strengthen its edge in the changing economy.

Six strategic partners, including the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), CITIC Guoan Group, China Post Insurance and three giant telecom operators, have injected the first batch capital of 30 billion yuan, according to Xinhua

The internet investment fund, approved by the State Council, is co-sponsored by the Cyberspace Administration and Ministry of Finance.

By bankrolling outstanding internet companies, the fund aims to foster innovation within the sector through a market approach.

State-owned bank ICBC, National Development Bank and Agricultural Bank of China pledged a combined 150 billion yuan credit as venture loans, said Xinhua.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/tech/2017-01/22/content_28026168.htm

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## 艹艹艹

https://backchannel.com/why-chinas-tencent-might-be-the-next-disney-b8f87f305c47#.lyaq7dnsn
*The Next Disney Will Come from China and Its Name Is Tencent
Tencent is using its social networks, WeChat and QQ, and video games to build an entertainment juggernaut.
*




(via League of Legends)

*Riot Games has been on a winning streak.* Its League of Legendsis the most popular PC game in the world. The game’s professional leagues have media rights worth in the hundreds of millions. If you’re a gamer you’ve likely heard of Riot; if not, the LA-based game developer might be — as Inc. magazine called it — “the most exciting company you’ve never heard of.”

It is also central to the growth strategy of Tencent, the biggest Chinese internet company and Riot’s owner. Tencent is best known for building WeChat, the world’s second-largest social media network, with more than 700 million users. But Tencent has another, less-recognized identity, as the largest gaming company in the world.

Tencent owns not only Riot but also Supercell, the maker of wildly popular mobile phone games. By all appearances, messaging and gaming may seem like completely different enterprises, with totally distinct business models. But that’s where Tencent has uniquely excelled. The company has found a symbiotic way to monetize both, through the astonishingly lucrative sales of virtual goods such as avatars, skins, and other digital artifacts for personalizing your online presence. Characters and skins from Tencent’s video game empire can become stickers and other ephemera that get distributed throughout its massive messaging platforms.

Think of virtual goods as phase one for Tencent — an essential precursor to the company’s next metamorphosis. Now it’s using its game assets and its social network to bridge naturally into every other form of entertainment. Just as Disney used the characters from its signature films to sell merchandise, music, spin-off shows, games, and tickets to its theme parks, Tencent is using its video game assets to fuel a books, comics, music and film empire. Instead of first meeting Tencent’s money-making characters in a movie, as you would have with Disney, you might first control them in a game on your phone, or encounter them as a sticker sent by a friend.

It’s worth pausing to note how unusual it is that the world’s next Disney-like conglomerate is emerging from a company that began with text messaging. Yet the Tencent story makes plenty of sense, once you dig into the company’s past.
Tencent was founded in 1998, and the following year it released its first messaging app, QQ. In 2004, it went public and started an online gaming business focused on casual games, such as chess, which it added to QQ.com. In that time period, two of Tencent’s Chinese competitors, Shanda Interactive Entertainment and NetEase, began to profit handsomely off of free-to-play gaming. Under this model, you can play significant chunks of a game without handing over a dime, and only devotees pay to access more in-game content, such as extra levels or nice hats.

So Tencent switched from developing its own games, which was never its strength, to licensing already successful, more immersive games and using its massive scale to distribute them. In 2008, Tencent began licensing popular multiplayer games made in the US and South Korea — such as _*CrossFire*_, _*Dungeon & Fighter*_, and *League of Legends *— to be published in China.

Having already become involved with _League of Legends_, Tencent had every reason to pay attention to Riot. It first participated in the gaming company’s $8 million Series C round in 2009, before increasing its ownership stake from 22.34 percent to 92.78 percent for $231 million in 2011. In 2015, Tencent fully acquired Riot for an undisclosed amount. Through its acquisitions and its investments, Tencent had swiftly become far and away the most powerful global company with a stake in gaming.

The internet giant has continued its buying spree, the most notable acquisition being that of Supercell, a Helsinki-based mobile game studio, for $7.8 billion last year. Supercell is the most profitable maker of phone games in the world, earning €845 million off of €2.11 billion in revenue in 2015. Its _Clash of Clans_ is estimated to have been the top grossing mobile game that year. In 2016, the App Store named its new game, _Clash Royale_, the iPhone Game of the Year.


To understand why Tencent was willing to shell out astronomical sums for these companies, you have to look at what they offered, and what it was that Tencent very much wanted: virtual goods.

Unlike the titans of California, Tencent hasn’t relied heavily on advertising to become profitable. In 2015 (the most recent available data), online advertising accounted for 17 percent of Tencent’s annual revenue, versus 89.9 percent for Google and 95 percent for Facebook.

Instead, Tencent found a lucrative path through the sale of virtual goods — a way for users to personalize their online experience. In products like QQ, that means buying a custom avatar and accessories to embellish that avatar. In games like _*League of Legends*_, that means buying a skin to personalize the look of your favorite champion.

Virtual goods are also the primary way free-to-play games such as _*League of Legends*_ and _*CrossFire*_ (2014’s top-grossing online game, also distributed in China by Tencent) make money. This model works especially well in China, where years of rampant piracy weakened the traditional retail model, where customers buy games in a box in a store. In Tencent’s financial reports, revenue from online games and virtual goods are grouped together under “value-added services.” In 2015, this category accounted for a whopping 78 percent of the company’s $15.8 billion in annual income.

But Tencent’s ability to identify selling opportunities around its content doesn’t end with avatars and skins. By 2011, it had developed something even more ambitious — its “pan entertainment” strategy.
The idea was for Tencent to leverage its intellectual property (IP), mainly from games, across multiple kinds of entertainment: live-action and animated films, books, music, and more. This pan entertainment strategy is now widely adopted by large Chinese gaming companies — in the US, by contrast, these outfits tend to focus solely on making games (with the exception of Blizzard Entertainment, which has dabbled in offshoots). Tencent began branching into these areas first with a comic and animation business in 2012, followed by a digital books publishing business — Tencent Literature — in 2013, and most recently Tencent Pictures in 2014.

In other words, Tencent was starting to look a lot like Disney.

The core of Disney’s IP engine has long been theatrical films. Successful movies spawned music productions, home video, stage plays, TV series, theme parks and resorts, a wealth of merchandise, video games, and more. Disney paid $4 billion for Marvel in 2009 and $4 billion for Lucasfilm and the legendary _Star Wars _franchise in 2012. We can all see the results of the successful commercial exploitation of those assets, many of which have become some of the highest grossing movies of all time, globally.

Like Disney, Tencent continues to gobble up valuable IP. The company announced $20.8 billion of acquisitions and investments in 2016 alone, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Tencent is just starting to test out what it can do with all this content. For example, three writer-producers of_The Simpsons_ and the animation house that created _Futurama_ created_Clash-a-Rama_, a comedy series based off of Supercell characters. Meanwhile, Riot has experimented with cinematics (short CG videos designed to develop back stories for characters in games), launched a full-fledged merchandise business, and created a board game.

These are all experiments leading in one direction: movies. Tencent is jockeying with Alibaba Pictures and Wanda Group for its share of China’s projected $10.4 billion in box-office receipts, a movie market second only to the US’s. China seems to have an insatiable demand for film. In 2015, there were 5,660 cinemas with 28,000 screens, with 15 new screens open daily. By comparison, the US had 40,547 screens that year. Each screen serves roughly 46,000 people in China versus 8,000 here.

Wanda Group, which controls 15 percent of global box-office revenues, has focused on acquiring film studios, including some big American ones — buying Legendary Entertainment for $3.5 billion and Dick Clark Productions for $1 billion in 2016 alone. Tencent, consistent with its gaming strategy, continues to focus on acquiring IP.

Specifically, Tencent has gone after genres that are more natural fits for Chinese moviegoers than Americans: sci fi, comic book, and fantasy. Consider, for example, the film _Warcraft_, which is based off a Blizzard video game and is also a Tencent investment. Last year it was the third highest-grossing movie in China, at $220.8 million, versus $47 million in the US, where it received a lukewarm reception. As Mark Ren, COO of Tencent, said in a speech, “We can take the content of games or literature and recompose them into movies and TV series, and that helps us inject fresh blood in the movie industry.”

Tencent has identified at least 11 comics, games, and novels it wants to turn into movies in the near future. It’s also bought the rights to more than 300 Japanese anime properties. These assets could lead to the creation of a Marvel-like universe with an addictive common thread, along the lines ofInfinity Stones, which conceptually tie together Marvel’s cinematic universe.
What this all means is that Tencent has found a way to manufacture, at scale, tremendous cross-platform brand loyalty. After spending years within its social media ecosystem, users are loathe to leave. Gamers, who have devoted potentially thousands of hours to playing and thousands of dollars to looking cool while doing so, are slow to move on to other games. Using film to build out the universes that users learn to love in games, comics and books deepens fans’ loyalty even more.

In other words, Tencent has morphed from a straightforward tech company into a fully contemporary, internet-savvy entertainment juggernaut. It’s like Disney, but even smarter.

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## Place Of Space

Tencent will buy Disney directly as to its usual style of biz-solutions.

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## hirobo2

Thanks for the article. I shall be boycotting Tencent products from now on. If Chinese companies continue doing what Tencent does out of sheer greed, pretty soon China will rely entirely on cultural exports from other countries and become devoid of her own.

Imagine a world where titles like Stephen Chow's The Mermaid no longer exists. But each year, features like Warcraft VI, League of Legends VII: The Movie dominate the top 10 Chinese box office figures year after year... Where movies based on domestic IPs are shunned for international ones just b/c it is owned by some Chinese company. What a world that would be.

BTW, I won't name names, but another company I will also be boycotting is the parent Chinese company responsible for The Great Wall...

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## patero

Place Of Space said:


> Tencent will buy Disney directly as to its usual style of biz-solutions.



You didn't think that comment through.

Disney currently has a market capitalization of US $175 billion. It would need to be an extremely leveraged buy out, and if Tencent tried the tender route via the Williams act they would need to offer substantially more than the current market price, probably US $200 billion or more.

https://ycharts.com/companies/DIS/market_cap

Besides, if Disney were for sale Wanda group would have attempted a buyout. But it's all probably academic, the reality is (particularly with the Trump administration in power) such a sale would be blocked by congress.

The author of the article also hasn't researched Disney's corporate structure in making comparisons between Disney and Tencent. Approximately $44.6 billion of Disneys $55.6 billion 2016 Revenues were generated by their Parks and resorts divisions, and their media networks division which includes sportscaster ESPN, Hulu, A+E networks and other broadcasting business units.

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## 艹艹艹



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## Jlaw

hirobo2 said:


> Thanks for the article. I shall be boycotting Tencent products from now on. If Chinese companies continue doing what Tencent does out of sheer greed, pretty soon China will rely entirely on cultural exports from other countries and become devoid of her own.
> 
> Imagine a world where titles like Stephen Chow's The Mermaid no longer exists. But each year, features like Warcraft VI, League of Legends VII: The Movie dominate the top 10 Chinese box office figures year after year...  Where movies based on domestic IPs are shunned for international ones just b/c it is owned by some Chinese company. What a world that would be.
> 
> BTW, I won't name names, but another company I will also be boycotting is the parent Chinese company responsible for The Great Wall...


I was very disappointed with Wanda for creating Great Wall. I will not watch that junk. westernized Asians do have pride.

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## Jlaw

ahojunk said:


> *8,000 apply for Baidu Map collector vacancies*
> 2017-01-16 08:29 | Xinhua | _Editor: Mo Hong'e_
> 
> View attachment 368781
> 
> _A Baidu Map information collector operates an unmanned aerial vehicle in Dukezong, an ancient Tibetan town in Yunnan province. (Photo/China Daily)_
> 
> Baidu Map, a desktop and mobile map service, recently advertised vacancies for map information collectors.
> 
> The job requires collectors to gather detailed road data, such as the location of ditches and overpasses, with collectors spending most of their time on roads and mountains as well as by the sea. The role of *chief map information collector offers an annual salary of 1 million yuan ($145,200)*.
> 
> Within two days of posting the vacancies in early December, Baidu received about 8,000 applications.
> 
> *Collectors are provided with a sport utility vehicle and an unmanned aerial vehicle to carry out their job*, in addition to high-tech equipment for information collection and professional photographic equipment. Furthermore, they are given summer and winter vacations, insurance and a high-temperature allowance.
> 
> The collective distance the collectors have covered has already surpassed 6.7 million kilometers, involving more than 700 million panoramic photos, with one collector having visited 215 cities in the past year, according to Baidu Map.
> 
> Tang Qiying, 21, has been working as a map information collector at Baidu for more than a year. He has traveled more than 30,000 km and visited five provinces in the past year.
> 
> "Because of the job, I have been *able to experience the most beautiful scenery*," he said
> 
> "However, *the job can be lonely*. One time, in a sparsely populated desert area in Qinghai province, I felt really lonely, as there was no one around. I kept driving until I saw a few antelopes, who I viewed as my friends. I think there is always a price to pay for getting what you want."
> 
> Zhu Zhaohui, a 24-year-old from Anhui province, has been working for Baidu Map for about 18 months. "My parents didn't understand my job at first, as I am away on business trips year-round, but I told them I want to visit more places while I am young," Zhu said.
> 
> "Sometimes, I encounter difficulties and feel afraid, but when I think about the more than 500 million people who are using the data that I have collected, it makes my efforts seem worthwhile."
> 
> Baidu Map is set to become a world mapping service provider covering more than 150 countries and regions, including Asia, Europe, Africa, North America, South America and Oceania, providing services for 99 percent of the world's population.
> 
> It said it holds about 70 percent of the domestic market share at present, with more than 300 million active monthly users and about 100 million car owners using its mapping service.
> 
> 
> ********
> 
> _If you like travelling, this is a good job._
> .


145k USD is not bad at all


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## cirr

*Supercomputer Tianhe-1 carries out 1,400 tasks per day*

CGTN, February 6, 2017

Video: http://china.org.cn/video/2017-02/06/content_40229257.htm

China's supercomputer, "Tianhe-One" carries out 1,400 computing tasks per day. It is mainly used to serve universities, research institutions, small and medium-sized enterprises, and provide scientific computing services.



China's supercomputer Tianhe-1 carries out 1,400 tasks per day

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## 艹艹艹

cirr said:


> *Supercomputer Tianhe-1 carries out 1,400 tasks per day*
> 
> CGTN, February 6, 2017
> 
> Video: http://china.org.cn/video/2017-02/06/content_40229257.htm
> 
> China's supercomputer, "Tianhe-One" carries out 1,400 computing tasks per day. It is mainly used to serve universities, research institutions, small and medium-sized enterprises, and provide scientific computing services.
> 
> 
> 
> China's supercomputer Tianhe-1 carries out 1,400 tasks per day

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## Dawood Ibrahim

*Mobile app helps China recover hundreds of missing children*

A mobile app helped Chinese authorities recover hundreds of missing children last year, Xinhua news agency reported on Saturday, in a country where child trafficking is rampant.

The Ministry of Public Security said 611 missing children were found last year, Xinhua said.

The "Tuanyuan", or "reunion" in Chinese, app developed by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd was launched in May and has allowed police officers to share information and work together.

Users near the location where a child has disappeared receive push notifications, including photos and descriptions. Notifications are sent to users farther and farther from the location of the disappearance if the child is still not found.

A new version of the app in November has expanded its reach through cooperation with other popular mobile apps, such as Alibaba's online shopping website Taobao, search engine Baidu, Tencent Holdings Ltd's instant messaging software QQ and mobile ride-sharing platform Didi Chuxing.

Child trafficking is common in China, where population control policies, although recently relaxed, have bolstered a traditional bias for male offspring.

Boys are seen as the main support for elderly parents and heirs to the family name. This has resulted in abortions, killings or abandonment of girls.

The imbalance has created criminal demand for abducted or bought baby boys, but also for baby girls destined to be future brides attracting rich dowries.

http://www.dawn.com/news/1313065/mobile-app-helps-china-recover-hundreds-of-missing-children


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## TaiShang

*Tech giants brand value on the up*
China Daily, February 7, 2017

Chinese technology giants' brand value gained momentum and financial service companies are in pole position in the global brand league table, according to a report.

Fifty-five Chinese companies made to the list of the world's 500 most valuable brands this year, with the technology sector soaring in value.

_*Three tech powerhouses－Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, Huawei Technologies Co Ltd and Tencent Holdings Ltd－were in the top 50 and realized double-digit growth in their brand value, according to a study conducted by United Kingdom-based consulting firm Brand Finance.*_

Brand Finance CEO David Haigh said: "Chinese tech brands are even more embedded in the daily lives of their users than Western brands are, while the diversity of services offered by brands such as WeChat maximizes the commercial potential of their brands."

*Alibaba reached a peak brand value of $34.8 billion, up 94 percent year-on-year, making it the world's 23rd most valuable brand and China's most valuable internet company brand.*

*Huawei and Tencent also grew impressively in brand value, rising 27.8 percent and 123 percent, respectively.*

In terms of financial brands, the study showed that Chinese banks' brand value growth has been rapidly outpacing that of European and North American competitors.

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, now ranks 10th, ousting US bank Wells Fargo as the most valuable bank in the world.

The consulting firm attributed the industry's growth to "vast population, organic expansion, foreign M& A activity and positive relationships with Chinese consumers".

Likewise, Ping An Insurance held sway as the world's most valuable insurance brand, increasing 11 percent in value to $6.2 billion.

This year Google overtook Apple as the most valuable brand across all industries, with a value of $109 billion.

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## 艹艹艹

http://www.reuters.com/article/tencent-holdings-publishing-ipo-idUSL4N1FR2E2
Mon Feb 6, 2017 | 2:09am EST
*Tencent-backed China Reading plans up to $800 mln 2017 IPO-IFR*






Feb 6 China Reading, the country's largest online publishing and e-book company, plans to raise up to $800 million in an initial public offering in 2017, IFR reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the plans.

China Reading, which is backed by China's biggest social network and online entertainment firm Tencent Holdings Ltd, is in the process of selecting underwriters for the IPO and is considering Hong Kong as a likely listing venue,added IFR, a Thomson Reuters publication.

The company, also known as Yuewen Group, hasn't yet finalised a total fundraising target, but the deal could range between $600 million and $800 million, one of the people told IFR.

Tencent didn't immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment on the China Reading IPO plans.

China Reading was formed in 2015, when a Tencent unit took over Shanda Cloudary. (Reporting by Fiona Lau of IFR; Writing by Elzio Barreto;Editing by Kim Coghill)

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## ahojunk

Doordie said:


> *Mobile app helps China recover hundreds of missing children*
> 
> A mobile app helped Chinese authorities recover hundreds of missing children last year, Xinhua news agency reported on Saturday, in a country where child trafficking is rampant.
> 
> The Ministry of Public Security said 611 missing children were found last year, Xinhua said.
> 
> The "Tuanyuan", or "reunion" in Chinese, app developed by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd was launched in May and has allowed police officers to share information and work together.
> 
> Users near the location where a child has disappeared receive push notifications, including photos and descriptions. Notifications are sent to users farther and farther from the location of the disappearance if the child is still not found.
> 
> A new version of the app in November has expanded its reach through cooperation with other popular mobile apps, such as Alibaba's online shopping website Taobao, search engine Baidu, Tencent Holdings Ltd's instant messaging software QQ and mobile ride-sharing platform Didi Chuxing.
> 
> Child trafficking is common in China, where population control policies, although recently relaxed, have bolstered a traditional bias for male offspring.
> 
> Boys are seen as the main support for elderly parents and heirs to the family name. This has resulted in abortions, killings or abandonment of girls.
> 
> The imbalance has created criminal demand for abducted or bought baby boys, but also for baby girls destined to be future brides attracting rich dowries.
> 
> http://www.dawn.com/news/1313065/mobile-app-helps-china-recover-hundreds-of-missing-children


.
*China takes fight against child abduction online*
2017-02-04 18:40 Xinhua _Editor: Wang Fan_

China's Ministry of Public Security announced Saturday that 611 missing children were found last year, following the launch of an app in May.

During the period, 648 updates on missing children were posted. Of the 611, 27 had been abducted and 358 had run away from home, according to the ministry.

A new version of the platform that went live in November has expanded its reach through cooperation with other popular mobile apps, such as Amap,Taobao, Baidu, QQ and Didi Chuxing.

Users near where a child disappears receive push notifications, including photos and descriptions. The scope of these push notifications will be expanded over time.

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## 艹艹艹

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/tech/2017-02/07/content_28120760.htm
*Tech giants brand value on the up*
By JING SHUIYU | China Daily | Updated: 2017-02-07 07:20



















Alibaba's Executive Chairman Jack Ma delivers a speech at an investor conference at the company's headquarters in Hangzhou, East China's Zhejiang province, June 14, 2016. [Photo/Xinhua]

Chinese technology giants' brand value gained momentum and financial service companies are in pole position in the global brand league table, according to a report.

Fifty-five Chinese companies made to the list of the world's 500 most valuable brands this year, with the technology sector soaring in value.

Three tech powerhouses－Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, Huawei Technologies Co Ltd and Tencent Holdings Ltd－were in the top 50 and realized double-digit growth in their brand value, according to a study conducted by United Kingdom-based consulting firm Brand Finance.

Brand Finance CEO David Haigh said: "Chinese tech brands are even more embedded in the daily lives of their users than Western brands are, while the diversity of services offered by brands such as WeChat maximizes the commercial potential of their brands."

Alibaba reached a peak brand value of $34.8 billion, up 94 percent year-on-year, making it the world's 23rd most valuable brand and China's most valuable internet company brand.

Huawei and Tencent also grew impressively in brand value, rising 27.8 percent and 123 percent, respectively.

In terms of financial brands, the study showed that Chinese banks' brand value growth has been rapidly outpacing that of European and North American competitors.

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, now ranks 10th, ousting US bank Wells Fargo as the most valuable bank in the world.

The consulting firm attributed the industry's growth to "vast population, organic expansion, foreign M& A activity and positive relationships with Chinese consumers".

Likewise, Ping An Insurance held sway as the world's most valuable insurance brand, increasing 11 percent in value to $6.2 billion.

This year Google overtook Apple as the most valuable brand across all industries, with a value of $109 billion.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*JD reported to plan for banking license*
By Fan Feifei | China Daily | Updated: 2017-02-04 09:30


















View of the stand of JD Finance of Chinese online retailer JD.com during an exhibition in Shanghai, Nov 4, 2016. [Photo/IC]

JD.com Inc, China's second-biggest e-commerce player, said on Friday it is carrying out work related to financial service licenses, after media reports said the internet giant is willing to cooperate with a domestic traditional bank to open a direct bank, engaging in direct banking business as a separate legal entity.

A direct bank is a bank without any branch network that offers its services remotely via online banking and telephone banking and may also provide access via ATMs (often through interbank network alliances), mail and mobile.

JD on Friday declined to comment on the reports and would not disclose details.

It is not the first time that internet companies have engaged in direct online banking in China. In January, internet search provider Baidu Inc and China CITIC Bank announced they had received approval from the China Banking Regulatory Commission in relation to the establishment of Baixin Bank, an online direct bank both companies had invested in.

CITIC will hold a 70 percent stake in Baixin and Baidu will have a 30 percent share.

In 2015, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's financial arm, Ant Financial Services Group, launched an online private bank called MYbank, which focuses on providing financial services to small and micro businesses and young entrepreneurs.

Internet giant Tencent Holdings Ltd also launched an online bank called WeBank.

Dong Ximiao, executive president of the Hengfeng Bank Institute, said most of the domestic direct banks exist as an internal department of a bank, some even as a secondary unit affiliated to the e-banking department or personal finance department.

However, a direct bank should be a separate legal entity according to international practice, Dong said.

Basing on the majority of investment accounts, China is said to be the global leader in financial technology and Internet banking investments.

Financial technology (orfintech) attracted around half of all the total Chinese venture capital last year and major Internet banks have performed well financially relative to other startups.

Other Chinese companies are following this trend.Xiaomi, one of China’s biggest online smartphone vendors, bought a 30 percent stake in Sichuan XW Bank last December. Sichuan XW Bank is a major Internet bank in China that leverages data to target consumers and small businesses.

Meituan.com, a website that specializes in offering group-buy options to consumers, also formed Julin Yilian Bank, and received its banking licenses last Dec. 2016.

According to a joint report by the DBS bank and consultancy firm EY, fintech investments surged to about $8.8 billion in just 12 months.

Ant Financial is said to have raised $4.5 billion in early 2016. This is the largest single private placement in financial technology history, which boosted the company's valuation to $60 billion.

The traditional banking industry in China is the biggest growth enabler of fintech, as major banks generally focus on serving state-owned enterprises, large private companies and local and regional governments. The under-served sectors have been a major benefactor of Internet banks in recent years.

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## TaiShang

long_ said:


> http://www.reuters.com/article/tencent-holdings-publishing-ipo-idUSL4N1FR2E2
> Mon Feb 6, 2017 | 2:09am EST
> *Tencent-backed China Reading plans up to $800 mln 2017 IPO-IFR*
> 
> View attachment 375237
> 
> 
> Feb 6 China Reading, the country's largest online publishing and e-book company, plans to raise up to $800 million in an initial public offering in 2017, IFR reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the plans.
> 
> China Reading, which is backed by China's biggest social network and online entertainment firm Tencent Holdings Ltd, is in the process of selecting underwriters for the IPO and is considering Hong Kong as a likely listing venue,added IFR, a Thomson Reuters publication.
> 
> The company, also known as Yuewen Group, hasn't yet finalised a total fundraising target, but the deal could range between $600 million and $800 million, one of the people told IFR.
> 
> Tencent didn't immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment on the China Reading IPO plans.
> 
> China Reading was formed in 2015, when a Tencent unit took over Shanda Cloudary. (Reporting by Fiona Lau of IFR; Writing by Elzio Barreto;Editing by Kim Coghill)



You know, my bro, around 2010, when I was an MA in the US, Google was moaning, kicking dust, and threatening China with pulling from China and, on the internet, you would think there was going to be a revolution just because China was readying to kick the law-breaking foreign company and its extensions out of the land.

I think @grey boy 2 remembers this.

Beijing did not take a step back.

Of course, nothing happened, and Google and its likes were firmly booted out. Some commentators on very high places (as high as Forbes) argued that China's replacements for the likes of Google, FB or Twitter (grabbed by its **** and violated by Trump now every midnight) would never rise.

They argued that Tencent would never have indigenous technology. Baidu would never have good algorithms. Weibo would never be as good as Twitter. Youku or Tudou would never be as good as YouTube. We would be doomed, cast out, and left in cold without the immense knowledge a Google would give you.

It was like: either google, or no SSCI paper to be ever written in China. Indians were particularly ecstatic because now they, and they only, would enjoy the fruits of freedom and Google-created heavenly knowledge.

It, however, did not turn out how they believed it would. Now China has billion Yuan companies in every conceivable area of the internet sector. Now they are, in fact, grabbing up Indian and other companies.

Talking about scientific, pragmatic, visionary governance.

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## cirr

When will https://www.zhihu.com get listed?

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## TaiShang

*European consumers prefer to buy online from China: survey*

(People's Daily Online) February 08, 2017






(Photo/Xinhua)

A survey released recently by the International Post Corporation (IPC) indicated that purchases made through Amazon, eBay and Alibaba occupy two-thirds of global cross-border e-commerce. *China leads as the most popular market for consumers around the world, accounting for 26 percent of recent cross-border purchases,* Beijing Business Today reported on Feb. 6.

IPC sent questionnaires to over 24,000 consumers in 26 markets across North America, the Asia-Pacific and Europe. Statistics shows that, *compared with consumers in other countries, Chinese people are more likely to shop online, with 36 percent buying something online at least once a week.*

Free delivery and return policies are important elements driving cross-border e-commerce. *Chinese consumers enjoy the largest number of free deliveries anywhere in the world,* accounting for 78 percent of the total.

China is the most popular market for online consumers, followed by the U.S., Germany and U.K. The U.S. and China are the main markets for cross-border e-commerce in the Asia-Pacific and Canada.* European consumers buy most from the Chinese market. However, residents of Luxembourg, Belgium, Austria and Switzerland mainly buy from neighboring countries, which share a common language.*

The top four product categories purchased through cross-border e-commerce are shoes, hats and clothes; consumer electronics; books, music and media; and health and beauty. Most of the commodities are relatively light and inexpensive.

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## 艹艹艹

http://en.people.cn/n3/2017/0213/c90000-9176988.html
*Chinese top world's online shoppers*
(China Daily) 08:35, February 13, 2017



A 22-year-old online buyer in Moscow checks her dress bought from a Chinese e-commerce platform on Nov 3, 2016. BAI XUEQI/XINHUA​
*Survey reveals 36% of nationals buy from digital shops at least once a week*

The Chinese are more likely to shop online than consumers from any other country, according to the latest survey by the International Post Corporation, a Brussels-headquartered association on postal services.

In the second annual study of 24,000 respondents in 26 markets across North America, the Asia-Pacific and Europe, the IPC found that 36 percent of Chinese buy from digital sites at least once a week, a frequency far outstripping peer buyers.

China is also the most popular market for consumers around the world to shop from, accounting for 26 percent of most recent cross-border purchases, followed by the United States with 16 percent, Germany's 15 percent and the United Kingdom's 15 percent.

Purchases from China are more popular with younger people and women, while purchases from Germany receive warmer welcome by men and the elderly, the international study found.

Online marketplaces such as Amazon.com Inc, eBay Inc and Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd were the most sought-after avenues for buyers from almost all countries, accounting for around two-thirds of all cross-border purchases, the study said.

When analyzing the results by age, Alibaba's sites, including Alibaba.com and AliExpress, were notably favored by younger e-shoppers, while eBay was chosen by those aged 35-54.

China was the overall favored market for Europeans, but notable differences were seen in Luxembourg, Belgium, Austria or Switzerland where customers mainly bought from neighboring countries with a shared language. Meanwhile, the US and China were the main markets cross-border shoppers bought from in the Asia-Pacific region and in Canada.

The top four categories bought through cross-border transactions are clothing, footwear and apparel (33 percent), consumer electronics (21 percent), books, music and media (14 percent) and health and beauty (13 percent).

When looking at the value of items bought by cross-border online shoppers, most were low-weight and low-value items, with 45 percent weighing less than 500 grams and 16 percent valued less than 10 euros ($10.7), with a further 40 percent valued between 10 euros and 49 euros.

The survey also indicated that clear information about delivery charges, free returns and free delivery over a particular value, were the most important drivers for cross-border online shoppers.

It found that consumers were more likely to pay a premium for tracking rather than for speed of delivery. They preferred to pay for delivery of a tracked item that took five to eight days for delivery than an untracked item that took three to four days.

About 70 percent of cross-border online shoppers were offered tracking and 88 percent used it, mostly in the interim stage, to check on delivery progress.

Almost three-quarters of shoppers used the post for their most recent cross-border purchases. Overall, 87 percent were satisfied with their delivery experience. Only 6 percent returned their cross-border purchase, mostly using the post for the return.

The survey also looked at consumer delivery experiences, finding that most cross-border purchases had free shipping.

Around 59 percent of respondents received free shipping for their most recent cross-border e-commerce purchases, citing retail offers, promotions, product value and loyalty programs as key reasons. Chinese consumers benefited the most from free shipping, with 78 percent enjoying zero payment for parcel deliveries.

China's logistics sector is worth a total of $2.2 trillion, against the global sector's total value of $9 trillion, according to logistics consultancy Armstrong & Associates.

Of that, express deliveries bolstered by e-commerce accounted for $43.5 billion last year and was the fastest-growing segment, the consultancy said

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## AndrewJin

long_ said:


> China's logistics sector is worth a total of $2.2 trillion, against the global sector's total value of $9 trillion, according to logistics consultancy Armstrong & Associates.


Burgeoning E-commerce is beneficial to numerous industries in the country, creating millions of pertinent jobs and facilitating technological breakthroughs.

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## 艹艹艹

http://gbtimes.com/business/chinas-sina-weibo-becomes-more-valuable-twitter
*China’s Sina Weibo becomes more valuable than Twitter*
GBTIMES
2017/02/13




_China's Weibo has for the first time surpassed Twitter in market capitalisation. (Photo: Zhen Huai, China Daily)_

Chinese microblogging platform Sina Weibo has for the first time become more valuable than its US counterpart Twitter.

Weibo’s market capitalisation reached US$11.3 billion, about US$200 million higher than Twitter’s US$11.1 billion, Bloomberg reported on Monday.


__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/831081131982348288
Twitter’s share price has tumbled after the company last week posted a disappointing earnings report for the fourth quarter.

Twitter’s monthly users only grew by 2 million to 319 million, and the San Francisco-based company still failed to draw more advertisers even as US President Donald Trump frequently uses the service to post controversial messages.

In contrast, Sina Weibo’s market capitalisation has been rising thanks to growing user numbers and the perceived growth potential of social media advertising market in China.

Sina Weibo has more than 340 million monthly users and its ability to monetising its user base has been constantly improving, according to Financial Times.

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba owns a 31.5 percent stake in Sina Weibo.

Both Twitter and Facebook are blocked in the Chinese mainland.

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## TaiShang

Now China's decision kicked them out (due to their failure to comply with the law of the land) makes more sense.

More money value generated and stayed at home.

Besides, Twitter's character limitation generates more hatred and less constructive argument. On Twitter, even rational people sound idiotic.

Take Trump for example.

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## AndrewJin

TaiShang said:


> Now China's decision kicked them out (due to their failure to comply with the law of the land) makes more sense.
> 
> More money value generated and stayed at home.
> 
> Besides, Twitter's character limitation generates more hatred and less constructive argument. On Twitter, even rational people sound idiotic.
> 
> Take Trump for example.


That's because 140 Chinese characters could convey 10 times more than 140-letter English....

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## TaiShang

AndrewJin said:


> That's because 140 Chinese characters could convey 10 times more than 140-letter English....



Indeed, true. Chinese is much more expressive, in that regard. 140 characters can convey a very sound argument. In fact, 140 character is more than enough for an abstract in an academic article.

Also, from January last year, Weibo lifted 140-character limitation to 2000 characters for the first post.

Reposts, however, are still limited to 140-characters.

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## 艹艹艹

AndrewJin said:


> That's because 140 Chinese characters could convey 10 times more than 140-letter English....





TaiShang said:


> Indeed, true. Chinese is much more expressive, in that regard. 140 characters can convey a very sound argument. In fact, 140 character is more than enough for an abstract in an academic article.
> 
> Also, from January last year, Weibo lifted 140-character limitation to 2000 characters for the first post.
> 
> Reposts, however, are still limited to 140-characters.


Has already lifted restrictions
已经没有140个字的限制了

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## TaiShang

long_ said:


> Has already lifted restrictions
> 已经没有140个字的限制了



Yes, the restriction lifted more than a year ago, as far as I know.

We do not want to generate people like Trump that debate with no logic because there's character limitation.

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## Götterdämmerung

AndrewJin said:


> That's because 140 Chinese characters could convey 10 times more than 140-letter English....



English letters? I didn't know that an Englishman created the alphabet.

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## 艹艹艹

TaiShang said:


> Yes, the restriction lifted more than a year ago, as far as I know.
> 
> We do not want to generate people like Trump that debate with no logic because there's character limitation.


yes，Some of Mr Trump's remarks have undermined social stability, which is something that people do not want to see.

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## ahojunk

Qihoo 360 to Work with International Vulnerability Platforms to Build a Global White Hat Collaboration Mechanism
(People's Daily Online) 10:32, February 14, 2017







_(Photo: Courtesy of Qihoo 360)_

China’s leading Internet security company Qihoo 360 Enterprise Security Group will discuss with the world’s well-known vulnerability response platforms to jointly build an international white hat collaboration mechanism during the RSA Conference.

Under such mechanism, vulnerability response platforms shall cooperate in such aspects as vulnerability response, security testing and others to cope with the worldwide cyber attacks and the increasingly rampant global data breach and data trafficking, according to Qihoo 360.

Bai Jian, a head of Qihoo 360’s Butian Vulnerability Response Platform, revealed that Butian Platform has held several discussions with three well-known vulnerability platforms and the parties will also make in-depth consultations during the RSA Conference.

“We will cooperate on security test, vulnerability notification, etc., and sign the memorandum of understanding on cooperation at a right timing,” Bai said.

The Beijing-based company called to strengthen cooperation and collaboration between the vulnerability platforms of different countries and combine the respective technological advantages of Chinese and Western hackers, to effectively enhance security capabilities of websites. More extensive and timely vulnerability response conducive to the realization of technology and talent sharing will greatly promote the global Internet security capabilities.

The vulnerability platforms from different countries each pool a large team of white hat hackers, according to Qihoo 360.

The number of white hat hackers registered on the Butian Platform has reached more than 30,000, and the vulnerability platforms in the U.S. have issued bonuses to nearly 10,000 white hats hackers.

Due to the huge number of Internet users and the complex network environment, all countries also become the victims of cyber attacks and other criminal acts while benefiting from the Internet, said Qihoo 360 Enterprise Security Group President Wu Yunkun.

“Only through extensive international cooperation to create a comprehensive, wide-ranging, multi-level, effective coordination mechanism can we effectively curb the increasingly rampant, borderless cyber attacks and other criminal activities,” Wu said.

Cyber attacks facing China are characterized of obvious globalization features, warned the latest “2016 China Website Security Vulnerability Analysis Report” by 360 Internet Security Center.

As of November 15, 2016, Qihoo 360’s Internet Security software has blocked 1.71 billion various website vulnerability attacks, and in the full year, the number of websites that suffered vulnerability attacks reached 636,000. Among them, the overseas attackers accounted for 23.4%, and victims with IPs from outside of China accounted for 33.1%.

Similarly, according to the “2015 Network Security Report” issued by the National Computer Network Emergency Response Technical Team/Coordination Center of China (CNCERT or CNCERT/CC) , Anonymous and other overseas hack organizations has been continuously attacking sites in China.

In 2015 alone, among IP addresses that implemented backdoor attacks to sites in China, 31,348 were located outside of China, mainly from the U.S. (13.9%) and South Korea (6.0%) and other countries and regions.

Wu said cyber attacks from different countries are technically both interlinked and diversified. The resulting cyber criminal industry chain has also become borderless.

“For example, it has become common for cybercriminal gangs from China to set up phishing websites in Europe and the U.S. and then return to China for fraud through strict teamwork,” Wu said.

From illegal drugs to weapons, all kinds of network databases are almost all available in the dark web market.

In a recent list exposed, a well-known dark web provider called “DoubleFlag” was selling user data stolen from a number of Chinese Internet companies, and the amount of data was up to 1 billion, mainly from Tencent, Netease, Sina and other local Internet companies.

In the same list, DoubleFlag also provided user data stolen from other countries such as Japan, of which the account leaked from the three Yahoo domain names alone totaled 23.59 million.

Data sales trends in the dark web market began to emerge from 2016, and some data providers provided data from a number of key companies, including Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, and Dropbox.

Over the past few months, the amount of databases uploaded and sold by DoubleFlag was huge. Moreover, it began selling other information that is unique and highly sensitive, and even attractive to intelligence agencies around the world, including data stolen from the US-based Cellular Corporation, which owns and operates the fifth largest telecommunications network in the U.S. and provides services for 4.9 million customers in 426 major markets across 23 states in the country, containing information like names, addresses, cities, states and cell numbers of 130 million Americans.

While among the vulnerabilities recorded by the 360 Butian Platform in 2015, more than 1,400 could cause personal information leakage, which may leak as many as 5.53 billion pieces of information.

In 2016, it collected more than 300 new vulnerabilities that may lead to personal information leakage, which may leak as many as more than 5 billion pieces of personal information.

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## onebyone

*Big-Data Technology Takes Root in China’s Farms*
By Huang Shulun and Teng Jing Xuan
Feb 23, 2017 04:38 PM





_A 24-hour online monitoring camera is stationed in an agriculture cooperative in Dexing, Jiangxi province, in September 2015. Chinese farmers are increasingly relying on big-data analytics instead of personal experience to manage their farms. Photo: IC_

When Lin, an asparagus farmer in Guangdong province, wants to check on his crops, he pulls out his smartphone. An app called Nongyan (Mandarin for “farming eye”) sends him readings from sensors in his fields.

If he notices the soil temperature climbing higher than 28 degrees Celsius, Lin, a former engineer, responds by misting his plants to make sure their roots stay moist.

“Asparagus is a thirsty crop,” he explains.

Lin is one of many Chinese farmers who now depend on big-data analytics to manage their farms.

“From selecting seed varieties, determining planting density, to pest and disease control, effective fertilizer use, harvesting, and storage, farmers make 40 to 50 major decisions each year, and these decisions all shape the farm’s eventual output,” said Gao Yong, president of Monsanto China.

These decisions, thanks to a growing interest in big data, are increasingly being based on algorithms rather than human experience.

This change is driven by a combination of top-down reforms, increasingly well-educated young farmers, and agriculture companies sensing a gap in the market.

*Pig Data*

In China’s massive pork industry, data-driven livestock management has been gaining popularity.

Beijing Nongxin Hulian Technology Co., Ltd., the tech subsidiary of agriculture giant Beijing Dabeinong Technology Group Co. Ltd., introduced the Zhulianwang (literally, “Pig Network”) platform in May 2015. The platform combines services like an online hog market, epidemic alerts and a mobile “pig-rearing assistant” app. Zhulianwang’s network now covers about 12,000 farms across China, or a total of nearly 20 million pigs.

Zhulianwang’s mobile app can give farmers real time updates on sows’ fertility status, predict when pigs will be fully grown and ready for slaughter, and tell when a litter is due to be delivered, or weaned. If pigs fall ill, farmers can send queries via Zhulianwang to online veterinarians.

Zhulianwang uses location data from individual queries to form a map of regional disease trends, and when the volume of queries from a particular location reaches a certain level, the platform issues epidemic warnings.

At the moment, about 60% of the data Zhulianwang collects comes from users manually submitting information. But data collection is becoming increasingly automated. For example, Nongxin Hulian recently introduced an ultrasound scanner that seamlessly collects data whenever farmers use it.

A major aim of Zhulianwang is to help farmers raise as many pigs as possible.

“We found that pigs were being bred very inefficiently, and the fundamental reason was that farmers lacked information,” Nongxin Hulian President Xue Suwen said.

Farmers traditionally decide when to wean and breed pigs based on their personal knowledge of pig physiology, but that’s no match for the precise algorithms services like Zhulianwang uses. According to the company, farms using Zhulianwang produced two more “growers” (the industry term for weaned pigs) for every sow in 2016, compared to the previous year.

It’s not just farm management practices that are being transformed. Zhulianwang also offers financial services to farms, traders, and slaughterhouses. Being able to access vast quantities of data on livestock means lenders can assign more accurate credit ratings to businesses in the pork industry, Xue said.

Increasingly well-educated young farmers and agribusiness owners are eagerly adopting high-tech services like Zhulianwang and Nongyan, which is owned by Guangzhou-based AirAG Technology Ltd.

An executive at agricultural data startup Hua Nong Tian Shi Technology Co. Ltd. told Caixin that many of the customers she encounters are second-generation farmers who have returned to their home provinces to work in agriculture after graduating from college, and who are willing to invest more in efficiency-raising technology.

Another factor is the increasing circulation of agricultural land in China. Farmland in China is owned by the state, and those who have the right to work the land cannot always transfer this right at will. But the central government has in recent years relaxed restrictions on rural families leasing out their land use rights, which means it’s now easier for large-scale farms to consolidate land and expand operations.

“After the right to cultivate the land has changed hands, the new users of the land aim to maximize profit, and cut costs, so they need precision,” said Yi Binghong, CEO of AirAG.

For companies providing big-data services, the motivation is often simply to grow their main businesses.

“We sell pig feed, so if pig farmers breed their animals more efficiently and do well, we’ll be able to sell more feed,” Nongxin Hulian’s Xue said.

Wen Han Qiuzi quit a research position at a Canadian government agency in 2014 to found Hua Nong Tian Shi in Beijing. At the time, most of the provincial authorities and farmers she spoke to thought that big data was a nice idea, but an abstract one far removed from the reality of their own lives. But the central government’s 13th Five-Year Plan, released in 2015, brought big data to the forefront as a real, practical way to reform the country’s agriculture sector, Wen said.

In late January, China’s Ministry of Agriculture announced its intention in 2017 to encourage the integration of big data analytics into four main areas: planting, protected horticulture, livestock breeding, and agriculture.

*Room for growth*

Consumers are also a major reason for the move toward big data in agriculture. Chinese consumers today are increasingly concerned about nutrition and food safety, Yi said. Allowing consumers to access data collected about crops in the field can “help them quickly judge the pros and cons of each product.”

Zhu, another Guangdong farmer, has an orchard with over 1,000 pomelo trees. His main reason for using Nongyan is so that “consumers can understand how exactly our pomelos are grown, and know that our fruits are safe to eat,” said Zhu.

Growers using Nongyan can tag their produce with QR Codes, which consumers can then scan using smartphones to access information on where and how each item was grown.

“The biggest headache for the agriculture sector today is information asymmetry,” Wei Junzhong, designer of ZOME corn trading app, said. Apps harnessing big data could solve issues of transparency in the food supply chain, in a country where concerns about tainted produce still weigh heavily on consumers’ minds.

Expectations are high for how big-data analytics can change China’s agriculture sector. But the technology, and the companies that offer it, are still in their infancy.

“At least 70% of companies offering big data services in agriculture don’t actually have enough data at the moment. It’ll take them another two or three years to collect all the data they need,” Xue said.

Additionally, big data service providers face an uphill task convincing more traditionally minded farmers to abandon their existing methods. It doesn’t help that the quality of farm management apps available today is inconsistent. Farmers have complained that some apps are impractical to use, or “don’t help very much” to raise farm productivity.

Asparagus farmer Lin looks forward to the day when agriculture apps can provide even more detailed, dynamic monitoring of crop conditions, including factors like soil pH and salinity.

The real key to improving crop quality is a “deeper understanding of soil,” Lin said.

Other industry insiders say Chinese companies need to provide one-stop comprehensive platforms in order to be of real use to farmers. The agricultural model of the future will integrate information on numerous factors as diverse as environmental conditions, warehousing and logistics, and provide links to third-party services like agricultural loans, insurance, and futures trading, former Monsanto China executive Liu Shi said.

“U.S. companies like Monsanto and Cargill are already aware of this, and are racing to perfect this system,” Liu said.

http://www.caixinglobal.com/2017-02-23/101058367.html

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## AndrewJin

It is happening, the world (some parts of the world) is reshaping.

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## onebyone

*Why China's Silicon Valley Is a Magnet for Tech Millennials*
Bloomberg News
February 24, 2017, 2:57 PM GMT+11

When Alex Chen and his brother Harrison wanted to get their ping pong-playing robot up and running, it wasn't Silicon Valley they turned to for help.

Instead it was Shenzhen, a former fishing village bordering Hong Kong that has the strongest claim to be China's answer to Silicon Valley. About a thousand startup accelerators are active in the city, drawn by its proximity to factories capable to churning out all manner of gadgets.

"It's the capital for hardware,'' said Duncan Turner, managing director for accelerator Hax. "All the suppliers are here, you've got an ecosystem of both manufacturers and also critically, engineering expertise.''

Shenzhen is now home to more than 11 million people and some of China's most recognizable technology names, including Huawei, Tencent and dronemaker DJI.

_— With assistance by Robert Fenner

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...licon-valley-is-a-magnet-for-tech-millennials_

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## TaiShang

Pig data, lol. 



AndrewJin said:


> It is happening, the world (some parts of the world) is reshaping.



It is important to merge agriculture with IoT in order to ensure food security, much better quality control, climate adjustments, as well as market-price regulations.

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## 艹艹艹

https://techcrunch.com/2017/02/27/j...-kick-start-its-android-alternative-in-china/
*Jolla inks exclusive license to kick-start its Android alternative in China*
Posted 10 minutes ago by Natasha Lomas (@riptari)






Mobile OS maker Jolla, whose Sailfish platform remains one of the few smartphone alternatives in play these days, has signed an exclusive license to a Chinese consortium to develop a Sailfish-based OS for the country.

Jolla says the Chinese consortium will be aiming to invest $250M in developing a Sailfish ecosystem for the country, though it’s not specifying exactly is backing the consortia at this point, nor over what timeframe the investment will happen — beyond saying one of its early investors, a local private equity investor Shan Li, will take a “leading role” in building it up.

“There are very big players behind it,” Jolla chairman Antti Saarnio tells TechCrunch, speaking ahead of a press conference held to announce the news here at the Mobile World Congress tradeshow in Barcelona.

“We are discussing with very big players joining in. We are not granting this [exclusive] licence for small businesses — it’s some very big Chinese players joining this. They have both the financial and other resources to scale the operating system in China.”

“What we have been talking about is starting with the security phone area, so there are corporate and government use-cases where a secure mobile operating system is needed. That’s the first use-case that we are going to start implementing [with the China consortium],” he adds. “In addition to this I would say there’s lot of potential in other areas like TV, also IoT, smartwatches, maybe smart home areas. Those are areas which we, Jolla, did not enter into those areas — because our own resources have been so limited.

“But of course the Chinese market is huge, and those players have the resources to scale this operating system into various new areas.”

If you’re feeling a sense of deja-vu you’d be right; Jolla announced a plan to create a China ecosystem for Sailfish all the way back in 2012 — with a similar amount slated for ecosystem investment then too. However Saarnio says it’s essentially taken what was then a very small startup five years to get the ball rolling and convince Chinese players to look beyond the Android Open Source Project — and invest in an alternative mobile platform that’s not ultimately controlled by Google’s corporate agenda.

“It seems that the market has finally learnt,” he says. “What’s happening at the moment in China is that all the biggest players like Alibaba, Baidu, Tencent, they have their own concepts where they are building [platforms]. For example Alibaba is building their own smart hub concept, their own car industry smart car concept and so on. And there are many very large players who need to compete with these projects and they are missing their operating system solutions — so we are talking to these kinds of companies.”

Alternative mobile OSes are essentially an endangered species these days, given the smartphone market lies prone in the grip of Android domination, with iOS getting to cream off most of the profit at the high end. Analyst Gartner gave the ‘others’ category just 0.2 per cent market share at the last count.

Yet Helsinki-headquartered Jolla — one of those few remaining ‘others’ — isn’t giving up pushing its Sailfish mobile OS, although it almost got snuffed out in a funding death valley back in late 2015. And despite dabbling with making its own hardware initially, Jolla has since shifted away from the consumer hardware space, to trying to license the OS to corporates and governments by offering a non-Android based open platform that they can mould to their needs (but which does also have Android app compatibility built it).

The main target for Jolla’s Sailfish sales pitch now is countries seeking a non-US-controlled mobile platform on which they can build a services strategy.

Back in November, for example, Jolla gained Russian certification for the Sailfish OS to be used for government and corporate use in the country — the first substantial win for the approach.

And today the first Sailfish device for the Russian market is also being announced by Jolla’s local licensee there, Open Mobile Platform. “There seems to be very strong political support for Sailfish Russia project, and I think that their agenda will be expanding quite rapidly,” says Saarnio.

In November he told TechCrunch Jolla was also in talks with the Chinese government, though he described it as a “more complex” country to negotiate with. But having secured an agreement with Russia, he said he was hopeful of movement in China and elsewhere — and now it looks like things are coming together for Jolla in the Far East.

Might the Chinese government be a future user of Sailfish-powered devices built by the new local consortium? “Of course we are aiming for that,” says Saarnio. “We are opening discussions to the government direction.

“How it went in Russia was we got investors and licensing partner who had good connections to government, and then we proved that we have a working solution for Russia. And then we got the government support. And now in China we are going to implement the same path.”

Saarnio reckons that within 10 to 12 months the China consortium should have Sailfish devices in the local market. Though it remains to be seen whether the consortium’s goal of pushing an alternative to the dominant Android platform is able to gain traction.

Also today, Jolla is announcing a strategic partnership with the Jala Group, a high tech holding in Bolvia which provides cloud services to enterprises. The hope there is also to move towards developing a Sailfish strategy for the region, says Saarnio, although he describes the project as at a “pilot phase” — and says it’s too early to say when any devices might result.

Another announcement from Jolla today is it’s adding support for Sony’s Open Devices Program — meaning developers looking to run Sailfish on additional hardware will be able to choose from certain Sony Xperia devices in future. The Xperia X will be first in line to get support, and is being demoed by Jolla running Sailfish here at MWC.

Jolla says it’s aiming to release an official version of the Sailfish OS for a range of Sony Mobile’s Xperia devices “soon”. It last released a community device of its own making,the Jolla C, back in May 2016.

“For us it’s very important that we have a solid hardware partner to offer Sailfish devices to the market,” says Saarnio. “And Sony is the perfect partner for these kind of secure devices. For us it was too much to develop our own phone in an organization that is focused on software development, so I think this is a very good move from our side in that our developers can keep a proper device for Sailfish and use that. And why not our fans as well?”

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## 艹艹艹

long_ said:


> “We are discussing with very big players joining in. We are not granting this [exclusive] licence for small businesses — it’s some very big Chinese players joining this. They have both the financial and other resources to scale the operating system in China.”


*who？*

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## AndrewJin

long_ said:


> *who？*


People who have ambitions as well as Money.

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## 艹艹艹

AndrewJin said:


> People who have ambitions as well as Money.



I guess it's a mobile phone manufacturer.

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## ahojunk

It will be interesting to see who are the Jolla partners in China.

I could be wrong but it could just be Jolla's marketing hype to get more funding and partners.

IMO, if there is a Chinese alternative to Android, it will be from one of the big guys, i.e. Alibaba, Baidu or Tencent. They have to resources to do it.

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## ahojunk

*Tencent's Ma envisions Chinese 'Silicon Valley'*
(China Daily) 09:43, March 04, 2017





_Ma Huateng, Chairman of Tencent and deputy of the National People's Congress, answers reporters' questions ahead of the fifth plenary session of the 12th NPC in Beijing on Friday. FENG YONGBIN/CHINA DAILY_

China should introduce favorable policies to turn the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Bay Area into the cradle of China's "Silicon Valley", national legislator Ma Huateng said on Friday.

Constructing a world-class high-tech Bay Area is critical to implementing China's innovation-driven strategy, said Ma, who also chairs internet giant Tencent, at a news conference ahead of the fifth session of the 12th National People's Congress, which begins on Sunday.

The proposal is also conducive to the long-term prosperity of the region, he said, especially for Hong Kong and Macao, which have untapped potential to deepen economic interdependence with the mainland.

Ma said the area is home to China's leading tech industries and financial services, as well as being a manufacturing hub, perfectly positioning it to become a global innovation center.

"Hong Kong will take the lead among these cities in international transportation, as well as in accounting and financial, legal and other commercial services. Dongguan specializes in manufacturing. And Shenzhen hosts China's tech giants, such as Tencent and Huawei, as well as drone maker DJI," he said.

To bolster growth, Ma encouraged the adoption of preferential tax rebate policies in the area and loosening entry permission between the mainland and Hong Kong to retain talent.

Guangdong Governor Ma Xingrui, speaking during the local political consultative and legislative sessions, said the three places will work together on building a world-class city cluster in the region this year.

The Bay Area is one of China's most affluent regions. In 2016, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Hong Kong each either reached or neared 2 trillion yuan ($290 billion) in gross domestic product.

Construction of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge, the world's longest cross-sea bridge, connecting Zhuhai in Guangdong with Hong Kong and Macao, is expected to be finished by next year, further integrating the region, he added.

Lin Jiang, an economics professor at Sun Yat-sen University, said Ma's idea to turn the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Bay Area into China's "Silicon Valley" is "realizable", as regional cooperation is becoming closer with preferential policies from the Guangdong Free Trade Zone.

"The Bay Area can serve as the country's experimental field for new technologies and emerging industries."


********

_Brilliant idea from a business entrepreneur and NPC legislator!
The beauty of China's political system._
.

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## ahojunk

If this proposed "Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Bay Area" comes to fruition, it will provide good competition to Zhongguancun in Beijing and elsewhere in China (such as Wuhan's Optical Valley, etc).

Competition is what keeps the companies on their toes. 

But I have the feeling that "Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Bay Area" will win as it already has the hardware Silicon Valley in Shenzhen.


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## Dungeness

*BBC: Why China's Internet Use Has Overtaken The West*
*We’ve reached a watershed moment in Chinese people’s online lives – and their innovation will lead the way for the rest of the world.*

David Robson 9 March 2017

Four years ago, the British anthropologist Tom McDonald set-up home in Anshan, a small rural town between Beijing and Shanghai. His aim was to study the way local people used social media – but even they were perplexed at his decision.

“They wanted to know why on Earth someone would choose to live in a place like this,” says McDonald. To them, the town was a backwater that many hoped to escape – hardly the thriving hub of technological change. But Anshan’s relative isolation was the precise reason McDonald had come.

*'The Chinese Internet is like an online carnival' – Tom McDonald*

*Even the connectivity in somewhere like Anshan beats many places in the West. “Before I left the field site, they had 4G,” he says. “I mean, the village where I’m from in Yorkshire still doesn’t have 4G!* So there are these interesting contrasts – people have modern lifestyles and lots of exposure to modernity in rural China now.”

And that progress is only accelerating. Both in the services available – including the widespread use of virtual money – and the ways people are using them, the Chinese are now a long way ahead of the West. And we would do well to watch places like Anshan as well as Beijing, if we want a glimpse of our own future.

Based on raw statistics, China has been at the forefront of internet access for almost a decade. Having overtaken the US in 2008, there are now nearly 700 million Chinese users online today – many with high-speed connections. And although a majority of those users come from the country’s big metropolises, around 178 million of those users can be found in rural towns like Anshan, whose population numbers just 6,000.

The lives of people in rural China are being changed by lots of new technology, not just high-speed internet (Credit: Gillian Bolsover)

Notwithstanding a few crossed-wires – some of the locals believed that he was an IT expert, and would often ask him for help with their technical issues – McDonald found that Anshan’s residents were more than happy to help with his research on their internet use.

At the time, two social networks proved to be the most popular – QQ and WeChat – while the microblogging platform Sina Weibo, arguably the more famous network outside of the country, had far fewer users.

One of the primary attractions was the apps’ instant messaging, used in place of regular email at work and at home. “There’s still very much a sentiment that the people you work with should be your friends, which makes working in China exhausting, because you are more committed to your colleagues,” McDonald says. “But it also means that people value a form of interaction, where you can continually message people in an informal way.”

*If QQ is a supercharged Facebook, WeChat is something like WhatsApp on steroids*

Both QQ and WeChat are far more than an email replacement, however. QQ, for instance, offers a profile page (in the Qzone), complete with a personalised animated introduction sequence, along with a timeline and diary to share your ta de dongtai (‘happenings’). It can also be used to access an extensive gaming network to access international games like World of Warcraft as well as home-grown games like Dream of Three Kingdoms.

If QQ is a supercharged Facebook, WeChat is something like WhatsApp on steroids. McDonald demonstrates the Drift Bottle function, for instance, which lets you record a short message and throw it into a virtual ocean, where it will be retrieved by a random user at a later point. WeChat will also let you view and chat to people nearby – “So it is more like Grindr or Tinder or whatever” – and if you are feeling lonely, you can also vigorously shake your phone – which again, makes you visible to strangers across the whole network who may also feel like a chat. It proved to be popular for university students, for instance, who used the ‘Shake’ function to make friends. (Currently, WeChat has more than 700 million users worldwide, most of whom are in China.)

_*One of the core differences, from British social media use, was the fact that the people of Anshan tended to shy away from political pronouncements on their profile pages – “not because of censorship, but just because all the people around them would ask why are you posting that on here,” says McDonald.*_ Instead, their updates tended to be centred on the family and relationships with somewhat saccharine images and messages – perhaps as a way of upholding some of the values at the heart of their rural community.

And McDonald found that the users were always experimenting with the ways they could adapt and apply the technology: one local business owner, for instance, tried to use his Tinder-style feature to attract customers to his barbecue restaurant. “So when they were looking for people nearby, they would see his restaurant.”

He was also struck by the colourful memes shooting around the Qzone, and the lively emojis – including, for instance, hundreds of ways of expressing Happy New Year. “There’s this kind of vernacular creativity that is really astounding.” All of which helped to show that Chinese internet use is far more varied and colourful than many had appreciated – a thesis that McDonald recently presented in his book (which is free to downoad).

Chinese technology moves fast, however. And since McDonald left Anshan for Hong Kong in 2014, many new features have emerged – including the networks’ own digital money. “You can book a taxi, get food deliveries, use it for savings, use it to pay your electricity bill, use it to book train tickets,” he says.

*'The penny hasn’t dropped that this is a really important change in people’s relationship with the state'*

He recently explored the phenomenon among relatively poor, migrant workers in Shenzhen, who had travelled across the country to work in phone factories. “We were walking down the street and almost every shop takes the stuff – so you can pay for a bottle of water or can of Coke with it,” he says. In this way, it has already proven to be far more popular than credit cards – which tended to be harder to obtain for people without permanent jobs.

Clearly, these companies are gathering a huge amount data from their users, yet it doesn’t seem to be a primary concern for many of these workers. “A lot of Westerners would think, ‘why am I giving all my data to just one company?’” says Guo Yanan, one of McDonald’s students who also worked on the project in Shenzhen. Instead, she says that many Chinese people are just pleased to have so much of their life consolidated in one app. “Maybe it’s because of the government having taken care of people’s life, but they think it’s just convenient.”

It’s an interesting comparison. In the past, Chinese workers would have had to invest their money in a bank backed by the government. “And so it’s a very important moment in China, where money’s leaving these state-owned enterprises and it’s going into a private company,” McDonald explains. This comes with a risk, of course – a state-owned bank is far more protected against bankruptcy. Yet very few people had thought about that possibility. “The penny hasn’t dropped that this is a really important change in people’s relationship with the state.”

*Whatever the risks it brings, McDonald thinks that we have only just witnessed the beginning of this revolution – and we could learn a lot from that creativity. “We used to think that Chinese people just copied the West, but when you go onto WeChat and TaoBao and AliBaba, it’s just astounding because it’s so much more than what we have in the UK – you can get anything, do anything, and it’s linked together in a very logical and easy to use way. We’ll be looking at them a lot in the future.”*

_David Robson is BBC Future’s feature writer. He is __@d_a_robson__ on twitter_.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170309-why-chinas-internet-reveals-where-were-headed-ourselves

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## Dungeness

CNN: Living without cash in China


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## AndrewJin

Cashless society, afraid by @Götterdämmerung, is simply unstoppable.
I don't care the big companies know my eating habits, I just don't want to bring any coins or notes.

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## Kyle Sun

because we are a developing country.


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## Dungeness

AndrewJin said:


> Cashless society, afraid by @Götterdämmerung, is simply unstoppable.
> I don't care the big companies know my eating habits, I just don't want to bring any coins or notes.



It is the dawn of things to come. China is taking the lead! Just like HSR, electrical cars, among many other things.

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## cirr

I am so darn lazy these days that I could hardly be bothered with sending texts in Wechat.

Instead I use Wechat mostly for voice message or video talk.

Only

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## TaiShang

Dungeness said:


> *If QQ is a supercharged Facebook, WeChat is something like WhatsApp on steroids*



That explains why China's government was super-smart, ultra-visionary, and mega-pragmatic to protect home industries in their nascent periods.

If China's government were not smart, visionary, and pragmatic, we could not have spoken of a complete indigenous national internet ecosystem that is larger than the leaders of industrial and technological revolutions in some not too distant past.

Just put yourself in the shoes of a country in which FB, Twitter and What'sApp are the leading medias and imagine how much you would have suffered in terms of lost opportunities in the form of money, technology, employment, innovation...

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## Dungeness

TaiShang said:


> *That explains why China's government was super-smart, ultra-visionary, and mega-pragmatic to protect home industries in their nascent periods.*
> 
> If China's government were not smart, visionary, and pragmatic, we could not have spoken of a complete indigenous national internet ecosystem that is larger than the leaders of industrial and technological revolutions in some not too distant past.
> 
> Just put yourself in the shoes of a country in which FB, Twitter and What'sApp are the leading medias and imagine how much you would have suffered in terms of lost opportunities in the form of money, technology, employment, innovation...




Good point！

Many of our friends here are so proud that they get to use FB etc., as if this was a proof they were "Freer" than Chinese. When they realize their internet ecosystem is in the hands of foreign multinationals, it is already too late. Their IT industries have already been castrated for good, and they can never have a chance to catch up with China's QQ, WeChat, WeiBo, Tmall, Taobao, Baidu, etc. Maybe this is the price to pay for their "democracy"?

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## TaiShang

Dungeness said:


> Good point！
> 
> Many of our friends here are so proud that they get to use FB etc., as if this was a proof they were "Freer" than Chinese. When they realize their internet ecosystem is in the hands of foreign multinationals, it is already too late. Their IT industries have already been castrated for good, and they can never have a chance to catch up with China's QQ, WeChat, WeiBo, Tmall, Taobao, Baidu, etc. Maybe this is the price to pay for their "democracy"?



Those friends of ours are free to be backwards, un-innovative, poor, and not in total control of their internet industry. In fact that does not hurt us because it saves us from unnecessary (potential) competition. To all their heart's desire, they can fill their stomach with democracy, if democracy means to make their countries a technological/industrial pariah of the West.

I am just happy how it has so far occurred for China. If our leadership had taken the advice from the West, today we would be proud of the next Twitter update on our phones. That would be the only pride left to us.

And that would be demeaning.

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## JSCh

*National big data engineering lab unveiled*
By Ouyang Shijia | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-03-11 19:47

China's first national engineering laboratory for big data distribution and exchange technologies was officially unveiled on Saturday in Beijing, in a move to seek breakthroughs in research, application of big data and boost China's digital economy.

Founded by Shanghai Data Exchange Corp, China Internet Network Information Center, China United Network Communications Group Co, Fudan University and China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, the national engineering lab aims to enhance China's ability in supporting fundamental sectors of big data. Inspur Group Co Ltd also contributed to the lab's launch.

"We are really honored to have the opportunity to lead the construction of the national engineering lab. We will work closely with our partners to promote the research of key technologies and applications of big data in different fields," said Tang Qifeng, CEO of Shanghai Data Exchange Corp.

According to Tang, the lab will develop core technologies of big data, build application and innovation centers in terms of finance, media, energy, healthcare, education, advanced manufacturing and other areas and launch research centers to help the nation better manage big data.

Yang Shanlin, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and director of the national engineering lab, said the key is to further the application of big data.

"The application drives the development of both big data technologies and related industries," he added.

In February, China's National Development and Reform Commission formally approved the construction of the National Engineering Laboratory for Big Data Distribution and Exchange Technologies. Tang said about one third of the investment came from the NDRC and the rest was contributed by Shanghai Data Exchange Corp and its partners.

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## AndrewJin

cirr said:


> I am so darn lazy these days that I could hardly be bothered with sending texts in Wechat.
> 
> Instead I use Wechat mostly for voice message or video talk.
> 
> Only


I only use voice message/video message/video phone/voice phone with closed friends and family.


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## Dungeness

AndrewJin said:


> I only use voice message/video message/video phone/voice phone with closed friends and family.



Here we still heavily rely on old fashion voice call and text. There are too many WeChat like apps, Whatsapp, Line, Snapchat..... and they don't talk to each other.


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## AndrewJin

Dungeness said:


> Here we still heavily rely on old fashion voice call and text. There are too many WeChat like apps, Whatsapp, Line, Snapchat..... and they don't talk to each other.


Too many similar apps are the problem.


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## TaiShang

*Alibaba revenue surges 60% in 4th fiscal quarter*
Xinhua | Updated: 2017-05-19 







Two men chat beside a logo of Alibaba at its headquarters on the outskirts of Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. [Photo/Agencies]


HANGZHOU - China's e-commerce giant Alibaba said Thursday that its quarterly revenue jumped 60 percent year on year in the fourth fiscal quarter ending March.

The group's revenue was about 38.6 billion yuan ($5.6 billion) in the quarter, beating market expectations, Alibaba said. This was Alibaba's highest quarterly revenue growth since a public initial offering.

*The company said that the figure was mainly driven by robust revenue growth across all its segments, "in particular our China commerce retail revenue growth."*

Revenue in the fiscal year surged 56 percent to about 158.3 billion yuan year on year, according to Alibaba.

Meanwhile, the annual number of active buyers on its retail platform in China climbed to 454 million, while the monthly number of active users on its mobile platform reached 507 million.

Daniel Zhang, chief executive officer of Alibaba, said the robust quarter demonstrated Alibaba's successful interaction with its 500 million consumers as well as its ability to create value.

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## JSCh

Tuesday, May 23, 2017, 11:22
*Alibaba gets smart about deliveries*
By He Wei in Hangzhou



Employees of a delivery service company use robots to sort parcels in Yiwu, Zhejiang province. (Photo/Xinhua)

Cainiao Network Technology Co Ltd, a courier aggregator backed by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, unveiled on Monday a smart logistics platform that uses 1 million new energy vehicles for express delivery, the latest move to ride China's logistics boom.

By partnering with automakers including SAIC Motor Corp Ltd and Dongfeng Motor Group Co, Cainiao will dedicate the cars to couriers and merchants for smart transportation, which features the use of big data, cloud computing and artificial intelligence in goods delivery.

The company also pledged to provide 50 billion yuan ($7.26 billion) of financial support through MYBank, a financial unit under Alibaba, to support couriers, supply chain companies and drivers, Cainiao President Wan Lin told the 2017 Global Smart Logistics Summit in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, where Alibaba is headquartered.

Wan predicted the platform would save 10 billion yuan in logistics expenditure annually, as it trims the rate at which its vehicles travel empty and reduces the driving distance via intelligent route planning using a leading algorithm.

China's courier industry is expected to be handling 1 billion parcels per day within five to eight years, but few couriers have developed the capabilities needed to cope with that astonishing amount, said Jack Ma, Alibaba's billionaire founder and chairman.

Ma added that the massive number of packages handled during Single's Day - when many online retailers offer massive discounts - will soon become a daily reality.

"That's why we are calling on all express delivery firms to transform into data companies and embrace new technologies," he said.

Unlike Amazon.com Inc or domestic rival JD.com Inc, Alibaba does not own its logistics infrastructure but uses Cainiao to assemble a network of delivery firms and builds a data platform that enables speedier and more efficient service by letting couriers bundle deliveries in the same area.

Combining upstream selling data on e-commerce platforms, couriers can realize virtually end-to-end forecasting, halving the time for parcel sorting, Wan noted. New technologies can also cut time, cost and errors in delivery through standardizing addresses and using digital labeling codes.

China's smart logistics market is projected to grow fivefold to 1 trillion yuan by 2025, an emerging segment that is poised to drive the next phase of growth in the world's largest logistics market, which hit 11 trillion yuan in 2016, said He Liming, head of China the Federation of Logistics and Purchasing.

New applications, such as driverless cars and drone deliveries, will also help lower the logistics cost to GDP ratio, a key gauge tracking economic efficiency, to 10 percent in the coming years, down from 14.9 percent in 2016, He said.

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## cirr

*Alibaba to help build China's first big data college to offer postgraduate courses*

2017-05-24 08:57

Global Times _Editor: Li Yan_

China's first big data college to provide both undergraduate and master's programs will be set up in Chengdu, Southwest China's Sichuan Province, a move to meet the country's future demand for talents as its big data industry develops.

The Chengdu University of Information Technology and Aliyun, Internet giant Alibaba's cloud computing subsidiary, jointly announced in Chengdu Tuesday during the 2017 Yunxi summit, one of China's largest cloud computing events, that they will work together to build the college.

The Sichuan college will be the third Alibaba big data school but the first to provide postgraduate courses to students, china.com.cn reported.

The college, which is slated to start recruitment in 2018, will cultivate 1,000 advanced talents specializing in sectors including cloud computing, big data security and artificial intelligence within next five years, according to reports.

The college is also expected to provide big data-related training to government officials, businessmen and students, including two of Alibaba's well-recognized global big data talent certification programs.

It is estimated that China will need 1.8 million big data professionals in the next 3 to 5 years, about 1.5 million more than it has now.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/05-24/258755.shtml

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## JSCh

* China launches big data engineering lab for government management *
_ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2017-05-25 19:32:44_|_Editor: Mengjie_






People visit a demonstration center of Guizhou big data pilot zone in Guiyang, capital of southwest China's Guizhou Province, May 25, 2017. The demonstration center is located in Guanshanhu District of Guiyang, with a construction area of 4,300 square meters. The mountainous Guizhou Province has become a pioneer in China's big data development due to a moderate climate, sufficient power supply and good network infrastructure. (Xinhua/Liu Xu)

GUIYANG, May 25 (Xinhua) -- China's first big data engineering laboratory newly launched in Guizhou Province is expected to help improve government management efficiency.

The lab, officially set up Wednesday, has several functions, including collecting and analyzing administrative data, offering privacy protection of data and applying big data technology to government decision making, clean government supervision, social management and public services.

The lab is located in the national high-tech industrial development zone in the provincial capital Guiyang.

"It will focus on the study of big data dedicated to government management and encourage the application and industrialization of big data in government management efficiency," said Wang Daming, head of the Council of National Engineering Laboratory.

The National Development and Reform Commission approved the joint construction of the laboratory by Guizhou and China Electronics Technology Group Corporation in November 2016.

Guizhou is the country's first pilot zone for big data. The technology has been widely applied in government management, business and daily life.

For example, the provincial high people's court has set up a big data system to aid the handling of cases and facilitate public inquiries.

The province also made a big data industrial map, which demonstrates companies' development in different areas, providing reference for policy making.

The province's computer, communication and other electronic equipment manufacturing industries saw their added value reach 9.3 billion yuan (1.4 billion U.S. dollars) in 2016, about nine times that in 2011.

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## Shotgunner51

*The 2017 China International Big Data Expo Opens in Guiyang *
News provided by* 2017 China International Big Data Expo* 
26 May, 2017, 06:34 ET












GUIYANG, China, May 26, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- The 2017 China International Big Data Expo opened on Friday in Guiyang, capital city of southwest China's Guizhou Province. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang sent a congratulatory letter while Vice Premier Ma Kai addressed the opening ceremony.

Premier Li pointed out that the digital economy is transforming mankind's way of production and living and is increasingly becoming a new engine powering economic growth. Guizhou Province followed the trend and pioneered in the process with remarkable fruits. China is willing to work with other countries to promote innovation and cooperation in digital economy.

Data has become one important fundamental and strategic resource and China should go further in big data innovative application to speed up transforming the manufacturing sector, according to Ma Kai.

With "Digital Economy Drives New Growth" as the theme, this year's expo will feature two summits, one exhibition and one contest. A total of 78 forums and 15 other activities will be held throughout the Expo.

Five high-end conferences on topics of machine intelligence, artificial intelligence, smart manufacturing, e-commerce and blockchain will be held during the summits.

As the first exhibition in the world with a theme centered around big data, the Guiyang Big Data Expo has now been successfully held for two years in a row. The previous expos have attracted investment worth 58.9 billion yuan (8.6 billion U.S. dollars) to Guizhou Province. The Expo became a national-level event in 2016.

Applicants for the Expo exceed 50,000, who come from 23 countries. Meanwhile, over 1,000 cutting-edge products, technologies and solutions are displayed brought by about 316 exhibitors from both home and abroad, according to the organizer.

Among the six exhibition halls, Hall 1 to Hall 5 exhibit the latest innovations and achievements and high-tech products in big data from world-renowned internet companies such as Oracle, Alibaba, Huawei, SAP, Foxconn and JD.com, while Hall 6 is designed as featured experience hall for VR, AR and AI.

On Thursday, a number of futuristic technologies were unveiled in the exhibition hall, such as the Driverless Magnetic Unit of central air-conditioning invented by Haier, the AR red envelope from Tencent and the latest lip-reading recognition technology from Hydata. Over 10,000 visitors went to the exhibition on Thursday.

The Guizhou provincial government rolled out a development strategy for big data in 2014, with the big data digital information sector scoring a 62-percent year-on-year growth in market scale that year. Guizhou's GDP totaled over 900 billion yuan in 2014, achieving the growth target outlined in the 12th Five-Year Plan one year earlier.

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...big-data-expo-opens-in-guiyang-300464495.html

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## TaiShang

*29 big data unicorn startups in China: Report*
Xinhua | Updated: 2017-05-27 

GUIYANG - China has *29 big data "unicorn" firms and 54 future unicorn firms*, according to a report on China's unicorn firms development.

The big data unicorn firm refer to a startup whose market value surpasses $1 billion within a decade of setting up.* Future unicorn firms are those valued over $100 million each within five years or over $500 million each between five and 10 years.*

The number of unicorn firms is seen to represent the innovation level and entrepreneurship environment of a city.

*The 83 unicorns with total market value of $220 billion are mainly in the finance and big data sectors*, said the report released by Greatwall Strategy Consultants.

The market value of the four super unicorns, Ant Financial, Didi Chuxing, Meituan-Dianping and Toutiao, exceeds $10 billion each.

The majority of unicorns are based in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hangzhou.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2017-05/27/content_29531422.htm

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## cirr

*China's first big data exchange breaks even*

By Chen Meiling in Guiyang | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-05-28 17:15

Transactions of China's first big data exchange was expected to reached 200 million yuan by the end of 2017, the exchange's executive president said Saturday.

The value of big data lies in circulation and trading. Now the turnover of the exchange is 100 million yuan, one percent of that in the black market, Wang Sanshou, executive president of Global Big Data Exchange, said at the 2017 China International Big Data Expo in Guiyang, capital of Southwest China's Guizhou province.

As the first big data trading institute of China founded in April 2015, there are 1, 000 members now compared to 300 at the end of 2015.

Members included major domestic IT companies such as China Unicom, Alibaba Group, JD and Huawei.

"All the internet companies in the world will become big data companies in three to five years, " Wang said. "There is no industry which is not linked with data."

The exchange broke even in the first half of 2017, he said.

Since the government has 80 percent of valuable data, the exchange also established cooperation with more than 100 provinces and cities of China in the data development and sharing business, Wang said.

It set up more than 10 big data trading service centers across the country, including those in Beijing, Shanghai, cities in Central China's Henan province and North China's Shanxi province, he said.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/tech/2017-05/28/content_29537539.htm

*Data expo closes in SW China*

Xinhua, May 28, 2017

GUIYANG, May 28 (Xinhua) -- *An expo on big data concluded Sunday in southwest China's Guizhou Province, with more than 16.7 billion yuan (2.4 billion U.S. dollars) worth of contracts signed*.

During the 2017 China International Big Data Expo that opened on May 25 in Guiyang city, capital of Guizhou, 119 projects were signed, according to a press conference.

In addition, 77 forums were held, with topics ranging from digital economy and data sharing to artificial intelligence, according to Xu Qin, vice mayor of Guiyang.

A total of 316 exhibitors, including 51 international companies, displayed their latest technology and high-tech products in an area covering about 60,000 square meters.

The event, with the theme of "Digital Economy Drives New Growth," attracted more than 50,000 visitors. 

http://www.china.org.cn/china/Off_the_Wire/2017-05/28/content_40916651.htm

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## TaiShang

*Race between US and Chinese internet giants heating up *
chinadaily.com.cn, June 1, 2017




Photo shows the logo of Tencent. [File photo]

A handful of US and Chinese internet giants are expected to do battle with each other in the next chapter of global internet competition, according to venture capitalist and former dotcom star analyst Mary Meeker, the _Financial Times_ reported.

Meeker released her annual internet trends report, a guide to the global internet and technology industry's development, on Wednesday in the United States.

The expansion of internet companies in the last half-decade has been "epic" in Meeker's eyes. She pointed out that the rise of internet giants has not only brought threats to companies in other industries, but has triggered turf wars between themselves as they expand beyond their initial markets.

"People don't spend enough time looking at how intense the competition is," Meeker said to the _Financial Times_.

Five of the world's top six most valuable companies are internet companies, which includes Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook, according to rankings compiled by Bloomberg in April.

Chinese internet giant Tencent is also in the top 10.

Meeker said the internet markets in China and India have strongly benefited the two countries' economies.

In addition, their mobile payment infrastructure is leading the world.

Meeker said as the digital service market in India is expected to increase rapidly, both US and Chinese internet giants regard it as "a global priority".

Tencent made a strategic investment in Flipkart, India's biggest e-commerce firm, this April.

And Chinese fintech giant Ant Financial Services Group, Alibaba's payment affiliate and owner of Alipay, has acquired a stake in Paytm, India's largest mobile wallet operator by user number.

Meeker believes that US companies such as Amazon are making more aggressive approaches in new markets after they learned lessons from their failures of marching into China.

"These companies are making sure they put more capital to work earlier," Meeker said.

She expected that new companies will dominate emerging categories of online activity just as Uber and Didi Chuxing have dominated ride hailing.

http://china.org.cn/business/2017-06/01/content_40941169.htm


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## TaiShang

*China's AI business ready to lead the world*
Xinhua, June 1, 2017



Chinese Go player Ke Jie analyses the game after the second match against artificial intelligence program AlphaGo in Wuzhen, east China's Zhejiang province, May 25, 2017. [Photo/Xinhua] 

Over the past week, the internet has yet again been buzzing about the future of artificial intelligence (AI).

And once again, the heat was generated by AlphaGo, Google's AI program, which completed a 3-0 clean sweep Friday over Ke Jie, the current world No.1 Go player.

In contrast to the generally negative reactions to AlphaGo's 4-1 victory over South Korean master Lee Se-dol in March last year, people are now more optimistic towards the future of AI.

"AlphaGo was not designed just to play Go," said Qian Jianlun, a Go teacher in east China's Zhejiang Province. "As an AI project, it will change a lot of aspects of our lives."

Full speed ahead

Qian's words echoed the overall positivity shown by the status quo of China's AI industry.

According to data from iiMedia Research, a major research institution, *China's AI industry increased by 43.3 percent in 2016, surpassing 10 billion yuan (1.47 billion U.S. dollars), and is expected to reach 15.21 billion and 34.43 billion yuan in 2017 and 2019 respectively.*

The numbers were driven by a boom in the amount of research taking place in the industry.* China has applied for 15,745 AI patents, ranking second worldwide*, according to Liu Lihua, vice minister of industry and information technology.

Favorable policies came as a consequence. *Over 40 robotics industry parks have now been or are currently being set up around the country, and for the first time ever, AI was included in the government work report* Premier Li Keqiang presented to the Fifth Session of the 12th National People's Congress in March.

"We will accelerate research and development, and commercialization of new materials, artificial intelligence [...] and develop industrial clusters in these fields," the report read.

"AI has become a key driving force behind Chinese companies," said Zhang Yaqin, president of Baidu, China's Internet giant.

*"In the AI era, China can innovate not only in products, but also in technologies,"* he added.

Data set the base

For insiders, the further development of China's AI industry will continue to count largely on data.

"The core of AI development lies in the massive amounts of data," said Li Kaifu, chairman and CEO of Sinovation Ventures, a venture capital company aiming to create successful Chinese start-ups.

"In China, we have a huge database, and it has proved to be quite valuable for us," he continued.

Bai Chunli, president of Chinese Academy of Sciences, agreed. "*By 2020, China will hold 20 percent of the global data, which is expected to reach 44 trillion gigabytes*," he stated at an expo on big data Monday.

AI has been playing a bigger role in people's everyday lives. For example, an AI system monitoring vehicles to intelligently control traffic was applied in east China's Hangzhou, and increased vehicle passing speeds by up to 11 percent during its trial last year.

"China is already leading the world in fields such as computer vision and automatic speech recognition," Liu Lihua added.

"We believe that AI presents the most favorable opportunity for us to lead the world," Li resonated.

Business yet to unite

However, for some, what has been transpiring in the industry is not enough for it to successfully achieve sustainable development.

Despite predicting that China's AI market will enjoy a 50-percent annual increase, way above the global rate of 20 percent, McKinsey and Company, a worldwide management consulting firm, also noted that less than 25 percent of the AI industry insiders in China have over ten years of experience in the business, while in the United States that number is 50 percent.

Also, the country's AI companies are yet to join forces.

"There's been a lack of technical collaboration in our AI industry," said Wen Xiaojun from CCID Wise, a major Chinese think tank. "The inter-connectibility of products is poor, and there is no efficient coordination between upstream and downstream producers."

He believes an industry service platform needs to be set up to boost functions including research and development, application and product examining.

"We need such an incubation center for AI to prosper," he added.

http://china.org.cn/business/2017-06/01/content_40939148.htm


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## Shotgunner51

*China Just Became The Games Industry Capital of The World*
* Global revenue passes $100 billion for the first time fueled by smartphone use *
by Nate Lanxon June 1, 2017, 12:01 PM GMT+8





The global games industry will generate revenue of an estimated $109 billion in 2017, of which 42 percent will come from mobile. Photographer: Anthony Kwan/Bloomberg

Revenue from computer games exceeded $100 billion globally in a single year for the first time, while China has overtaken the U.S. as the *"gamer capital of the world"* in terms of market size, according to a report published by London-based venture capital firm Atomico.

The 600 million gamers in China generated $24.6 billion of the industry's $101.1 billion global market value over 2016, just ahead of the U.S.’s $24.1 billion. In 2015, the global games industry was worth $91.8 billion according to data from research house Newzoo. A notable contributor to the growth has been Apple's mobile app store in China. In 2016, China accounted for 31 percent of the total $18 billion generated by games on iOS, compared with just 3 percent of the $2.4 billion total in 2012.

Tom Wehmeier, principal and head of research at Atomico and author of the report published Thursday, said a number of other major milestones were passed in 2016. _“We've got to the point today where there are now more than two billion gamers globally, and mobile has really taken over to the extent that it's the largest segment overall,”_ said Wehmeier.​
Mattias Ljungman, a partner at Atomico and one of its co-founders alongside Niklas Zennström, said _“the average revenue per user is higher in China than the U.S., which to me would probably make most people fall off their chairs.”_​





China's importance to the growth of the global gaming industry is not difficult to see. *Tencent Holdings Ltd.*, China’s largest internet company by market value and one of the 10 largest public technology companies in the world, has seen enormous success from its mobile gaming and advertising divisions, including social networking platform WeChat and desktop game League of Legends. It also owns Honour of Kings, which analysts have estimated will contribute more than 50 percent of Tencent's smartphone game revenue this year and recorded monthly gross revenue of as much as 3 billion yuan ($440 million) in April.

In Europe and the U.S., numbers are still rising alongside investor confidence, according to Atomico. The global games industry will generate revenue of an estimated $109 billion in 2017, of which 42 percent will come from mobile titles. That will rise to as much as $129 billion by 2020, at which point mobile will overtake the combined value of all traditional platforms for games — console and PC — by generating 51 percent of the total revenue for the industry.

_"Games have become truly mass market and it's a massive, massive opportunity that's only going to get bigger,"_ Ilkka Paananen, the chief executive officer Supercell, the developer of the popular Clash of Clans mobile game, said in the report. _"One of these days somebody’s going to build a game that reaches a billion users a month."_​
Much of China's gaming market is contained at home, with little international appeal. Atomico's report, citing research house App Annie, states that as much as *93 percent of all money spent by Chinese gamers go to titles developed by Chinese-based companies*. This compares to 56 percent of U.S. gamers spending on U.S.-developed games, and 36 percent of Europeans spending on games developed in the EU.

Many Chinese industrial companies, from chemical solvent producers to poultry processors, have recently been buying up Western games companies as a way of boosting their overall profit margins, thanks to the high margins so many of these entertainment businesses command. Bloomberg previously reported that as much as *70 percent of all acquisitions of games companies since 2015 have been made by Chinese buyers*.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...ecame-the-games-industry-capital-of-the-world

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## TaiShang

*China's rural folk ride the $3b app*
By Fan Feifei (China Daily) 10:02, June 05, 2017






_A farmer uses mobile phone to do live streaming, Wuxiang county, Shanxi province, May 18, 2017. [Photo/Xinhua]_

Kuaishou, a Chinese video sharing and live streaming app, has become popular among China's rural population as it brings them closer by allowing them to record and share their lives.

*What makes Kuaishou distinct is its focus on ordinary people, not glamorous celebrities and stars who abound on mainstream short video and live streaming apps.*

"The number of daily active users of Kuaishou has surpassed 40 million, creating millions of short videos via the UGC (user generated content) method," said Su Hua, its founder and CEO.

The next goal is to encourage rural folk to record and share lighter-vein videos.

For any social networking app, the key is daily active users. Considering the success of Instagram, Su believes there is still great potential for growing the number of daily active users of Kuaishou.

The APP is popular even in urban centers. Daily active users in first-tier cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen number 10 million.

*Stated differently, 30 million users, or more than 70 percent of users, come from outside first-tier cities.*

And *87 percent of Kuaishou's users are from the post-'90s generation or the so-called millennials.* "We are devoted to recording the daily life of ordinary people, giving them a stage to express themselves," said Su, adding the app aims to improve the user experience and attract more new users.

The app would recommend personalized content to users based on their browsing history and preferences with the help of artificial intelligence technology and a sophisticated algorithm. "We also pay attention to data confidentiality and user security," Su said.

Kuaishou was established over six years ago. The company is now exploring ways of monetizing its assets (user traffic). It believes online virtual tools, gifts, video advertisements, e-commerce, games and other value-added services could prove money-spinners.

Su said Kuaishou's ultimate goal, however, is not to commercialize the platform totally. "However, excellent commercialization programs will make us strengthen team building, hire more talent, and optimize our products."

*In March, Kuaishou received 350 million yuan ($1.1 million) in financing. The funding round was led by Chinese internet giant Tencent Holdings Ltd. Last year, it received funding from internet search giant Baidu Inc and Sequoia Capital. Their investments valued Kuaishou at over $3 billion.*

Apart from Kuaishou, the Su-led startup also provides two video-related apps, focusing on live broadcast assistance and short video, editing features.

Given its large number of short videos, Kuaishou feels the pressure to review all that content, to ensure it is safe, decent and compliant with existing regulations.

"As a video-sharing platform, we need to check the contents of uploaded videos in accordance with the national regulations, before recommending them to users," Su said.

"The pressure of manual review is huge. We have spent three years establishing our review system. The professional review team comes from television channels with rich work experience. We'll strengthen the monitoring of live-streaming content, and deal with users who disseminate inappropriate content, including pornography," said Su.

_Zhuang Qiange contributed to the story._

http://en.people.cn/n3/2017/0605/c90000-9224172.html

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## onebyone

The world’s largest e-commerce platform operator said fiscal 2018 sales may increase by up to 49 per cent, 10 percentage points higher than estimates


PUBLISHED : Friday, 09 June, 2017, 9:30am
UPDATED : Friday, 09 June, 2017, 10:30am











Meng Jing

5 Jun 2017
Alibaba Group Holding is the most valuable Asian company, surpassing its nearest rival by more than 8 per cent, after its New York-traded stock soared to a record on the back of a bullish 2018 sales forecast that beat every analyst estimate.

Alibaba’s shares jumped 13.3 per cent overnight to a record US$142.30 on the New York bourse, boosting its market capitalisation to US$360 billion, 8.4 per cent more than Tencent Holdings as the most valuable Asian company.

The world’s largest online shopping platform defied every analyst estimate with an earnings forecast yesterday that topped average projections by 10 percentage points, as digital advertising grows while new ventures into cloud computing and digital entertainment begin to pay off.

Revenue will increase by between 45 per cent and 49 per cent in the year ending March 2018, said the Hangzhou-based company, owner of the _South China Morning Post_. That’s higher than the 35 per cent average estimate in Bloomberg’s poll of 43 analysts.
“The revenue guidance was a positive surprise,” said New Street Research’s analyst Kirk Boodry, who was expecting a 40 per cent growth, and has a “buy” recommendation on the stock. “The main driver is the power of their data analytics platform, as they can provide very detailed and accurate consumer targeting for advertisers, who are increasingly keen to spend money with Alibaba. ”








Founded by former English teacher Jack Ma Yun in 1999, Alibaba’s Taobao and Tmall sites are the go-to platforms for China’s 448 million online shoppers, who buy everything from clothing, electronics to food and services through the internet.


That’s helped the company chalk up US$547 billion in gross merchandise volume -- the value of goods sold through the platform -- for the year ended March 31, for which the operator charges a fee. The company’s fiscal 2017 sales rose 56 per cent to a record 158.27 billion yuan (US$23.29 billion).

“Despite having a larger base, we continue to accelerate our revenue growth,” said chief financial officer Maggie Wu during Alibaba’s annual investor event in Hangzhou.

The revenue projection “is going to be voted by the feet of the merchants and consumers, and we have the confidence that based on the data and technology we have, we are going to achieve that,” she said.

Alibaba’s forecast is easing any concern that China’s slowing economy could weigh on online sales. Revenue growth and the increase of Alibaba’s retail transaction volume are “decoupling,” Wu said.








“Why is that? Because of the broader value proposition we provide to merchants, brands and customers,” she said.


The smartphone, increasingly the preferred medium for China’s online shoppers, is also becoming the content source for their entertainment, providing streaming video and digital music, Alibaba said.

To reflect its increasingly diverse customer base, Alibaba said it will start reporting active consumers, instead of just buyers. It will begin to disclose “customer management revenue” instead of just online marketing, to reflect sales from serving a broader base of advertising platforms.

Alibaba has made a big push in recent years into cloud computing, where it provides computing power over the internet akin to Amazon’s AWS.

The unit, which accounts for about 5 per cent of total revenue, is Alibaba’s fastest growing business. The company will push to expand its share of the cloud computing market in the subsequent quarters, while keeping the profitability of the division on a lower priority, Wu said.

Alibaba’s accelerated growth reflects the “winner takes all” trend in the global technology industry, said Hou Xiaotian , who has a “buy” recommendation on the stock.

“With Alibaba’s advantage in data and technology, it’s in a much better position in finding the next big thing and seizing new opportunities than any other smaller company.”

http://www.scmp.com/tech/enterprise...soars-record-us360-billion-bullish-2018-sales

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## cirr

I thought Tencent had a higher market cap. than Alibaba. No?

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## Jlaw

Wow, Alibaba has bigger market cap than India 's biggest tech company Infosys

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## cdtiger

Haha, it's not just "bigger than Infosys". It's 10 times bigger in terms of market cap. 



Jlaw said:


> Wow, Alibaba has bigger market cap than India 's biggest tech company Infosys

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## Shotgunner51

cirr said:


> I thought Tencent had a higher market cap. than Alibaba. No?


At the moment Tencent is HK$2.603 trillion (roughly HK$335.9 billion), Alibaba is US$355.6 billion, so both about the same in market cap

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/0700.hk?ltr=1
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/baba?ltr=1


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## Shotgunner51

*ZTE Signs Strategic Partnership with Telenet on 5G and IoT*






BRUSSELS, June 2, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- *ZTE Corporation (0763.HK / 000063.SZ), a major international provider of telecommunications, enterprise and consumer technology solutions for the Mobile Internet, today announced the signing of Strategic Partnership Agreement on 5G and IoT with Telenet*, deepening the two companies' collaboration on next-generation technologies.

In a ceremony at the Castle Val-Duchesse in Brussels officiated by *Prime Minister Charles Michel* and *Premier Li Keqiang*, Telenet Chief Technology Officer Micha Berger and ZTE Senior Vice President Xiao Ming signed the new agreement that expands the partnership between the two companies to cover future network innovations.






Mr. Berger said: "We already engaged for a couple of months with ZTE now and are very happy about it. We are convinced this partnership will allow us to offer a top quality mobile network for existing and future needs all over Belgium."

*Telenet is the largest cable broadband service provider in Belgium, listed on the Euronext stock exchange under the ticker TNET*, providing a range of digital television, fixed and mobile services to residential and business customers across Belgium and Luxembourg.

In August 2016, Telenet selected ZTE to upgrade its national mobile network, deploying ZTE's world-class Uni-RAN technology. The network modernization project not only resulted in major improvements in performance and service quality for Telenet subscribers but also gave the carrier enhanced capabilities to manage its operations.

ZTE helped Telenet replace 2G base stations and optimize 3G, 4G coverage, delivering increased network capacity for enhanced user experience for subscribers, and supporting evolution to future network technologies.

With ZTE's industry-leading technology, Telenet completed field test and set a new European network speed record, achieving download speeds of 1.3 Gigabits per second, four times faster than existing 4G services.

Together with ZTE, Telenet is exploring technology solutions for IoT services and high capacity solutions using LTE Massive MIMO and LTE Broadcast solutions.

*As a global leader in 5G technology, ZTE is committed to investments in research and development of core 5G technologies including Massive MIMO, MUSA (multi-user shared access), FB-OFDM (filter-bank OFDM), Virtual Cell and network slicing.*

ZTE is a major participant and contributor to global 5G technologies and standards. The company is a member of over 70 standards organizations, alliances, and forums, including ITU, 3GPP, IEEE, NGMN, and IMT-2020 (5G) Promotion Group.

"ZTE is excited by our strategic agreement with Telenet," said Mr. Xiao. "This agreement provides a solid foundation for Telenet and ZTE to expand and strengthen the long-term partnership on the way to a new 5G era."

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...hip-with-telenet-on-5g-and-iot-300468208.html

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## onebyone

*A company as an economy? Alibaba says it can be world’s fifth-largest by 2036*

E-commerce giant will serve 2 billion customers and support 10 million businesses on its platforms in 19 years’ time, says founder Jack Ma


PUBLISHED : Friday, 09 June, 2017, 7:36pm
UPDATED : Friday, 09 June, 2017, 10:55pm

Alibaba Group Holding, the world’s largest e-commerce platform operator, aims to become the fifth-largest “economy” in the world by 2036, founder Jack Ma Yun said on Friday.

In 19 years’ time, the technology giant would have created 100 million jobs and would support 10 million profitable businesses on its platforms as it strove to become a global business in the truest sense, serving as many as two billion consumers worldwide, the executive chairman told about 400 investors at its headquarters in Hangzhou.

The Chinese firm, which runs the popular Taobao and Tmall e-commerce platforms, has set a target to achieve US$1 trillion in gross merchandise volume in 2019 – the 2020 financial year – which would make it roughly the 16th- or 17th-largest “economy” in the world, according to Ma. He said Alibaba’s gross merchandise value today already made it the 22nd-largest “economy” globally, just behind Argentina.

“If a company can serve two billion consumers, that is one-third of the total population of the world. If a company can create 100 million jobs, that is probably bigger than most governments can do. If a company can support 10 million profitable businesses on its platform, this is called an economy,” Ma told the audience.

At that point, Alibaba would become the No 5 “economy” in the world, just behind the United States, China, Europe and Japan, Ma said, without specifying the company’s projected gross merchandise value number by that year.

The idea of companies as economies is not new. General Electric and Wal-Mart Stores, among the largest companies on the planet with the most extensive network of operations, have been compared to sovereign economies in the past. Wal-Mart’s 2002 sales rivalled the world’s 22nd-biggest economy, Australia.

Current international commercial trading practices are not helping small and medium-sized enterprises survive as big companies are expanding across the continents and eroding the market share of smaller players. People are also worried that they will lose their jobs as machines become more widely adopted.

Hangzhou-based Alibaba, which owns the _South China Morning Post_, is determined to become a global company that places importance on inclusivity by supporting small businesses and helping young people, according to Ma.

Targeting two billion consumers by 2036, of whom an estimated 800 million would be Chinese, meant Alibaba would look for 1.2 billion more consumers outside its home country, he added.

The company had been actively looking for investment and acquisition opportunities in a way that ensured the sustainable growth of the group, executive vice-chairman Joe Tsai said at the same event.

Over the past two years, Alibaba’s strategic investments have totalled US$21 billion, spread across various business sectors including digital media, entertainment, logistics, new retail and social media.

Alibaba’s future success will be driven by its ability to use data to increase user engagement further and deepen its relationships with brands
TSANG CHI, HSBC
Alibaba has also become the most valuable Asian company as its stock surged after it projected on Thursday that sales in the 2018 financial year might increase by up to 49 per cent, 10 percentage points higher than estimates.

Its New York-traded shares jumped 13.3 per cent to a record US$142.30 on Thursday, boosting its market capitalisation to US$360 billion.

Shares of Alibaba’s nearest rival in Asia, Tencent Holdings, gained 1.5 per cent to close at HK$277.40 on Friday in Hong Kong. Tencent’s total capitalisation of HK$2.6 trillion (US$333 billion) on Friday is about 8 per cent lower than Alibaba’s at the close on Thursday.

Alibaba’s success rests on two factors: as an early mover, it met untapped consumer demand and now boasts 507 million mobile monthly active users, while its huge user base has also made it a valuable partner for brands, according to Tsang Chi, HSBC’s head of internet research in Asia-Pacific.

“Alibaba’s future success will be driven by its ability to use data to increase user engagement further and deepen its relationships with brands,” Tsang wrote in a report dated June 9.

“Indeed, revenue guidance that far exceeded expectations and deep-dive discussions at its 2017 investor day indicate we are at the beginning of data-driven monetisation,” Tsang said.

HSBC has inflated its target price for Alibaba’s shares to US$162 from US$145 previously. The new projection is 13.8 per cent higher than the price at the close on Thursday in New York.


This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as:
alibaba aims to become fifth largest economy


http://www.scmp.com/business/compan...libaba-aims-become-fifth-largest-economy-2036

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## cirr

Shotgunner51 said:


> At the moment Tencent is HK$2.603 trillion (roughly HK$335.9 billion), Alibaba is US$355.6 billion, so both about the same in market cap
> 
> https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/0700.hk?ltr=1
> https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/baba?ltr=1



Both will be 500 billion USD companies in a couple of years save a major stock market correction.

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## open-source

good to see the technology is reaching forward


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## Shotgunner51

open-source said:


> good to see the technology is reaching forward


Agree. I see in next gen telecom tech, ZTE is becoming the challenge to Huawei's dominance, competition it's good for the whole ICT industry.

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## grey boy 2

*U.S. Tech Companies Now Copycats of Chinese Peers, Andreessen Horowitz Partner Says *
By Liza Lin Published June 09, 2017 Features Dow Jones Newswires 

Chinese technology companies have long had a reputation of being copycats of Western peers, but U.S. companies have recently begun to return the favor, said a partner at prominent venture-capital firm Andreessen Horowitz.

China's internet titans such as Tencent Holdings Ltd. are influencing U.S. startups and majors alike, and many Chinese models are being replicated in the U.S., said Connie Chan, a partner at the Silicon Valley venture firm whose investments include Airbnb Inc. and Facebook Inc.

LimeBike, a San Mateo, Calif., upstart backed by Andreessen Horowitz, adapted China's dockless bike-sharing model for U.S. consumers, Ms. Chan said at The Wall Street Journal's D. Live Asia conference Friday. The company's smartphone-activated bicycles, which use designated public spaces for parking instead of docking stations, were first rolled out by Beijing-based Ofo Inc. and Beijing Mobike Technology Co.

Also, Apple Inc. recently added payment services to its iMessage chat service, taking a page from Tencent's playbook, Ms. Chan said.

"I love this reversal of what 'China copycat' can mean," she said. "It no longer just means a Chinese company copying the States, it can mean a U.S. company copying China."

David Su, the founding managing partner at Matrix Partners China, said the next big Chinese technology success story would likely come from companies whose business models leverage micropayments on mobile as well as the software services and security space.

"In the next few years, we will see a lot of innovation on payment on mobile which will drive a lot of consumption and changes in behavior," said Mr. Su, an early investor in Chinese tech giant Baidu Inc. and ride-hailing company Didi Chuxing Technology Co.

Mr. Su said the growth in investments coming from China's three internet majors- Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., Tencent and Baidu--hasn't had an impact on valuations for early-stage venture-capital firms, as the three companies typically take part in later funding rounds, he said.

Still, intense battles often take place there.

"Unfortunately, because of the hyper competition among the big giants, often when one picks a big player, the other side almost compulsively will pick another competitor," Mr. Su said. "It's created almost two blocks of warring camps."

Write to Liza Lin at liza.lin@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 09, 2017 02:06 ET (06:06 GMT)
 http://www.foxbusiness.com/features...e-peers-andreessen-horowitz-partner-says.html
https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-te...s-andreessen-horowitz-partner-says-1496987481

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## r@ven21

Trump has just Trumped America..


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## cirr

*5G to drive 6.3-trillion-yuan economic output in China: report*

2017-06-14 08:44

Xinhua _Editor: Gu Liping_

A telecom academy has predicted that 5G technology in China will drive 6.3 trillion yuan (930 billion U.S. dollars) of economic output by 2030.

Beijing's China Academy of Information and Communication Technology said Tuesday in a report that the new generation of mobile networks will help digital industries and reshape the landscape of economic development.

China's digitization drive will be made easier, with more investment into Internet sectors, stimulating data consumption and improving national competitiveness.

By 2030, 5G-related sectors will generate around 2.9 trillion yuan of economic value added and 8 million new jobs.

The world is in a "crucial period" of standards development for 5G and its application, the report said, calling for the government to help build Internet infrastructure and create a better business environment.

China has worked hard in research and development of new networks. The world's largest 5G test field has been built in Huairou District, Beijing, with the participation of industry giants including Ericsson, Huawei and Nokia.

The country's major telecom operators plan to commercialize 5G mobile networks as early as 2020.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/06-14/261349.shtml

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## TaiShang

Shotgunner51 said:


> Agree. I see in next gen telecom tech, ZTE is becoming the challenge to Huawei's dominance, competition it's good for the whole ICT industry.



Isn't this the same ZTE that has been targeted unfairly on phony national security grounds by the US regulators for fear of losing competition on their home turf?

Looks like the Brussels is too stupid to put their national security in jeopardy.

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## TaiShang

*5G to drive 6.3t yuan economic output in China: report*
Xinhua | Updated: 2017-06-14

BEIJING - A telecom academy has predicted that *5G technology in China will drive 6.3 trillion yuan ($930 billion) of economic output by 2030.*

Beijing's China Academy of Information and Communication Technology said Tuesday in a report that the new generation of mobile networks will help digital industries and reshape the landscape of economic development.

China's digitization drive will be made easier, with more investment into internet sectors, stimulating data consumption and improving national competitiveness.

By 2030, 5G-related sectors will generate around 2.9 trillion yuan of economic value added and 8 million new jobs.

*The world is in a "crucial period" of standards development for 5G and its application, the report said, calling for the government to help build internet infrastructure and create a better business environment.*

China has worked hard in research and development of new networks. *The world's largest 5G test field has been built in Huairou district, Beijing, with the participation of industry giants including Ericsson, Huawei and Nokia.*

The country's major telecom operators plan to commercialize 5G mobile networks as early as 2020.

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## AndrewJin

TaiShang said:


> *5G to drive 6.3t yuan economic output in China: report*
> Xinhua | Updated: 2017-06-14
> 
> BEIJING - A telecom academy has predicted that *5G technology in China will drive 6.3 trillion yuan ($930 billion) of economic output by 2030.*
> 
> Beijing's China Academy of Information and Communication Technology said Tuesday in a report that the new generation of mobile networks will help digital industries and reshape the landscape of economic development.
> 
> China's digitization drive will be made easier, with more investment into internet sectors, stimulating data consumption and improving national competitiveness.
> 
> By 2030, 5G-related sectors will generate around 2.9 trillion yuan of economic value added and 8 million new jobs.
> 
> *The world is in a "crucial period" of standards development for 5G and its application, the report said, calling for the government to help build internet infrastructure and create a better business environment.*
> 
> China has worked hard in research and development of new networks. *The world's largest 5G test field has been built in Huairou district, Beijing, with the participation of industry giants including Ericsson, Huawei and Nokia.*
> 
> The country's major telecom operators plan to commercialize 5G mobile networks as early as 2020.


A huge boost for Chinese economy!

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## TaiShang

*Tencent's mobile game King of Glory takes the crown*
By Guo Rong | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-06-16







Players take part in _King of Glory_ mobile game competition in Shaoxing, East China's Zhejiang province, April 29, 2017. [Photo/VCG]

Tencent's hit game _King of Glory_ defeated all other mobile games in the world to take the No 1 spot in income generation, according to a report released by APP Annie, a US-based analysis company.





Lu Han. [Photo/VCG]

* Although there are some shortcomings in the study, such as not including the Android platform in the report, the game topped the income list thanks to its huge domestic market and its overseas version.*

*Tencent, NetEase, China Mobile Games and Entertainment and Longtu Game dominated the top 10 list of global iOS publishers, accounting for 40 percent of global revenue.*

_King of Glory_ is a multiplayer online battle arena and the game launched in beta version for iOS and Android platforms on Nov 26, 2015.

The first-quarter revenue of the game reached 12 billion yuan ($1.76 billion), and a hero skin of Zhao Yun, a military general who lived in the Three Kingdoms (220-280), sold for 150 million yuan ($22 million) in one day, a Tencent insider said.

The game has 200 million registered users, with 50 million daily active users, according to data released by Tencent.

Popular singer and actor Lu Han was invited as the king ambassador of the game in May. A Sina Weibo about _King of Glory_ forwarded by him was liked by 1.66 million fans.

"_King of Glory_ went wild because it features many similarities to _League of Legends_, which has a deep fan following, and also due to the powerful promotion carried out by Tencent," said Tang Xin, chief research officer of mobile data provider Jiguang.

"This socially supercharged game is easy to go viral," Tang added.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2017-06/16/content_29774382.htm

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## cirr

*Report forecasts major gains from 5G tech*

2017-06-17 10:17

China Daily _Editor: Li Yan_

*As China moves to the forefront of fifth-generation or 5G mobile communication technology, 6.3 trillion yuan ($925 billion) of economic output and 8 million jobs will be created by 2030*, a telecom academy said.

The China Academy of Information and Communications Technology said in a report that 5G will accelerate digitalization and promote the rapid growth of telecom, equipment manufacturing and information services.

The report also said at the initial stage of commercialization of 5G mobile networks, telecom carriers will carry out large-scale network construction. Revenue from the investment on network equipment will become the major source of economic output related to 5G.

China and the rest of the world are going through a crucial period of development of 5G standards and applications, the report said.

"*The report underestimates the impact of 5G on social economy*. It isn't yet more than five years since 4G was launched, but it has had a huge influence in boosting the development and popularization of mobile payments. I expect 5G will bring greater economic benefits and generate more new jobs," said Xiang Ligang, a telecom expert and CEO of cctime.com, a telecom industry website.

The country has attached great importance to 5G in its 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20), with the aim of commercializing it by 2020.

In March, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced the country had established the world's largest 5G test field in the race to standardize the technology.

China Mobile Communications Corp, China United Network Communications Group and China Telecom Corp, the country's major telecom operators, have already accelerated their efforts to develop 5G technology, with their total investment in 5G infrastructure forecast to reach up to $180 billion over a seven-year period.

That would dwarf their estimated $117 billion investment in 4G from 2013 to 2020, an analyst at Jefferies, an investment bank, was quoted as saying by South China Morning Post.

Xiang said the commercialization of 5G not only involves network construction by telecom carriers but inputs on terminal devices such as refrigerators, air conditioners and automobiles. So 5G network inputs would be more than estimated.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/06-17/261851.shtml

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## AndrewJin

cirr said:


> *Report forecasts major gains from 5G tech*
> 
> 2017-06-17 10:17
> 
> China Daily _Editor: Li Yan_
> 
> *As China moves to the forefront of fifth-generation or 5G mobile communication technology, 6.3 trillion yuan ($925 billion) of economic output and 8 million jobs will be created by 2030*, a telecom academy said.
> 
> The China Academy of Information and Communications Technology said in a report that 5G will accelerate digitalization and promote the rapid growth of telecom, equipment manufacturing and information services.
> 
> The report also said at the initial stage of commercialization of 5G mobile networks, telecom carriers will carry out large-scale network construction. Revenue from the investment on network equipment will become the major source of economic output related to 5G.
> 
> China and the rest of the world are going through a crucial period of development of 5G standards and applications, the report said.
> 
> "*The report underestimates the impact of 5G on social economy*. It isn't yet more than five years since 4G was launched, but it has had a huge influence in boosting the development and popularization of mobile payments. I expect 5G will bring greater economic benefits and generate more new jobs," said Xiang Ligang, a telecom expert and CEO of cctime.com, a telecom industry website.
> 
> The country has attached great importance to 5G in its 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-20), with the aim of commercializing it by 2020.
> 
> In March, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced the country had established the world's largest 5G test field in the race to standardize the technology.
> 
> China Mobile Communications Corp, China United Network Communications Group and China Telecom Corp, the country's major telecom operators, have already accelerated their efforts to develop 5G technology, with their total investment in 5G infrastructure forecast to reach up to $180 billion over a seven-year period.
> 
> That would dwarf their estimated $117 billion investment in 4G from 2013 to 2020, an analyst at Jefferies, an investment bank, was quoted as saying by South China Morning Post.
> 
> Xiang said the commercialization of 5G not only involves network construction by telecom carriers but inputs on terminal devices such as refrigerators, air conditioners and automobiles. So 5G network inputs would be more than estimated.
> 
> http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/06-17/261851.shtml


Trillions of yuan!

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## cirr

*INDICS(INDustrial Intelligent Cloud System) 

Cloud to aid aerospace manufacturing*

2017-06-17 10:52

China Daily _Editor: Li Yan_

China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, one of the nation's major space contractors, is employing its *industrial internet* expertise to boost intelligent manufacturing in the country.

The State-owned defense giant has been striving to promote its *CASICloud* website over the past two years. Launched in June 2015, the website was designed to enable users to benefit from the industrial internet, according to a news release published by CASIC at the 2017 Industrial Internet Summit on Thursday.

The term "industrial internet" was introduced by the United States' industrial giant General Electric in 2012. It refers to a new type of manufacturing automation that combines advanced machines with internet-connected sensors and big-data analytics. It is designed to boost intelligent manufacturing, which is characterized by a high level of productivity, efficiency and reliability of industrial production, experts explained.

CASIC is the world's second operator of an industrial internet platform following General Electric, which opened its Predix platform in 2014. Germany's Siemens opened its MindSphere in 2016, becoming the third member of the elite club.

CASIC has abundant knowledge and experience in regard to industrial manufacturing and information technology, development and production of space equipment, and such knowledge and experience are essential to intelligent manufacturing, said Shu Jinlong, chairman of CASICloud Technology Co, a subsidiary of CASIC that is responsible for operating the Chinese platform.

"We thought of adopting the industrial internet several years ago as CASIC was seeking to better coordinate its research and production complexes in the manufacturing process of space products," Shu said. "With the introduction of our internal industrial internet, we have improved the efficiency and productivity of institutes and factories under CASIC. So we hope that the industrial internet could help more businesses."

So far, more than 800,000 enterprises, including 3,000 foreign companies, are users of CASICloud, with more than 90 percent being small, privately owned ones, according to CASIC. Through the website, users can publish ideas and invite tenders for production, monitor and control their factories' machines in real time, collect and analyze data gathered in the manufacturing process as well as optimize their operation software.

CASICloud also assists users in finding partners and commercial opportunities through cloud computing-based matching, Shu said.

Gao Hongwei, chairman of CASIC, said the company hopes CASICloud could enable its users to be better connected and to take advantage of the industrial internet.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/06-17/261854.shtml

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## cirr

*A glimpse of China's mid-year online shopping spree*

2017-06-19 08:29

Xinhua _Editor: Mo Hong'e_

Chinese Internet users splurged on the mid-year online shopping spree on Sunday.

While November 11, or Single's Day, is the largest online shopping festival in China created by Alibaba's Tmall, June 18 ("6/18") shopping festival was launched by *JD.com*, Tmall's arch rival.

Other companies soon jumped on the bandwagon and began to offer special offers to get more customers.

On June 18, JD.com reported its first hour sales more than doubled from the same period last year. Tmall pocketed over 100 million yuan (14.71 million U.S. dollars) seven minutes after its opening. Another Chinese e-commerce heavyweight *Suning.com* saw its orders more than quadrupled from a year ago.

According to iResearch, a Beijing-based consultancy, while demand is high, Chinese consumers tend to be rational by caring more about quality instead of price.

The top five items on the shopping list of JD.com consumers are cell phone, air conditioner, flat panel computer, laptop and baby formula. Consumers are more selective in quality.

*Kaola.com*, a cross-border e-commerce platform, found consumers are becoming more critical in selecting big names, but were less interested in popular best-sellers.

Cao Lei, director of China E-Commerce Research Center, said with consumer upgrade going on in China, e-commerce market has shifted from "price war" to responding to the demands of the affluent and sophisticated middle class.

Putting all those purchases into consumers' hands is a huge task.

*To make fresh food reach consumers in the shortest period of time possible, Tmall's cold chain service is operating around the clock. Its daily delivery of fresh food totals near 500 tonnes.

By using smart warehouse, it takes only three minutes to move a parcel out of the depot through automated assembly lines.

E-commerce platforms are using drones to make speedy deliveries. At this year's "6/18" shopping festival, Suning.com is using drones to get packages directly to shoppers in rural villages.

JD.com uses augmented reality and virtual reality to offer interactive shopping experiences and also employs robots, driverless cars and drones for deliveries.*

Xu Lei, JD Group's chief marketing officer, said retail sales will be driven by changing consumer habits and technology upgrades.

The mega-spending spree came as China's economy is slowing down as the world's second largest economy is transitioning from dependence on export and investment to consumer spending.

Growth of the property development investment slowed in May for the first time since November, but retail sales grew 10.7 percent year on year in May boosted by strong online sales, signaling continued consumption strength.

China is the world's largest online shopping market, with about 467 million online consumers spending about 26.1 trillion yuan last year, up 19.8 percent year on year.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/06-19/261914.shtml

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## JSCh

*First robot couriers hit the road*
By Du Xiaofei (People's Daily Online) 13:05, June 19, 2017





_robot courier (People's Daily)_​
On June 18, students at six Chinese universities received items they had purchased from JD.com from robot couriers.

Still a pilot project, the robots were dispatched to just half a dozen universities, including Renmin University, Tsinghua University and Zhejiang University. At JD.com delivery stations, items were first divided among the robots according to size. The smart robots were then able to plan their routes with the help of an automatic navigation system, which also assists them in avoiding obstacles en route.

They follow preset routes and send messages to the recipients when they are 100 meters away from their destinations. The robots can move as quickly as electric bikes, though they are set to walk at the speed of pedestrians when on campus. They also slow down in advance of speed bumps.





_item delivered by robot courier (People's Daily)_​
University students will be the first group to benefit from the new technology. Considering the openness of college students when it comes to hi-tech products, JD.com will highlight its 1,300 delivery stations at universities as the promotional campaign for robot couriers kicks off.

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## cirr

*China set to take 5G lead*

2017-06-20 09:12

Global Times _Editor: Li Yan_

*Early start and 4G experience helping: experts*

China is likely to take the global lead in developing the fifth generation of cellular network (5G) technology thanks to the head start gained by the country's three telecom operators and homegrown equipment suppliers, as well as the experience accumulated through building 4G networks, experts said on Monday.

China's "big three" carriers - China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom - have already sketched out plans for building 5G infrastructure and conducting 5G technology tests.

The high-speed 5G networks are expected to provide wireless Internet speeds that are 100 times faster than the current 4G networks, and with lower power consumption.

"China Telecom has established a united open laboratory for 5G testing, and has already started field tests in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou," a spokesperson for China Telecom who whished to remain anonymous, told the Global Times on Monday, adding that the mobile operator applied for 59 5G-related patents last year.

On May 17, China Telecom announced that it had built the world's first and largest Narrow Band Internet of Things (NB-IoT) network, signaling a "breakthrough" in the development of 5G technology, the spokesperson said. NB-IoT is generally seen as paving the way for the massive IoT capacities that are vital for 5G technology.

In a similar move, China Mobile announced that it will conduct 5G field tests and start to build 5G networks in China's major cities from 2017. China Unicom also said it will start some preparation work for 5G technology in the second half of 2017. Both carriers intend to roll out commercial 5G technology by 2020, according to media reports.

It is estimated that the three carriers will spend a combined $180 billion on 5G infrastructure over the coming seven years, the South China Morning Post reported on June 12, citing Jefferies equity analyst Edison Lee.

That level of investment would represent about a 48 percent increase in total spending by the three companies from their combined outlay on 4G, said the report. It would also eclipse Japan's spending on 5G, which was forecast to hit $46 billion over the same period.

"5G networks are capital-intensive because the technology needs greater frequency reuse and more base stations," Xiang Ligang, chief executive of domestic telecom industry portal cctime.com, told the Global Times on Monday, noting that huge investment probably promises faster progress.

Besides, telecom operators can also benefit from their rich experience in building 4G networks, experts said.

China is now home to the world's largest 4G network with users touching 770 million by the end of 2016, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).

Meanwhile, domestic telecommunication manufacturers such as Huawei and ZTE, whose innovative capacity is comparable to global tech giants like Ericsson, are also investing heavily in research related to 5G technology, Fu Liang, a Beijing-based IT expert, told the Global Times on Monday.

*Setting 5G standards*

Currently, industry discussions are focused on 5G technology standards. The International Telecommunication Union, which is part of the United Nations, has set a goal for 5G network deployment to begin in 2020, after standards for the technology are agreed on. The concept is known as IMT-2020.

Fu said that as an early starter in researching the technology, China is likely to have a bigger voice in formulating international 5G standards.

"In the past, China was merely following the technology framework designed by foreign competitors," Fu said.

"In terms of 5G, China has participated from the very beginning when the market demand surfaced, and then to the technology concept and application."

The country established the IMT-2020 5G Promotion Group in 2013 to coordinate efforts by mobile service operators, manufacturers and research institutes. And the China-developed 5G standard is scheduled to be released in 2018 and begin commercialized deployment in 2019, the Xinhua News Agency reported.

In March, the MIIT announced that China has established the world's largest 5G test field in the race to standardize the mobile communication technology. On June 6, international mobile communication standard organization the 3rd Generation Partnership Project confirmed that Service-based Architectures, which were proposed by China Mobile, will be used as the unified infrastructure for 5G core networks.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/06-20/262094.shtml

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## Shotgunner51

*AU experts undergo training in China under Huawei-sponsored program*
Xinhua | Updated: 2017-05-27 13:15

ADDIS ABABA - *Chinese tech giant Huawei on Friday sent the 3rd batch of 10 technical experts of the African Union (AU) to China for a two-week training on information and communication technology (ICT) sector. *





Seeds for the Future Mexico 2016





Seeds for the Future 2016​
Huawei and AU signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in January 2015 for cooperation between the two sides in the area of ICT and capacity building for the African continent.

In the implementation of the MoU, under the initiative dubbed "Seeds for the Future", Huawei has been organizing training and experience sharing visits for African experts in China, aiming also at familiarizing the experts with latest technologies in the ICT area.

The participants in the 3rd batch took part a pre-departure orientation and guidance by Huawei, AU, and the Chinese Mission to AU on Friday at the AU Headquarters in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa.

In his remarks on the occasion, Kwesi Quartey, Deputy Chairperson of the AU Commission, hailed China's rise and development as "very, very impressive, incredible," which he said is best example for Africa.

The Deputy Chairperson, who recently visited China and attended the Belt and Road Forum, noted that China has dynamic, flexible leadership that shows Africa the way through inclusive education as foundation and its application of science and technology.

Quartey commended Huawei for its support by providing the training for African ICT experts on the topics very relevant for Africa.

He also urged the participants to use the opportunity to acquire the knowledge to effectively implement the African projects.

"Education, training, science and technology is key for Africa especially as we focus on the theme of harnessing the demographic dividend of the youth through investments. The skills and know-how transfer is key," he stated.

Cheng Ning, Counselor of Cooperation and Exchange at the Chinese Mission to AU, said that the training helps Africa's effort to develop capacity in the ICT sector.

Stating that the training is organized in collaboration and partnership with Huawei, Chen said it is in line with China's commitment to supporting Africa to realize sustainable development under the 10 major cooperation plans between China and Africa.

Besides Huawei's program, he said that China has been providing capacity building support to Africa, through various short and long-term training programs in China.

Stating that China has also been providing support to various social activities in Africa, Chen said China will continue supporting capacity building efforts on the continent.

He called for the participants to explore China during their stay in the country for the training.

Speaking on the occasion, Deputy CEO of Huawei Ethiopia, Adam Ma, reiterated that the training is organized to support AU's effort in the ICT area.

With 18 years of experience within Africa's ICT industry coupled with extensive industry global network, Huawei is well positioned to partner with the African Union and share its experience, noted the Deputy CEO.

Two AU staff members, who have participated in the Huawei's program with previous batches, namely Yagouba Traore and Martha Yetayew shared their experiences during the training.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2017-05/27/content_29527526.htm


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## onebyone

_





This story was delivered to BI Intelligence Apps and Platforms Briefing subscribers. To learn more and subscribe, please click here._

China’s telecoms will spend a combined 2.8 trillion yuan (US $411 billion) on building out 5G mobile networks from 2020 to 2030, according to a new 5G study from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology.

The figures in the study, as reported by the South China Morning Post, forecast China to become the biggest 5G market by subscribers in the next decade; China’s 5G subscriber count is expected to reach 588 million by 2022, according to an estimate from equity firm Jefferies. China is currently the largest 4G market, with 843.7 million 4G subscribers as of April 2017.

Here are three key takeaways from the report:


5G will spur new revenue for telecom and hardware makers. By 2030, China Mobile, Unicom, and China Telecom are expected to generate 7.9 trillion yuan in combined 5G-related revenue.
Legacy and emerging mobile services and technologies alike will see more adoption due to 5G speeds. Internet companies and application developers are expected to generate 10.7 trillion yuan in total 5G-related revenue from 2020 to 2030. 5G will power nascent tech like augmented and virtual reality (VR), connected homes, M2M communications, and large-scale operations of IoT devices.
The 5G market is expected to have such a significant impact on the Chinese economy that it could account for 3.2% of Mainland China’s entire GDP in 2025, generate 8 million jobs, and add 2.9 trillion yuan in economic value by 2030. As demand for 5G services heightens, there will be a boom in new companies, employment opportunities, and sales of equipment. 
China’s 5G focus will play a big role domestically in terms of driving mobile usage. 5G’s ability to transmit data roughly 10 times faster than 4G, the current standard, according to Ericsson’s annual Mobility Report, will enable consumers to conduct more standard mobile activities and also add in data-heavy ones, like smartphone-based VR streaming and using artificial intelligence assistants. 

But perhaps more importantly, China’s ambitious pursuit of pervasive 5G connectivity could help advance global efforts. While China diverted from global network norms in its 3G standard, it's now working on developing 5G standards with global compatibility in mind, according to a report from FierceWireless. 5G is expected to hit the consumer market sometime around 2020, according to the GSMA.

Peter Newman, research analyst for BI Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service, has conducted an exclusive study with in-depth research into the field and created a detailed report on the IoT that:


Provides a primer on the basics of the IoT ecosystem
Offers forecasts for the IoT moving forward and highlights areas of interest in the coming years
Looks at who is and is not adopting the IoT, and why
Highlights drivers and challenges facing companies implementing IoT solutions

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## onebyone

http://www.businessinsider.com/china-plans-to-lead-5g-network-adoption-by-2030-2017-6


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## Zer0reZ

*Law needs to intervene over Apple’s alleged monopoly*
*




*
Apple's policy of creaming off 30 percent of tip revenue collected on local apps has caused wide public dissatisfaction. Tips are voluntarily offered by app users to content creators, be they individuals or a team, as a reward for their work. Apple now designates tipping as in-app purchases, but this is just dissembling on their part. 

WeChat, a social media app widely used in China, declined to comply with Apple's policy and has disabled the tipping function on versions run on iOS. Some small platforms such as online content aggregation app Toutiao and question-and-answer website Zhihu have compromised. Apple will peel off 3 to 3.2 yuan from a tip of 10 yuan, a percentage which is startling. 

It must be pointed out that Apple's decision to wring more profits from tip revenue is unacceptable to the majority of Chinese people. It is an act of bullying similar to robbery. If Apple insists on this practice, regardless of how much revenue it grasps from it, the image of the company in the Chinese market will be seriously damaged, and this will harm its development in China in the long-run. 

Chinese domestic brands are seeking a bigger market share. Four domestic smartphone companies ranked among the top five by shipments in China in the first quarter of 2017. Apple only placed fourth in the ranking, the sole foreign brand. Had it not been for its unique operating system that helped sustain users, the situation might be even worse. At this juncture, Apple should strive to consolidate its status in the Chinese market through innovations rather than taking radical approaches. 

Apple may violate the antitrust principle by imposing a forced charge that takes advantage of its market share and operating system. The law should intervene at this point.

Surprisingly, no Chinese companies filed a lawsuit against Apple over the tipping dispute. Chinese market supervision authorities have so far remained silent. We expect they will conduct an investigation and get involved soon. 

It's obvious that the rights and interests of Apple users have been infringed. Non-Apple users can freely tip authors of their favorite articles, but those who use iPhones have to hand over 30 percent of the tip to Apple, leaving only 70 percent for the authors. In view of the unfair conditions Apple forcibly imposed on them, they as individual users are unable to confront the company. Kidnapped by Apple's unique operating system, it is difficult to make other choices. 

Apple has violated the basic principles of fair competition and the authorities should conduct an anti-trust investigation into it. 

There is no need to incorporate nationalism into the matter. If a company is suspected of using monopolistic practices to maximize profits, the market supervision department and the law should intervene. At a time when the rule of law is comprehensively advancing, Chinese society should become more accustomed to resorting to law when public interests have been violated. 

*Apple staff in China ‘sold personal data’*

Chinese authorities said that they have uncovered a massive underground operation run by Apple Inc employees selling personal data of computer and phone users.

A total of 22 people have been detained on suspicion of infringing individuals' privacy and illegally obtaining their digital personal information, according to a statement issued on Wednesday by police in East China's Zhejiang Province.

Of the 22 suspects, 20 were Apple employees who allegedly used the company's internal computer system to gather users' names, phone numbers, Apple IDs and other data, which they sold as part of a scam worth more than 50 million yuan ($7.36 million).

The statement did not specify whether the data belonged to Chinese or foreign Apple customers.






*45,000 apps removed from iOS App Store in Chinese mainland over 10 days*


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## JSCh

*ZTE wins 75 percent share of True's Beyond-100G backbone WDM Network project in Thailand *

*23* *June 2017, Shenzhen, China *– ZTE Corporation (0763.HK / 000063.SZ), a major international provider of telecommunications, enterprise and consumer technology solutions for the Mobile Internet, today announced it has won the bid for three networks in True's beyond-100G backbone wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) network project in Thailand, gaining around 75 percent project share. The backbone transmission networks will enable True to provide valuable functions such as ultra-large capacity optical transport network (OTN) cross-connection, intelligent scheduling of optical networks, and ultra-long-distance transmission, helping True adapt to future service development and follow-up evolution.

ZTE is committed to helping True create a large-capacity, high-performance and high-stability backbone dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) network. The new 100G/400G backbone transmission WDM network will greatly improve True's network capacity and effectively promote its service growth in 3G/ long term evolution (LTE), fixed network, broadband and other fields.

In this project, ZTE has adopted the 100G and beyond-100G WASON solution, industry-leading PM-QPSK/PM-16QAM modulation and coherent reception technology, and the industry-leading digital signal processing (DSP) algorithm and third-generation soft decision forward error correction (SD-FEC) to achieve transmission without electronic relays in the entire network, greatly reducing the cost of the network. The software-defined optical networking (SDON) technology makes optical network transmission more intelligent, effectively shortens the service deployment time, and greatly improves the efficiency of network scheduling. In addition, this project supports the industry-leading embedded optical time domain reflectometer (OTDR) solution, can achieve comprehensive and real-time monitoring of the fibre parameters and fault points in the existing network, greatly improving network maintainability and reducing troubleshooting time. This project also provides the colourless directionless contationless flexgrid, reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexer (CDCF ROADM) function, which can fully meet the operator's requirements for the transparent transmission, flexible scheduling, aggregation, management, and monitoring of massive data services.

With more than 300 network application cases and a total length of 300,000 km network fibre, ZTE maintains an industry-leading position in the field of 100 Gbps/beyond-100G innovative technologies. According to a 2016 annual report released by OVUM, an internationally renowned consulting firm, ZTE ranks second for its share in the optical network market.

http://www.zte.com.cn/global/about/press-center/news/201706ma/0623ma1

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## Shotgunner51

*China Is Driving To 5G And IoT Through Global Collaboration*
Moor Insights and Strategy  , Contributor
Jun 20, 2017 @ 09:30 AM
Post written by John Fruehe
John Fruehe is a Moor Insights & Strategy senior enterprise analyst for networking and servers






Telecoms and cloud service providers are gearing up for two of the largest functional changes in decades: The Internet of Things (IoT) which is happening now and 5G which is on the horizon. Both will require substantial investments in capital and operations for today’s networks to be competitive and thrive in this connected future. No single vendor can deliver the full stack, and proprietary technologies will not keep pace with these future needs. This transformation will be delivered in virtualized (not physical) technologies, open source and multivendor, relying on significant integration work across many in the industry to be successful. *Chinese players like China Mobile , Huawei and ZTE are emerging as leaders in this space*, through something not traditionally expected from the region: *global collaboration*.

OPNFV is an initiative from the Linux Foundation that is working on the interoperability and integration of these virtual components, referred to as virtual network functions (VNFs), into a platform called network function virtualization (NFV). This platform enables carriers to move from physical devices and appliances towards virtual functions that are software-based, because hardware-based solutions will never scale to meet demands. The network needs to change, especially in light of technologies like 5G and IoT that require new ways of working.

This year’s OPNFV Summit was held in Beijing, China, a choice that could have limited attendance from outside of China, but the representation, while China strong, did cover the globe. At the event, I hosted a panel with representatives from *NTT DoCoMo* (Japan), China Telecom, *China Mobile* and Orange (France). These carriers all brought a diversity of experience, engagement and progress, as they are all in different stages of their transition into the virtual world. Interestingly, the collaboration across these different companies works, because everyone seems to be facing the same challenge: building new networks based on tools that might not exist yet while still running their current business—akin to building an airplane in mid-flight. OPNFV enables them to drive a common set of requirements back to vendors, ensuring they will have the tools and technologies to make this work.

I spoke with Heather Kirksey, OPNFV director, who was supportive of China and its ability to collaborate globally. “The choice for China was intentional, we are a global organization. This is not a regional China event, it is our global event.” Kirksey pointed out that while travel expense, time and visas make it difficult to hold the event here, these are the same challenges that the Chinese face with US or European events. While it may be harder and more expensive for her organization, it pays dividends in bringing more collaboration and diversity, which are key to OPNFV success.

Collaboration between carriers is typically easier because regulation and geographic challenges limit conflict, but for equipment companies, the global market makes it more difficult for them to work with competitors. Yet the working group representation sees competitors like Ericsson and *Huawei* both working to achieve the same project goals. Inclusion and diversity were strong themes of the event.

As 5G changes the carrier landscape, we’ll see some key technologies like NFV act as the underpinning for the transition. Open source software—and now even open source hardware—will be critical components. Open source is all about public debate, and unlike previous transitions that were driven more by standards bodies driving consensus, the next generation of communications technology will be driven more by open source organizations like OPNFV, OpenStack, OpenDaylight, DPDK, FD.io, ONOS and ONAP as the underpinnings of 5G will be virtual and very cloud-centric. Collaboration has become the preferred mechanism for driving change, and China is stepping up as a major player in this movement, overcoming many of the language and cultural barriers that stymied sharing in the past.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/moorin...ot-through-global-collaboration/#7db9c6ce8aa0


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## JSCh

*7 Chinese mainland tech firms included in 50 Smartest Companies list *
By Wang Xueying
2017-06-27 23:01 GMT+8



MIT Technology Review on Tuesday released its list of* 50 Smartest Companies. *Seven tech companies from the Chinese mainland have been included in the 2017 list, namely iFlytek (No. 6), Tencent (No. 8), Face++ (No. 11), DJI (No. 25), Alibaba (No. 41), Ant Financial (No. 49) and Baidu (No. 50).

Every year, MIT Technology Review identifies 50 companies, which performed aggressively by combining advanced technologies and business savvy. Considered the dominant companies of the future, firms on the list previously included tech giants such as IBM and Amazon, but some are startups full of ambition, such as SpaceX and Tesla. The list aims to encourage technologically innovative companies to promote their successful business models all over the world.



Source: MIT Technology Review. 

It's 2017 and artificial intelligence technology factors into placement on the list. As such, firms that have made great advances in emerging technology fields like deep learning, voice and facial recognition, as well as DNA sequencing, have dominated the list. 

Looking at Chinese mainland’s contribution to the list, it marks iFlytek’s first time to be included. As an IT firm, iFlytek has developed its own voice recognition software, dubbed “Chinese Siri”, and has introduced more than ten voice-based mobile products in China. In MIT Technology Review’s opinion, this company “already dominates China’s voice recognition market and is now expanding into voice-activated command systems for cars, homes, robots, and schools.”



New technology is changing people‘s daily lives. /VCG Photo

Another newcomer from China this year is Face++, a company which provides facial recognition services. At present, popular Chinese online payment platform, Alipay, uses Face++’s core technology to allow users to log in and pay by using their faces as identification. Meanwhile, ride-sharing firm Didi Chuxing, and popular photographing app maker Meitu, both use Face++’s services.



No-cash payment has become very popular in Chinese mainland. /VCG Photo

Over the past several years, Chinese companies, especially tech giants, have been playing a more important role in global economic development. To some degree, it represents the rise of China’s economy, as well as its international influence in the world.


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## cirr

*7 Chinese mainland tech firms included in 50 Smartest Companies list*

2017-06-28 13:18

CGTN _Editor: Li Yan_

MIT Technology Review on Tuesday released its list of 50 Smartest Companies. Seven tech companies from the Chinese mainland have been included in the 2017 list, namely *iFlytek* (No. 6), *Tencent* (No. 8), *Face++* (No. 11), *DJI* (No. 25), *Alibaba* (No. 41), *Ant Financial* (No. 49) and *Baidu* (No. 50).

Every year, MIT Technology Review identifies 50 companies, which performed aggressively by combining advanced technologies and business savvy. Considered the dominant companies of the future, firms on the list previously included tech giants such as IBM and Amazon, but some are startups full of ambition, such as SpaceX and Tesla. The list aims to encourage technologically innovative companies to promote their successful business models all over the world.

It's 2017 and artificial intelligence technology factors into placement on the list. As such, firms that have made great advances in emerging technology fields like deep learning, voice and facial recognition, as well as DNA sequencing, have dominated the list.

Looking at Chinese mainland's contribution to the list, it marks iFlytek's first time to be included. As an IT firm, iFlytek has developed its own voice recognition software, dubbed "Chinese Siri", and has introduced more than ten voice-based mobile products in China. In MIT Technology Review's opinion, this company "already dominates China's voice recognition market and is now expanding into voice-activated command systems for cars, homes, robots, and schools."

Another newcomer from China this year is Face++, a company which provides facial recognition services. At present, popular Chinese online payment platform, Alipay, uses Face++'s core technology to allow users to log in and pay by using their faces as identification. Meanwhile, ride-sharing firm Didi Chuxing, and popular photographing app maker Meitu, both use Face++'s services.

Over the past several years, Chinese companies, especially tech giants, have been playing a more important role in global economic development. To some degree, it represents the rise of China's economy, as well as its international influence in the world.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/06-28/263272.shtml


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## cirr

*China's ZTE Corp to set up 5G tech hub in Italy*

2017-06-30 09:18

Xinhua _Editor: Gu Liping_

China's ZTE Corp will make Italy its European hub for the development of 5G wireless technology, the company confirmed on Thursday.

Fifth-generation or 5G is the next mobile wireless standard, and will make telecoms faster and more powerful. The company announced its plans in a meeting with Lombardy regional officials in Milan.

ZTE intends to open 13 new research & development centres in Italy, said its CEO for Western Europe, Hu Kun. "The 5G network will be ready by next year," said Hu who also serves as president of ZTE Italy, adding "The pre-5G phase is in full swing."

5G development at the Italy tech hub "will be the most important experimentation, at the European level, in the telecoms field," Hu told the Italian Institute for Asia and the Mediterranean (IsiameD), one of its digital technology partners in Italy, in an interview posted on the IsiameD website.

Founded in 1985, ZTE operates across 140 countries and employs over 30,000 researchers in 18 R&D centers, according to its corporate website.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/06-30/263539.shtml


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## cirr

*Chinese telecom giants to pilot 5G technology*

2017-07-05 13:52

Xinhua _Editor: Gu Liping_

China's three major telecom operators will pilot 5G technology in several cities during the second half of this year, the Economic Information Daily reported Wednesday.

The pilot projects will be carried out in cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, Guangzhou, Nanjing, Suzhou, and Ningbo, the Xinhua-run newspaper said, citing sources from the telecom giants, namely China Mobile, China Unicom, and China Telecom.

The companies will test the 5G technology, build base stations, and launch applications such as autonomous driving, smart cities, and smart homes based on the network, according to the report.

The pilot programs will be expanded to another 10 or more cities in provinces including Jiangxi, Hainan, Shanxi, Shandong, Zhejiang, and Hebei in the future, it said.

The moves will help China play a leading role in developing the global 5G standard and pave the way for commercialization and further development of the technology, the newspaper said.

China plans to commercialize 5G mobile networks, which provide much faster connectivity and lower energy consumption, as early as 2020.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/07-05/264146.shtml


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## onebyone

*In China 5G trials, ZTE hits massive 19 Gbps network speeds*
In recent 5G speed tests, telecom provider ZTE was able to set a new industry record in terms of network throughput, exceeding 19 Gbps.

By Conner Forrest | July 5, 2017, 5:56 AM PST






In Chinese 5G network trials, international telecom provider ZTE Corporation set a new industry record when it exceeded a throughput of 19 Gbps, the company announced in a Monday press release. In a separate test, the firm was also able to achieve a low latency of 0.416 ms.

In short, the 5G future is here, and it's fast.

In total, ZTE conducted seven separate tests as part of the second phase of China's National 5G tests, the release said. The tests were conducted in Huairou, Beijing.

*SEE: IT Networking Fundamentals Certification Training (TechRepublic Academy)
One of the most prominent tests was the eMBB (enhanced mobile broadband) test, conducted at sub-6Ghz. In the test, ZTE was able to offer 28 streams to users through the 3.5 GHz pre-commercial base station, the release said, ultimately achieving the new 19+ Gbps record. In the release, ZTE said this could be used to help connect some of the densely-populated urban areas in China.

In a separate test, trialing eMBB on high-frequency millimeter waves, ZTE surpassed 13 Gbps using a 26GHz base station. ZTE noted that tests like this will help the eventual commercialization of high-frequency technologies in mobile, according to the release.

Low latency was also on the agenda for testing. In an ultra-reliable and low-latency communications (uRLLC) test, the firm achieved a latency of 0.416 ms. ZTE's proprietary chips were used in the test to achieve such latency, the press release said.

An additional trial had implications for the future of Internet of Things (IoT) adoption as well. Using MUSA (multi-user shared access) technology, ZTE achieved performance of 90 million connections/MHz/hour/km2, the release said.


ZTE also used network slicing to create a unified network to support multiple interfaces and applications, such as those mentioned above. This would allow for more flexible service configuration, and the tests on this platform managed a peak rate of 15 Gbps, along with latency lower than 0.416 ms, and 90 million connections/MHz/hour/km2 at the same time, the release said.

The trials here were part of China's growing effort to deploy 5G by 2020. ZTE, a Chinese company, currently has 3,000 employees dedicated to 5G research and development, and is planning to double the money it is investing in the technology.

The 3 big takeaways for TechRepublic readers

In recent 5G network trials, ZTE achieved 19 Gbps network throughput and 0.416 ms of latency.
The seven tests will have an impact of 5G technologies for mobile connectivity in densely-populated areas, as well as improving IoT connectivity.
ZTE is doubling its investment in 5G R&D, as China sets it sights on a 5G deployment by 2020.
Stay informed, click here to subscribe to the TechRepublic Data Center Trends newsletter.

http://www.techrepublic.com/article/in-china-5g-trials-zte-hits-massive-19-gbps-network-speeds/
*

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## onebyone

Phase 2 of China’s National 5G tests were conducted in Huairou in Beijing. ZTE completed tests for continuous wide coverage, eMBB (enhanced mobile broadband) at sub-6Ghz, eMBB at millimeter-wave frequencies, uRLLC (ultra-Reliable and Low Latency Communications), eMTC (massive Machine Type Communications), in addition to two hybrid scenarios, achieving multiple breakthroughs:

*eMBB@Sub6GHz Test: New Record for the Peak Value, with Cell Throughput Exceeding 19 Gbps*

In the eMBB@Sub6GHz test scenario, ZTE provided 28 streams for multiple users by using the 3.5 GHz pre-commercial base station, with a peak cell throughput higher than 19 Gbps, a new industry record. This data rate is higher than the ITU-defined value (10 Gbps). ZTE’s solution overcomes the limitations of standard interfaces, and provides more spatial division streams than the standard and common value (16 streams) in the industry. This technology is especially suitable for China’s densely-populated urban areas, highlighting ZTE’s technology leadership in 5G eMBB scenarios.

*Industry-first eMBB@mmWave Test: Single-User Rate Exceeding 13 Gbps*

ZTE was the first to use the 26GHz base station in the high-frequency eMBB test scenario, and achieved a 4-stream rate of 13 Gbps even when a single test terminal supported a bandwidth of less than 1 GHz. This rate is higher than that defined by ITU (10 Gbps), and is a major step forward in the development and commercialization of high-frequency mobile communications.






*mMTC Scenario: Massive Capacity of 90 Million Connections/MHz/hour/km2*

In the mMTC test scenario, ZTE increased the overload rate of connected terminals by 600 percent by using the innovative MUSA (multi-user shared access) technology, and verified an equivalent massive IoT access performance of 90 million connections/MHz/hour/km2, which is 90 times the value (1 million connections/square kilometers) currently defined by ITU. mMTC is one of the three key scenarios defined in 3GPP standards. ZTE plays a leading role in the NOMA (non-orthogonal multiple access) Working Group, serving to accelerate industry standardization of 5G globally.

*uRLLC Scenario: Ultra-Low Latency of 0.416 ms*

In the uRLLC test scenario, ZTE achieved an ultra-low latency of 0.416 ms based on a unified test platform, lower than the ITU-defined 1 ms. The system is based on ZTE’s self-developed chipsets, which is self-adaptable in eMBB and uRLLC scenarios. The results show ZTE’s leadership in the implementation of key 5G uRLLC technologies and prototypes, which is a key step for 5G commercialization in the future.

ZTE is committed to driving the commercialization of 5G products, laying a solid foundation for commercial 5G deployment in China by 2020.

https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2017/...gbps-and-is-on-track-for-2020-deployment.html

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## neem456

I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
Wonder what use is 19 gbps.

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## Mista

neem456 said:


> I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
> Wonder what use is 19 gbps.



Virtual reality or Internet of Things.

https://www.cnet.com/news/5g-not-ju...ts-you-do-vr-self-driving-cars-drones-remote/


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## scherz

neem456 said:


> I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
> Wonder what use is 19 gbps.



You can watch on 16K Stream how India will be taken over by Chinese Military.

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## neem456

scherz said:


> You can watch on 16K Stream how India will be taken over by Chinese Military.


Hmm
Meanwhile in 1080p I am watching how India thrashed Chinese plan of constructing road in Chinese territory itself while Chinese could do nothing more than blowing hot air on daily basis.

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## shadows888

neem456 said:


> I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
> Wonder what use is 19 gbps.



it's not for you, it's for businesses.

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## Jlaw

neem456 said:


> I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
> Wonder what use is 19 gbps.


5G not meant for poor countries.

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## jetray

Jlaw said:


> 5G not meant for poor countries.


is it for rich beggars to buy US bonds?



neem456 said:


> I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
> Wonder what use is 19 gbps.


19GBs is way too much data and the device will heat up a lot if it will handle that speed. Even the routers we have now can only handle 3.2gigs. Lets wait & see , proof of pudding is in eating.

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## AndrewJin

Jlaw said:


> 5G not meant for poor countries.


Of course.
SupaPowa2012 is too rich even for 3G

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## Tauren Paladin

I sense a lot of jealousy in Indian members. China is ready for 5G soon and they come here to say 5G is useless because it's too fast.

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## randomradio

All the Chinese kids here don't realize that Reliance has already built a pan India all-IP network.

https://newsroom.cisco.com/press-release-content?articleId=1826139
*Cisco and Reliance Jio Build World’s Largest All-IP Digital Services Platform*

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## Dungeness

randomradio said:


> All the Chinese kids here don't realize that *Reliance has already built* a pan India all-IP network.
> 
> https://newsroom.cisco.com/press-release-content?articleId=1826139
> *Cisco and Reliance Jio Build World’s Largest All-IP Digital Services Platform*



"Has already built" or "Plan to build"?

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## rcrmj

neem456 said:


> I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
> Wonder what use is 19 gbps.


primitive factor driven Indian wouldnt know the needs for massive bandwith in modern internet driven societies

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## dray

Dungeness said:


> "Has already built" or "Plan to build"?



Operational for more than a year now.



neem456 said:


> I have 40 mbps connection and its a overkill for my usage, i dont know what to do with such speeds.
> Wonder what use is 19 gbps.



They will beat India in multiplayer video games and scream 'victory', while their army on the ground wet their pants. These obnoxious loudmouths are just like pests....disgusting.

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## randomradio

Dungeness said:


> "Has already built" or "Plan to build"?



We have already become the world's largest data consumers now.

http://telecom.economictimes.indiat...o-india-becomes-top-mobile-data-user/57269548
_“India has become no 1 country in mobile data usage. Jio users consumed more than 100 crore GB of data per month on the Jio network and that’s more than 3.3 crore GB a day,” Ambani said in a televised conference in Mumbai._

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## Dungeness

randomradio said:


> We have already become the world's largest data consumers now.
> 
> http://telecom.economictimes.indiat...o-india-becomes-top-mobile-data-user/57269548
> _“India has become no 1 country in mobile data usage. Jio users consumed more than 100 crore GB of data per month on the Jio network and that’s more than 3.3 crore GB a day,” Ambani said in a televised conference in Mumbai._



Yeah, India has become a superpower in 2012.

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## Pyr0test

congrats to Huawei for becoming the 1st non goverment owned tech/communications company to reach top 100 according to Fortune

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## Han Patriot

Dungeness said:


> Yeah, India has become a superpower in 2012.


Just ignore him. He doesn't even understand the technology involved. Reliance is a big Huawei customer, when 5G comes, they will most likely buy Huawei stuff.

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## JSCh

* China, Zambia reach deal for construction of more communication towers *
_ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2017-08-04 23:37:01_|_Editor: yan_





LUSAKA, Aug. 4 (Xinhua) -- China and Zambia on Friday signed a framework agreement for construction of communication towers (phase two) in the southern African country.

The agreement involves 808 towers, 1,009 2G, 3G and 4G wireless stations, the setting up of a matched transmission network and user access terminals in unserved and under-served areas in order to improve communication services.

Chinese Ambassador to Zambia Yang Youming signed on behalf of his government while Fredson Yamba, Secretary to the Treasury, signed on behalf of the Zambian government during a ceremony witnessed by President Edgar Lungu in Lusaka, the country's capital.

China's Huawei Technologies has been engaged to construct the towers, with the project expected to take about three years to complete.

The Chinese envoy said the signing of the agreement marks another milestone in the development of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) in Zambia as the sector was one of the important areas of cooperation under the framework of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC).

The completion of the project will result in an increase in the voice service penetration from 70 percent to almost 100 percent as well as increase in data service penetration from five percent to 40 percent, a move that will result in improved communication conditions for people.

The Chinese envoy added that the completion of the project will lessen inconveniences experienced when using ICTs in the country as well as improve the investment environment of the country.

On his part, the Zambian leader said the launch of the second phase of the construction of communication towers demonstrates his government's commitment to provide citizens with ICT infrastructure in order to improve communication.

The Zambian leader said the launch of the project was a milestone in the government's commitment to ensure inclusiveness in the country.

The Zambian leader further said about 2,000 jobs will be created under the project which will also provide connectivity for enterprises as well as enable rural farmers access markets for their products.

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## TaiShang

*Weibo posts strong Q2 financial performance*
Xinhua, August 9, 2017

Chinese social media giant Sina Weibo reported strong financial performance in the second quarter (Q2) of this year thanks to booming advertising and marketing demand.

*The tech firm raked in net revenue of about 253.4 million U.S. dollars, up 72 percent year on year, according to its unaudited financial results released Wednesday.*

Net income attributable to Weibo reached 73.5 million U.S. dollars, an increase of 184 percent year on year.

Advertising and marketing services remained the major source of income, bringing in 218.3 million U.S. dollars in Q2, a 72-percent surge over Q2 of 2016.

Weibo boasted about 361 million monthly active users as of the end of June, up 28 percent year on year, with 92 percent of them coming from mobile devices.

"These strong results give us confidence that our strategy to focus on developing a unique and expansive content ecosystem, launching engaging features like Weibo Stories, and attracting KOLs (key opinion leaders), celebrities and other influencers to increase the social and viral nature of Weibo is boding well for us," said Weibo CEO Wang Gaofei.

Weibo estimated its net revenue will be between 290 and 300 million U.S. dollars for the third quarter of 2017.

http://china.org.cn/business/2017-08/09/content_41383705.htm


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## JSCh

* Cambodian telecoms firm partners with China's Huawei to bring 4.5G service *
_ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2017-08-21 20:43:31_|_Editor: Yang Yi_





PHNOM PENH, Aug. 21 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia's mobile telecommunications company Smart Axiata, in partnership with global ICT solutions provider Huawei, launched the 4.5G network in Cambodia on Monday.

Cambodian Minister of Posts and Telecommunications Tram Iv Tek said Smart Axiata was the first telecom operator that introduced 4.5G evolution technology to Cambodia.

"This latest evolution of mobile technology will enable subscribers to enjoy better and faster mobile internet," he said during the launching ceremony. "Fast access to the internet is indeed an important tool in developing a digital economy."

In Cambodia, about 45 percent of the population is still offline, the minister said, adding that the country expected that 100 percent of the urban dwellers and 80 percent of the rural dwellers would use the Internet by 2020.

Thomas Hundt, chief executive officer of Smart Axiata, said 4.5G network is capable of providing an Internet speed 8 times higher than that of 4G.

"We strive to be the most progressive telco in the country. Smart will continue to seek new and better ways to ensure our subscribers receive the best possible service," he said. "After being the first telco introducing 4G LTE in Cambodia in 2014, 4G+ in 2016, and now 4.5G, and 5G is surely not far away."

Industry experts expect the first commercial launch of full-fledged 5G to happen in 2020.

Li Xiongwei, chief executive officer of Huawei Technologies Cambodia, said Huawei was very pleased to cooperate with Smart to launch 4.5G and to bring Cambodia closer to next generation technology.

"The 4.5G will certainly bring significant network improvements from today's 4G network, while acting as a bridge for future mobile data applications when 5G is launched in the future," he said.

Cambodia has six mobile phone operators and about 30 Internet service providers.

According to the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, approximately 8 million out of the country's 15 million people have now access to the Internet.

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## JSCh

*China Telecom offers 10 times faster broadband in Shanghai in 2018*
 Zhu Shenshen 
17:25 UTC+8, 2017-08-25 

Shanghai will become the first city in the world with full coverage of one-gigabyte broadband bandwidth in 2018, more than 10 times faster compared with the current network now, China Telecom said today in Shanghai.

With greatly improved speed of broadband services, users can have services like super high-definition video services, IPTV or Internet protocol TV and other interactive services, said China Telecom, which has attracted more than 5.2 million family broadband users since kicking off the service in Shanghai 20 years ago.

The local average broadband bandwidth is about 71.7 Mbps or megabytes per second — already the fastest in the Chinese mainland. By the end of 2017, the average broadband bandwidth in Shanghai will reach 115 Mbps, 12 percent growth year-on-year. The 1-gigabyte broadband network will be 10 times faster, which will cover the whole city by 2018, said China Telecom.

Enterprises and organizations are also expected to benefit for the upgraded network, covering on the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence applications.

Smaller carriers including China Telecom and China Unicom have to develop unique advantages to compete with market leader China Mobile, analysts said.

Last week, China Unicom announced to attract 78 billion yuan (US$11.5 billion) investment from companies including Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent.

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## TaiShang

*China's IT, internet industry prospers*
Xinhua, September 6, 2017

China's IT and internet industry continued to prosper in 2016 thanks to a better business environment and technological innovation, according to a report of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).

Total revenues of major IT and internet companies reached 17 trillion yuan (about US$2.6 trillion), 1.55 times that of the 2012, the latest official data showed.

This represents 11.6 percent annual growth from 2012 to 2016, with the electronics manufacturing and software sectors leading growth by expanding 9.5 percent and 18.1 percent respectively.

Profit growth at major electronic IT and internet companies gathered pace in 2016 on increasing investment and lower tax rates.

Last year such firms reported total profits of 1.3 trillion yuan, nearly double that in 2012, with a 17.3 percent annual growth.

The report said that last year the electronics manufacturing sector continued to support the country's industrial growth with its value-added output expanding 10 percent year on year.

The number of IT and internet companies with annual revenues of more than four billion yuan exceeded 200 and nearly a thousand companies made cross-border operations last year.

Investment in the electronics manufacturing sector rose 1.6 percent year on year. The growth was 14.7 percentage points higher than that of 2015, according to the report.

The industry's rapid development was boosted by internet-based innovations including virtual reality, smart television and drones.

IT is playing a bigger role in consumption, which will boost combined output of related industries to 15 trillion yuan in 2020, according to an industry guideline released recently by the State Council.

China will bolster online information consumption in the next few years to stimulate domestic demand and shore up economic growth.

By the end of 2020, the consumption of online information products and services is expected to grow at least 11 percent per year to reach 6 trillion yuan, according to the guideline.

Online information consumption stood at 3.9 trillion yuan last year, contributing 0.26 percentage points to the country's 6.7 percent year-on-year GDP growth.

The government has said it will create a sound business environment by adopting inclusive and prudent regulation, cutting red tape, and improving the protection of personal information and intellectual property.

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## TaiShang

*China leads world in internet market*
By Cheng Yu and Ma Si | China Daily | Updated: 2017-09-15 

China pioneers the world in internet development, as the growth of its netizen population and the amount of internet consumption both top the corresponding rate in other nations, a newly released industry report said.

*The compound growth rate of Chinese netizens reached 25 percent in the past 15 years and ranks the first globally while China's internet consumption has grown at a compound rate of 32 percent in the past five years, which is also ahead of most countries in the world.*

The report, published by global management consultancy the Boston Consulting Group as well as a group of internet giants such as Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, Baidu Inc and Didi Chuxing, reveals the latest trend of China's internet economy.

"We found that many new applications permeate much quicker in China than the US as Chinese netizens are more willing to accept new applications," said Li Shu, a partner at Boston Consulting.

"For example, Chinese transportation platform Didi Chuxing took three years to get half of China's ride-sharing market penetration while Uber still hasn't achieved the same goal "up till now," Li said.

Another trend the report pointed out: *China's internet market is very influential in terms of scale and impact as a considerable number of internet giants, start ups and unicorns－new, non-listed companies with valuations of more than $1 billion－are competing with world magnates in the field.*

Data from open database CrunchBase showed that *among 221 global unicorns, Chinese firms make up for nearly one third of the total, with a valuation of around $330 billion.*

Statistics from China Internet Network Information Center showed that China had a total of 751 million netizens by June 2017, which is about the total population of Europe.

China's "internet market can develop so rapidly based on such a big quantity. It is partly benefited by China's overall economic situation, since China has a large amount of young consumers and internet talents, a well-rounded capital foundation, as well as a solid base on infrastructure," Li said.

In the past few years, the State Council, Chinese cabinet, has pushed forward a series of plans to booster internet infrastructure construction, including broadband, mobile internet, iCloud and new technologies, which guarantees a sound environment for internet development.

According to the report, China's internet economy is highly active but also fluctuates greatly in top destinations of investment such as group purchases, live video streaming and peer-to-peer lending. An increasing number of enterprises has followed the trend, but the survival rate is low.

The Chinese internet market "is moving from application-driven innovation to technology-driven innovation. We believe that in the future, the large amount of users as well as abundant application scenes will help China to promote technological innovation," added Zhao Cheng, general manager of public affairs of Baidu Inc.

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## cirr

*Smart robot developed in China guarantees water resistance of new Apple phones*

2017-09-15 09:39

chinadaily.com.cn _Editor: Liang Meichen_

Technology developed by a Chinese university has been incorporated into the latest phones released by Apple.

The iPhone 8 and iPhone X, which were unveiled on Wednesday, are "precision‑engineered to resist water and dust," according to the company.

That specification was achieved by a university in Dalian, which says its smart robot system for spraying adhesive is key equipment that guarantees the water-proof ability of the new iPhones.

A team at the Dalian University of Technology, in northeastern Liaoning province, developed the smart robot controlling system based on technology it developed.

Unlike adhesives applied manually, the robots can automatically select the spray point and accurately calculate the coordinates of the precise location through image measurements.

The process greatly enhances the spray efficiency and ensures the waterproofing effect.

The system is utilized in most of the domestic factories operated by Apple supplier, Foxconn.

The total cost of the equipment has exceeded 170 million yuan ($25.9 million), sources at the university said.

The university team are focusing on the intelligent perception, deep learning, independent decision-making and other key technical problems of robot control in order to provide security and technical support for the application of robot in relevant industries.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/09-15/273739.shtml

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## JSCh

* China's Huawei, ZTE to develop high-speed Internet in Algeria *
_ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2017-10-04 10:27:29_|_Editor: Mengjie_





ALGIERS, Oct. 3 (Xinhua) -- Chinese telecommunications manufacturing giant Huawei on Tuesday signed an agreement with Algerian telecommunications operator Algerie Telecom (AT) to develop very high-speed Internet service, Algeria's state news agency reported.

According to Algeria Press Service, the partnership agreement is aimed at deploying optical cabling terminates at homes and companies.

The project will provide more effective communication between network users, including video conferencing, peer-to-peer, Internet Protocol (IP) telephony and online backup.

AT's CEO Adel Khemane told reporters that this "partnership project is set to deploy a very high-speed broadband network over a period of one year, in a bid to offer this service to more than one million customers."

Meanwhile, another Chinese telecom product manufacturer, ZTE, signed a partnership agreement with the Algerian Federation for Young Entrepreneurs (FNTE), as part of the deployment of an optical cabling network nationwide.

AT aims to strengthen its positioning in the telecommunications sector in Algeria amid competition from some prominent private operators.

China and Algeria, which established a comprehensive strategic partnership in 2014, have expanded cooperation in fields such as infrastructure, engineering construction and telecommunications.

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## Dungeness

TaiShang said:


> Total revenues of major IT and internet companies reached 17 trillion yuan (about *US$2.6 trillion*), 1.55 times that of the 2012, the latest official data showed.



Now that is even bigger than India's entire GDP, yet China has never tried to claim the title of "IT Superpower". It says something about these two countries.

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## TaiShang

Dungeness said:


> Now that is even bigger than India's entire GDP, yet China has never tried to claim the title of "IT Superpower". It says something about these two countries.



China is better continue this way, building up capabilities and let the numbers speak for themselves after the ground reality is set.

India is big ambitions and small capabilities. Hence, the gap between ambitions and capabilities is filled with big mouth words.

***

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## JSCh

*China to pioneer next frontier of innovation, expert says*
By Ma Si | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-10-18 08:52

















Wang Endong, chief scientist at China's largest server maker, Inspur Group, and delegate to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, meets the press before the opening of the Congress in Beijing October 18, 2017. [Photo/Xinhua]

China will be a world pioneer in making servers to power artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and big data applications as these cutting-edge technologies are widely seen as the next frontier of innovation, a renowned expert in the sector said on Wednesday.

"After years of development, China has leaped from a follower into a leader of innovation in server-related technologies," Wang Endong, chief scientist at China's largest server maker, Inspur Group, told reporters on the sidelines of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

Servers are the "engines" to drive the flow of data in various industries. They run core business systems in finance, telecom, electricity, energy, transmission and other industries that are directly related to people's livelihood.

According to Wang, three of the top five global server makers are from China. The country is also playing an important part in setting worldwide industrial standards.

"We outpaced other countries in server patent applications, which will offer a strong momentum to growth," he added. Wang also called for more efforts to achieve breakthroughs in the research and development of core technologies.

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## cirr

*China to make new breakthrough in quantum communication: CPC delegate*

2017-10-19 10:13 Xinhua _Editor: Gu Liping_





Photo taken on Nov. 26, 2016 shows a quantum communication ground station in Xinglong, north China's Hebei Province. (Xinhua/Jin Liwang)

Chinese researchers will soon make a new breakthrough in quantum communication after the world's first 2,000-km quantum communication line between Beijing and Shanghai went into operation in September, a senior university official said._*[Special Coverage]*_

The team led by Pan Jianwei from the Chinese Academy of Sciences has continued deep research to optimize the transmission of the quantum communication line so a jam will not occur when the number of users increases, said Xu Wu, Communist Party chief of the University of Science and Technology of China based in Hefei, capital of east China's Anhui Province.

Due to the attenuation of optical fiber, relay stations are needed to extend the distance of quantum communication. There are more than 30 relay stations, with an average distance of about 80 km between them, on the Beijing-Shanghai line.

The research team is working to extend the distance between two stations to 300 or 500 km to cut the number of relay stations and consequently the overall cost, said Xu, one of the more than 2,200 delegates to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), which opened Wednesday in Beijing.

A breakthrough will be made in this regard in the near future, said the Party official, whose university is applying for a national laboratory in the quantum field.

Quantum communication has ultra-high security. It is impossible to wiretap, intercept or crack the information transmitted through this means.

The Beijing-Shanghai quantum communication line is connected to the world's first quantum satellite, which was launched by China in August last year, through a station in Beijing. The satellite is nicknamed Micius after a fifth century B.C. Chinese philosopher and scientist who has been credited as the first person to conduct optical experiments.

As it is a new type of communication, the line's operation might come across problems. The team will try to solve problems through further research to make the line better meet the needs of the country and the users, said Xu.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/10-19/277628.shtml

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## cirr

*ZTE launches Pre5G solution*

2017-10-20 09:40

Global Times _Editor: Li Yan_

Major Chinese telecommunication provider ZTE Corp launched on Thursday a solution to accelerate the Pre5G evolution for fifth-generation (5G) networks, the company said in a statement sent to the Global Times.

The total Pre5G solution allows existing 4G subscribers to experience 5G-like services. It will be able to co-exist with 5G for long-term collaborative development, ZTE said.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/10-20/277746.shtml

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## cirr

*China predicted to account for half of 5G subscribers*

Written by Scott Bicheno

1 day ago






Analyst house CCS Insight has been running the numbers on predicted 5G adoption and come to the conclusion that China will be all over it.

They reckon 5G will take off faster than any of the previous generations, which is no great reach since that’s usually the case with the next ‘G’. With things only set to kick off in 2020, CCS forecasts we’ll hit the 1 billion mark by 2023, with more than half of that accounted for by China alone.

China has shown a remarkable ability to ramp very quickly. For years growth in the smartphone industry was driven by around a billion Chinese consumers upgrading from feature phones to smartphones and they clearly love a mobile phone. Furthermore vendors like Huawei and ZTE, alongside mega-operators like China Mobile have been throwing cash at 5G for a while. By contrast CCS reckons Europe will trail the Far East and the US by at least a year.

“We see China playing a far more influential role in 5G than it did in 4G,” said Marina Koytcheva, VP of Forecasting at CCS. “Size, scale and economic growth give China an obvious head start, but we expect network deployments to be much faster than in the early days of 4G. China will dominate 5G thanks to its political ambition to lead technology development, the inexorable rise of local manufacturer Huawei and the breakneck speed at which consumers have upgraded to 4G connections in the recent past.”

The firm has clearly been receiving many of the press releases we have around 5G and warns that many of the utopian use-cases put forward are going to be a long time coming.

“The unrelenting hype that has surrounded 5G for several years has seen a diverse range of applications put forward as the main drivers of adoption,” Kester Mann, Principal Analyst, Operators at CCS. “Some of them will be relevant at different times of the technology’s development, but the never-ending need for speed and people’s apparently limitless demand for video consumption will dominate 5G networks.”

“5G is about creating a network that can scale up and adapt to radically new applications,” said Geoff Blaber, VP Research, Americas at CCS. “For operators, network capacity is the near-term justification; IoT and mission-critical services may not see exponential growth in the next few years but they remain a central part of the vision for 5G. Operators will have to carefully balance the period between investment and generating revenue from new services.”

Here’s the CCS Insights global 5G connections forecast.





http://telecoms.com/485569/china-predicted-to-account-for-half-of-5g-subscribers/

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## cirr

*China aims to roll out 5G standard and mobile prototypes next June*

2017-10-27 16:19

Ecns.cn _Editor: Mo Hong'e_





Wen Ku, director of the telecom department at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, answers questions at a press conference, Oct. 27, 2017. (Photo/China News Service)

(ECNS) -- The second phase of China's 5G testing program will be concluded by the end of this year with the third round starting in 2018, said Wen Ku, director of the telecom department at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, on Friday.

As one of the first countries in the world to promote 5G testing, China established the IMT-2020 (5G) development group back in 2013 and has made strides in research and development.

By next June, China will introduce the first global 5G standard, and around the same time, aim to introduce 5G prototype products, said Wen at a press conference in Beijing.

It was added that 5G is expected to become a driving force for China's economic growth and transformation with extensive use in each corner of life.

Test results show technical solutions provided by participating companies can meet core requirements. Five companies including Huawei and ZTE have built 15 stations in Huairou District in Beijing for further tests.

China plans to commercialize 5G mobile networks, which provide much faster connectivity and lower energy consumption, as early as 2020.

http://www.ecns.cn/cns-wire/2017/10-27/278705.shtml

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## JSCh

* China-Europe high-bit-rate network *
Source:Global Times Published: 2017/10/29 21:38:39

TransTeleCom and China Telecom, one of China's largest telecommunication operators, announced on Thursday in Moscow that they have completed a joint large project - the first terrestrial high-bit-rate telecommunication route connecting China and Europe. 

The 100-gigabit bandwidth route will be used by international clients to move bulk data from Asia to the major exchange point in Frankfurt, Germany.

The telecom operators can now offer an optimum data transfer route to international clients that put equal value on speed and reliability. TransTeleCom handles more than 20 percent of the data traffic from China to Europe.

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## JSCh

*China’s Citic buys Dutch telecom operator with eye on New Silk Road*
by GBTIMES  Oct 26, 2017 14:47 



Citic Telecom said it now has 140 Points of Presence across countries along the Digital Silk Road between Asia and Europe. _Screenshot / https://www.citictel-cpc.com/_

China’s Citic Telecom CPC has completed its acquisition of Dutch telecom operator Linx Telecommunication BV, as part of a plan to provide telecommunications solutions in countries covered by the Belt and Road initiative.

Citic Telecom said on Wednesday that, following the acquisition, it has become one of the first Asian-managed service providers to own more than 140 Points of Presence (POPs) across countries along the Digital Silk Road between Asia and Europe.

POPs are locations where two or more different networks or communication devices connect to each other.

“Our mission to connect the world to the Digital Silk Road is closer to fulfilment, as we support customers to invest and operate in central Europe, eastern Europe and Russia,” Stephen Ho, CEO of CITIC Telecom, said.

“Accelerating internationalisation and digitalisation, the markets along the “One Belt, One Road” route offer huge development potential. Information interconnectivity is the basis and a development priority of the initiative,” he concluded.

The Belt and Road initiative is a China-proposed plan that aspires to boost trade and infrastructure investment among more than 60 countries along the ancient Silk Road trade routes from Asia to Europe and Africa.

Citic Telecom is owned by Citic, a major Chinese state-owned investment company.

The Amsterdam-based telecom company will change its name to CITIC Telecom CPC Europe, it said.



China’s Citic buys Dutch telecom operator with eye on New Silk Road

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## cirr

*Quantum communication networks put in service in central China*

2017-11-01 09:09

Xinhua _Editor: Gu Liping_

A quantum telecommunication network has been put into service in Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei Province, the network builder said Tuesday.

Wu Xiaofeng, deputy director of the Fourth Institute of China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation, said the network was now used for communication among government agencies in Wuhan. It is the first quantum communication network in central China.

According to a national plan, the network will be connected to other similar city quantum networks along the Yangtze River.

A quantum telecommunication line is also under construction between Wuhan and Hefei, capital of Anhui Province.

Anhui is on a 2,000-km quantum communication line in China. Known as the Jing-Hu (Beijing-Shanghai) Trunk Line, it connects Beijing, Jinan, Hefei and Shanghai.

The line is the world's first trunk line for secure quantum telecommunications.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/11-01/279166.shtml

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## cirr

*Inspur forms grand alliance to give B&R markets tech boost*

2017-11-03 09:52

China Daily _Editor: Gu Mengxi_

Inspur Group Co Ltd, China's biggest server maker, formed an alliance with global tech giants and Chinese financial institutions on Thursday to provide IT solutions to economies participating in the Belt and Road, or B&R, Initiative.

This is the first alliance initiated by enterprises to serve countries and regions involved in the B&R Initiative, according to Inspur.

Tech players IBM and Cisco Systems Inc, financial and retail services provider Diebold Nixdorf, and telecoms major Ericsson AB are part of the alliance.

Together with Inspur, they will offer solutions for cloud data centers, financial services, taxation, smart cities and other projects.

"The Belt and Road Initiative is not only about connecting ports, railways and highways, but also about freeing up the flow of information and data and enhancing digital links among those countries and regions," said Sun Pishu, chairman and CEO of Inspur.

National banks and insurance companies including the China Development Bank, the Export-Import Bank of China and China Export & Credit Insurance Corp will provide financial support for relevant projects.

"Our alliance is meant to solve both technical bottlenecks and capital shortages that are limiting the development of economies related to the Belt and Road Initiative, especially in their efforts to accelerate informatization," Sun said, without disclosing specific investment plans.

The move is in line with China's broad plan to promote innovation.

The country is making significant progress in the IT sector, with breakthroughs already made in both hardware and software.

Wang Endong, chief scientist of Inspur, said: "After years of development, China has leapt from a follower to a leader in innovation in server-related technologies. China outpaced other countries in server patent applications, which will offer a strong momentum to growth."

Inspur said earlier it aims to double its overseas revenue from 20 percent of total revenue in 2016 to 40 percent by 2020.

As of now, the Shandong-based company's IT products are available in 113 countries and regions.

Its sales footprint covers half of the economies related to the B&R Initiative, including Thailand, Malaysia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia and Russia.

In Saudi Arabia, Inspur has provided its high-tech products and solutions to sectors and industries such as agriculture, healthcare, aerospace and new vehicle materials.

"Different from other cooperations, the alliance will bring China's high-tech prowess to countries like Nigeria, one of most populous countries of Africa, which will meet our urgent need for solving mounting security problems and promoting intelligent education," said Amb Kabiru Rabiu, a representative of the government of Kano, which is an important province in Nigeria.

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## cirr

*Lenovo to acquire Fujitsu's PC unit*

2017-11-03 09:38 China Daily _Editor: Gu Mengxi_

*Computer maker posts strong growth in quarterly revenue*

Lenovo Group Ltd said on Thursday that it will spend about $224 million to acquire a 51 percent stake in Japanese technology firm Fujitsu Ltd's personal computer business, to boost margins and recapture the top slot in global personal computer shipments.

The Chinese company, which was dislodged from the top slot earlier this year by HP Inc, expects the Fujitsu deal to have a scale-effect on its operations and revenue.

The combined market share of Lenovo (21.6 percent) and Fujitsu (about 4 percent) is bigger than HP which holds about 22.8 percent, according to data from market research company International Data Corp.

The deal also came close on the heels of the company announcing its strongest revenue jump in two years, thanks in part to the faster-than-average growth of its PC business.

Hong Kong-listed Lenovo said in a filing that it would pay for the stake in Fujitsu Client Computing Ltd with 17.85 billion yen ($156.70 million) in cash and the remaining based on performance to 2020. The two sides will also set up a joint venture that will integrate Fujitsu's client resources, manufacturing, research and development capabilities with Lenovo's global presence.

Lenovo said it posted a 5 percent year-on-year jump in revenue to $11.8 billion for the quarter that ended in September. The performance surpassed analysts' projections for $11.3 billion and marked the biggest rise since the same period of 2015, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Yang Yuanqing, chairman of Lenovo, said in a statement that "While sustaining a leading profit level, our PC business has performed better than the average. By boosting marketing and sales capabilities, the data center business is also being effectively reconstructed."

Lenovo has been struggling to revive momentum in personal computers, smartphones and server businesses amid mounting competition from both domestic peers and foreign rivals.

Jacky Zhao, an analyst at IDC, said the Fujitsu deal will contribute to Lenovo's long-term development, as it is trying to team up with all possible partners amid the continued downtrend in the PC market.

"Setting up joint ventures is an effective way to survive the cold winter. It can give Lenovo more resources to revive its business when demand begins to pick up," Zhao said, adding the commercial and consumer PC market is already showing signs of recovery.

Lenovo also said in July, 2016, that it would spend $195 million to increase its stake in its PC joint venture with another Japanese firm NEC Corp.

When it comes to the smartphone business, where Lenovo is facing mounting pressure from rivals such as Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, the company said the turnaround is still in progress.

In the quarter ended in September, it sold 15.3 million units of smartphones globally, up 10 percent year-on-year, with good performances especially in Latin America and Western Europe.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/11-03/279502.shtml

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## cirr

*China sets timeline to develop industrial internet*

2017-11-04 09:07 Xinhua _Editor: Li Yan_

China has set a clear timetable for integration of industry and the internet, or the "industrial Internet," a senior official said Friday.

By 2025, construction of industrial internet infrastructure network covering all regions and sectors will be basically complete, said Chen Zhaoxiong, vice minister of industry and information technology (MIIT).

By 2035, China will lead the world in key sectors of the industrial Internet field.

By the middle of the century, China should be among the top countries in terms of overall strength of industrial Internet.

"The industrial internet is a new concept that matters to the whole world," said Han Xia, an MIIT official. "Compared with developed countries, China still lags behind."

A State Council executive meeting Monday approved guidelines on developing the industrial internet, promising streamlined administration and fiscal support. Market access will be widened, and companies encouraged to seek private funding.

Businesses must improve security against cyber attacks, while specialist network security systems for key manufacturing sectors such as automobiles, aviation and aerospace will be put in place.

In line with overall economic restructuring, billions of yuan are expected to flow into technology projects related to the "Made in China 2025" strategy, a blueprint for improving the manufacturing sector.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/11-04/279616.shtml

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## JSCh

*China to provide better Internet access in Nepal *
By Zhou Weigang
2017-11-20 20:36 GMT+8
Updated 2017-11-20 23:11 GMT+8

Running over the Himalayas and all the way to Hong Kong, a length of optical fiber is changing locals’ daily lives in Nepal. 

Built by China Telecom Global (CTG), the link is part of the company’s mission to provide greater Internet access and services to Nepal.

Considered a move to break the decades-long monopoly of India's telecom service provider in the Nepali market, CTG's Internet services are eagerly expected by the local telecommunication industry and people who do business online.




Surfing the Internet /Gbtimes Photo

Calling himself a pioneering figure of online video news in Nepal, Sitaram Bhattarai said that he has been troubled by the “not-so-reliable” Internet service for years, as it has been solely provided by India since installation in Nepal. But now, he is no longer bothered.

A network operation center not far from his office monitors the Himalayan optical fiber. So far, all tests show that the Internet access provided by China is very stable. Even better, it’s affordable.

Nepal Telecom is optimistic and ambitious about the connection’s market prospects.



4G service is only available in two cities in Nepal at present. /CGTN Photo

Currently, 4G service is only available in two cities in Nepal, Kathmandu and Bokhram. But China’s services are expected to open new business opportunities for the whole mobile Internet market. Kaminiraj Bhandari, managing director of Nepal Telecom said that focusing more on mobile services will allow “telecom providers to give customers good quality services, on-demand services”.

Providing high-quality services to Nepal is only one part of CTG's plan. According to Deng Xiaofeng, its general manager, the cooperation is a win-win strategy. Inspired by the project, Deng recently expanded CTG’s Internet services to Pakistan, Laos and Thailand.



/VCG Photo

“We want to build a grand corridor and a big platform for telecommunication. I’d call this an ‘information-centered high-speed link’ along the Belt and Road routes. This offers our company a great opportunity. This opportunity also belongs to all of our partner companies participating in the Belt and Road Initiative. We can develop together.”

Back in Nepal, people like Bhattarai really want to grow their businesses based on the Internet services. They are eagerly awaiting the arrival of a faster and more reliable Internet service, as they believe that better connections to the outside world can improve lives.

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## JSCh

*China starts 3rd phase of 5G tests*
By Ma Si | China Daily | Updated: 2017-11-25 09:07
















A 5G display station at the 25th PT/EXPO COMM China in Beijing in September. [Photo/VCG]

*Current round to help country gain an edge in early tech adoption*

China has started the third phase of 5G technology research and development tests, ahead of schedule, as the country accelerates steps to gain a lead in the race toward commercializing the next-generation communication technology.

The move came as China Mobile Communications Corp and Huawei Technologies Co Ltd showcased the world's smallest 5G testing terminal on Friday, indicating that the country will pioneer the world in 5G research and development.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said the third phase of technical tests aims to get pre-commercial 5G products ready when the first version of 5G standards comes out in June next year.

The industry regulator has called for more efforts to upgrade testing environments and a bigger push to experiment with more 5G-enabled applications, with added focus on the integration of chips, systems and other instruments.

Previously, officials said the third phase tests would not start until next year. The country had concluded the second phase of tests earlier this year, with contributions from both domestic and foreign companies such as Huawei, ZTE and Ericsson.

On Friday, China Mobile and Huawei also showcased the world's smallest 5G testing device at the former's global partners conference in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.

The device, which is roughly the size of Amazon.com Inc's smart speaker, can convert high-speed 5G signals into Wi-Fi signals, helping users access wireless broadband services. It can be used to test 5G pre-commercial networking and support other trials, Huawei said in a statement.

In comparison, most of the testing machines are very heavy and some even need to be carried by a trolley.

These moves are part of China's broad push to commercialize 5G services in 2020.

China Mobile said it would deploy 10,000 5G base stations by 2020.

Huang Haifeng, an expert at the leading telecom industry website cww.net, said China has evolved from a follower into a leader in the global telecom sector.

"The smallest 5G testing machine shows that China Mobile and Huawei have poured tons of resources into research and development, because 5G-enabled devices are far better than 4G devices in many aspects and it is hard to shrink the devices into a small size," Huang said.

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## TaiShang

Nov 24, 2017 07:55 PM

*China Not Phoning It In on Race to 5G*
By Yang Ge





China's three major wirelesss carriers plan to spend $180 billion collectively on 5G networks over the next 10 years, according to one analyst estimate. Photo: IC

*China gave the latest signals this week that it intends to be at the forefront of the next generation of mobile communications*,* reversing years of a previous policy that saw it typically lag behind, as it tries to wield greater influence in the development of new technologies.*

One of the new signals came from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), China’s telecoms regulator, which said* it has officially launched the third stage of trials for fifth-generation (5G) networks expected to replace current 4G technology in global markets starting in 2019.*

The ministry said the new trials aim to speed China’s move to the commercialization of the technology that will facilitate data transfer rates of up to 100 megabits per second in major metropolitan areas. That will boost efficiency for functions like video streaming and pave the way for a new generation of functions with big data requirements.

“(The new trials) are aimed at promoting organizational coordination, encouraging research and development and testing between domestic and international companies, in order to lay a solid foundation for the realization of commercial 5G service, and to contribute to the global advancement of 5G technology and the industry’s development,” the MIIT said in a statement on its website on Thursday.

*In another major signal of the country’s intent, state broadcaster CCTV reported on Friday that China’s three major wireless carriers, China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, all plan to roll out the initial commercial version of 5G mobile networks next year and will scale up from there.*

The latest signals continue Beijing’s trend of aggressively pushing 5G, which could see commercial service launch as soon as 2020, said Edison Lee, an analyst at Jefferies. Such an aggressive rollout, within a year or less of peers in major Western markets, would break sharply with the past when China was typically at least two to three years behind.

*Such delays were largely due to conservatism by the MIIT, which wanted to wait for the technology to mature before making major investments usually totaling more than $100 billion by the nation’s big three carriers. Lee said he forecasts the trio will spend $180 billion collectively on 5G networks over the next 10 years.*

China has sought to have a greater say in development of 5G technologies after spawning some of the world’s top networking equipment makers, most notably Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., and evolving into the world’s largest wireless market, with around 1.3 billion subscribers. Such a role opens the door for local companies to develop new technologies that can be used in their own equipment and consumer products and also licensed to others.

*“It’s the first time that China could participate in setting a global telecom standard and various Chinese entities have aggressively contributed to the standard so that China will likely own a decent patent share in 5G, maybe 15% to 20%,”* Lee said. “It will help China become a leader of the global supply chain. Moreover, China has ambitions plans in utilizing the 5G networks to provide industrial IoT (internet of things) services, promote cloud computing and big data for all major industries.”

China is expected to become one of the fastest adopters of 5G when new services start to launch in the next few years, accounting for more than half of all subscribers by 2022, *according to a report* released last month by London-based CCS insight.

Other countries will catch up after that, but the nation is still expected to account for about 40% of all 5G connections by 2025, CCS forecast.

“We see China playing a far more influential role in 5G than it did in 4G,” said CCS analyst Marina Koytcheva. “*China will dominate 5G thanks to its political ambition to lead technology development, the inexorable rise of local manufacturer Huawei and the breakneck speed at which consumers have upgraded to 4G connections in the recent past.*”

https://www.caixinglobal.com/2017-11-24/china-not-phoning-it-in-on-race-to-5g-101175941.html

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## cirr

*China to speed up IPv6-based Internet development*

2017-11-27 09:34 Xinhua _Editor: Wang Fan_

China plans to put the Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6)-based network into large-scale use, to boost the development of the Internet industry.

The country aims to have 200 million active users of IPv6 by the end of 2018, while the number will exceed 500 million by 2020, according to an action plan issued by the general offices of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the State Council.

By the end of 2025, network, applications and terminal devices will fully support the adoption of IPv6 in China, and it will have the largest number of IPv6 users in the world, according to the plan.

Computers, mobile phones, electronic devices and sensors that are connected to the Internet need a unique Internet Protocol address to identify themselves and communicate with each other.

The addresses used predominantly on the Internet are based on a communication standard known as IPv4, whose supply of addresses is running out.

The IPv6 network, first developed in the 1990s in China, allows a much higher theoretical limit on the number of IP addresses than the current IPv4 system.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/11-26/282312.shtml

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## JSCh

*China to build three information infrastructure projects*
By Zhang Jie | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-11-29 13:51

















China is accelerating its plan to carry out the "Broadband China" strategy to develop digital economy. [Photo/IC]

China is accelerating its plan to carry out the "Broadband China" strategy to develop digital economy.

Three series of information infrastructure projects involving optical fiber, 5G networks and quantum communication networks were released by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).

According to the NDRC, the optical fiber project with 100Mbp capacity will be promoted to China's central and western regions. The optical fiber users will account for 50 percent of all internet users in villages, and the regions' access capability to broadband will need to reach 12 Mbps.

China's municipalities, capital cities and major city clusters in Pearl River, Yangtze River delta areas, and Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region will start to build 5G networks. People will be able to use 5G service in urban areas and home.

The secure quantum communication backbone network will be set up in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and the Yangtze River economic zone, and some cities will establish satellite earth stations.

In three to five years, the building of information infrastructure will boom in rural areas of central and western regions, and first-tier cities will enter into 5G and quantum era, news website 21jingji.com said citing local government officials.

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## JSCh

Public Release: 1-Dec-2017
* 70Gb/s optical intra-connects in data centers based on band-limited devices *
Science China Press



Experimental setup for 70 Gb/s data transmission link.
Credit: ©Science China Press

With the ever development of optical data-center intra-connects, the realization of high-capacity and low-cost optical communication links among severs in data centers has been more and more popular in the industry. Recently, a research result, completed by the researchers from Peking University, shows that a 70Gb/s optical link has been experimentally demonstrated using the 18GHz band-limited VCSEL and multimode fibers, which makes it possible to realize high-speed data transmission in data centers only by low-cost and band-limited devices.

_SCIENCE CHINA Information Sciences_ has just accepted a paper under the title "A 70 Gbps NRZ optical link based on 850 nm band-limited VCSEL for data-center intra-connects" which is authored by Zhongwei TAN, Chuanchuan YANG, et al.

This research builds the corresponding optical communication link and conducts the experimental work. The receivers utilize the forward-feed equalization (FFE), combined with the max likelihood sequence estimation (MLSE), to process the received data, efficiently eliminating the inter symbol interference (ISI) caused by the limited bandwidth and realizing the 70 Gb/s data transmission.

With the development of Internet, the demand for mass data transmission and processing is ever growing. Especially for hyper-scale data centers, it is significant to build the high-capacity and low-cost communication links for sharing the processing ability and storage ability among servers. Based on the above, optical data-center intra-connects develop quickly, and how to realize the optical links with high speed and low cost becomes extraordinarily important. The previous researches in this field mostly focused on the high transmission rate and employed large-bandwidth VCSELs (25GHz or so, typically). However, the large-bandwidth VCSELs lead to extremely high cost, which is against the original intention for low-cost optical intra-connects in data centers.

Based on the status, this research mainly focuses on the 18GHz band-limited commercial VCSEL, for cost saving, uses proper equalization method to suppress the ISI and realizes high data rate in short-reach data-center interconnects.

Dr. Chuanchuan YANG, the corresponding author of this paper, believes that this research is of great directive significance for the band-limit and cost-effective VCSELs to be utilized in the data centers for the high-speed optical interconnects among severs in the future.

The results enrich the research work in the field of short-distance optical intra-connects in data centers and mainly research on the communication characteristic for band-limit devices. It has important scientific significance and reference value for realizing high-capacity and low-cost data center intra-connects.

The research work is completed cooperated with Prof. Fan ZHANG, Prof. Ziyu WANG, Ph.D. candidate Yixiao ZHU, Master students Zhaopeng XU and Kaiheng ZOU, from Peking University. "To our best knowledge", wrote the researchers, "the results reported the highest data baud rate for an 18-GHz-class 850 nm VCSEL based optical link."

###​
This research was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation, China (Nos. 61275005, 61475004).

See the article: Zhongwei TAN, Chuanchuan YANG, Yixiao ZHU, et al. A 70 Gbps NRZ optical link based on 850 nm band-limited VCSEL for data-center intra-connects. _Science China Information Sciences_, 2017 (in press), doi: 10.1007/s11432-017-9276-y.


70Gb/s optical intra-connects in data centers based on band-limited devices | EurekAlert! Science News

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## cirr

*中国“芯”多了一位“万能”成员*

2017年12月01日 星期五





本报记者 何 亮

近日，高云半导体科技股份有限公司在上海发布了一款具有中国自主知识产权的FPGA芯片及配套平台化产品，这也是中资公司收购美国FPGA厂商莱迪斯（Lattice）告吹后第一次亮出国产“名片”，意味着中国“芯”家族多了一位中国造的“万能”成员。

*增加一个USB功能，集成一片新市场*

FPGA是现场可编程逻辑阵列——一种可编程“万用”芯片，其特殊的灵活性决定了在新兴应用领域中具有广阔的发展空间，特别是当下火爆的人工智能，没有现成的芯片（ASIC）可用，只能通过FPGA，利用可编程的特点，来实现并验证工程师所需要的初步解决方案。

与目前消费市场很少集成USB2.0功能块不同，新的芯片将它集纳起来，这透露出一个技术信号——FPGA不仅应用在通信系统和设备上，而且与消费类产品搭上关系。高云半导体CEO朱璟辉表示：“就像苹果工程师对FPGA表现出的兴趣一样，在iPhone 7中已经用到了FPGA。”

对于集成电路，曾有厂商将CPU（中央处理器）与FPGA集成，后者善于并行计算，处理能力强，前者则强在“管理”，这正是FPGA所缺乏的，两者结合，可有效地提升整体性能。可是，高云新的芯片放弃了CPU,却与MCU(单片微型计算机)集成到一起，朱璟辉给出的理由是，“一方面，在MCU市场，ARM架构已经占据了绝对统治地位，因此，FPGA+ARM内核的架构，将有助于提高FPGA的竞争力。另一方面，嵌入式市场非常宽广，高云选择采用FPGA+MCU（ARM）的方式进入这个广阔的嵌入式市场，主要针对的还是中高端的差异化应用，力求开拓出一片新天地。”

在消费级领域中，嵌入诸如USB2.0等模块的芯片会在图像监控、智能工业、医疗设备等领域逐步推开，动态可重构以及单片集群水平不断提高，将使FPGA功能越来越强大。比如在伺服电机控制器中，芯片的集成使这类应用的控制系统更简洁，还有更精准的电机步进控制，更炫的显示效果控制，更加人性化，更加简易的人机交户方式。

*改变加密技术，应对突发“断电”*

制造芯片要分层研磨，反向剥离可以将芯片每一层信息“偷”出来。比如将工艺次序倒过来执行，逐层拍照、克隆，即便完美复制的成功率很低，“万里挑一”的机会总会有的。因此供应特殊需求更成为一种在遭受技术封锁环境下的有效办法。而且，芯片做的设计常被抄袭，其电路设计和外形非常容易被原封不动地复制出来。

高云芯片实现的创新加密技术也是针对芯片本身被克隆和芯片设计被抄袭两种情况。对于前者，高云的GW1N系列芯片实现55纳米流片和28纳米设计，如果进行“反向”克隆，设备成本昂贵，且后续生产也是一个难题。高云半导体董事长陈天成告诉科技日报记者，“因为从90纳米开始，晶体管的大小跟光波几乎相近，拍照产生衍射现象，厂商则从光学原理出发，算出衍射情况做修正，在物理上还原。但是，摩尔定律不断推进，55纳米、40纳米等集成度更高的芯片靠‘反向’克隆还没有成功。”

而对用户设计的保护，芯片多了一种自我“摧毁”的手段以保证用户设计的数据流不被读出。陈天成打了个比方，这项加密技术有点像ATM机，如果ATM机被恶意破坏了，里面的钱会被喷上大量的墨汁，即使把钱取走钱也用不了的。

新的芯片是Flash工艺的非易失性FPGA。所谓非易失就是像闪存一样，当你通电的时候数据就在里边，当你掉电的时候数据还在里边。“相比于美国FPG厂商Lattice的OTP（只能编程一次）对标产品，高云芯片采用闪存工艺技术，可以多次编程，具有更强的灵活性和可重用性。”陈天成表示，目前，该类型产品可以完全取代传统的CPLD（复杂可编程逻辑器件），每年约有5亿美元的市场总量。

@Bussard Ramjet 

http://digitalpaper.stdaily.com/http_www.kjrb.com/kjrb/html/2017-12/01/content_383167.htm

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## cirr

*China-made components add security*

2017-12-04 08:54 China Daily _Editor: Wang Zihao_

*CASIC rolls out latest upgrade for intranet to prevent cyberattacks*

China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, a major defense contractor, has deployed the latest wave of technology in the country's largest secure intranet, which is entirely based on domestically developed hardware and software.

As one of the country's biggest arms-makers, CASIC pays great attention to information safety. Since the secure intranet project began in 2014, it has grown to connect about 20,000 computers and is the country's largest domestically sourced system, according to Shen Shiguang, deputy head of the Beijing Institute of Computer Technology and Application.

The institute is part of the CASIC Second Academy and is in charge of building and maintaining the intranet. The project was first aimed at replacing imported computers and software - which had been employed for a long time to handle classified defense information - with domestically developed technology. In September 2015, CASIC expanded the project to include all the company's computers dealing with commercial secrets.

The newly upgraded intranet features a high level of security. It is physically isolated from the internet and other publicly accessible networks, and because it is based on Chinese-designed hardware and software, it essentially eliminates the possibility of technical backdoors that are subject to hacking, Shen said.

He said a number of information security hazards have existed inside the networks and computers used by key Chinese organizations - especially those related to infrastructure and national security - since most of their processors, operating systems and storage devices were developed by foreign enterprises.

"Almost all nations of the world, especially big powers, are sparing no effort to make sure that their classified information is well protected," Shen said. "For China, if we couldn't have our own systems, our information networks would face intimidation or threats from foreign countries, and we wouldn't be able to upgrade or repair them."

Through steady improvements, most software on the CASIC internal system has become easy to use and runs as fast and as smoothly as those based on Intel chips and Microsoft software, he said.

"We will continue to build the network," Shen said. "We plan to take three years to make it connect with at least 50,000 computers within the company."

He added that the institute is leading a national program sponsored by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology to promote secure intranet to government departments and enterprises tied to national security.

China's top leadership has repeatedly stressed the significance of information security. In February 2014, the Communist Party of China Central Committee set up the Central Leading Group for Cyberspace Affairs, headed by President Xi Jinping.

Developing and adopting indigenous information systems does not go against the country's commitment to an open market, as no nation should be willing to entrust its secrets to foreign platforms, said Ni Guangnan, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and expert on information technology.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/12-04/283027.shtml

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## JSCh

*Successful next-generation New Radio tests mark progress*
By Ma Si | China Daily | Updated: 2017-12-04 09:53

















Visitors watch a live show of a 5G network trial test during the Mobile World Congress in Shanghai in June. [Photo provided to China Daily]

China Mobile Communications Corp, ZTE Corp and Qualcomm Inc have reached a milestone in the precommercialization of fifth-generation communication technologies, by successfully conducting the world's first end-to-end 5G New Radio technology test.

The trio announced in mid-November that they have completed an interoperability test based on the 5G New Radio specifications under development by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project, or 3GPP, an industry coalition dedicated to promoting global wireless communications standards.

The 3.5 gigahertz data connection, which was tested at China Mobile's 5G Joint Innovation Center, is set to accelerate the commercial application of 5G. It is made possible thanks to ZTE's precommercial base station and a 5G prototype developed by Qualcomm Technologies Inc, a unit of Qualcomm.

Cristiano Amon, executive vice-president at Qualcomm Technologies, said the test "is true testament to our 5G leadership, driving toward the timely launch of standards-compliant commercial networks".

According to the United States-based chip giant, the demonstration has achieved a connection that can support multi-gigabit peak data rates, while also maintaining a lower level of lag than current networks. Those features will make it an indispensable piece of the autonomous tech puzzle, particularly where that concerns self-driving vehicles.

Xiang Ligang, a telecoms expert and CEO of industry website Cctime, said although the test was conducted on the unfinalized version of 5G standards, it showed that Qualcomm and ZTE are well ahead of the competition in terms of being prepared to build 5G networks at scale.

"The first version of 5G standards is scheduled to come out around June 2018. But the big pieces are now about as ready as you can get, given drastic changes are unlikely this late in the standardization process," he said.

According to Xiang, the test shows that the trio can gain an advantage in addressing the ever-increasing number of devices featuring connectivity and the data-intense requirements of next-generation media streaming.

Xu Huijun, chief technology officer and executive vice-president of ZTE, said in a statement that the Chinese telecoms gear maker is aiming to become one of the first suppliers of commercial 5G equipment and solutions.

"During the course of 5G technology verification and product-based development, ZTE is actively verifying a multitude of key technologies, solutions and network models together with industry partners," Xu added.

Li Zhengmao, vice-president of China Mobile Communications, said: "China Mobile is committed to promoting unified global 5G standards with industry partners. The achievement of end-to-end 5G New Radio interoperable connection testing, compliant with the 3GPP 5G New Radio standards, is an important milestone of 5G standards for precommercialization."

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## JSCh

*China, neighbors to boost telecom infrastructure*
By Ma Si in Wuzhen, Zhejiang | China Daily | Updated: 2017-12-04 07:33














China, Thailand, Laos and other countries and regions involved in the Belt and Road Initiative on Sunday underlined the need for sustained efforts to expand broadband access and improve the quality of telecommunication infrastructure.

They also agreed to step up efforts toward building an interconnected Digital Silk road as part of the Belt and Road digital economy international cooperation initiative.

The digital initiative was unveiled at the 4th World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, Zhejiang province, which opened on Sunday and will close on Tuesday.

Representatives said the countries concerned will allocate more resources to build infrastructure for regional communication, internet connectivity, satellite-based navigation services and information traffic.

Lin Nianxiu, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission, China's top economic planner, said digital economy is playing an increasingly important part in driving global development.

"We will strengthen cooperation to explore cutting-edge technologies and to accelerate digital transformation, so that rapid tech advancements can benefit people in every country," Lin said.

China is working hard to build a digital silk road so that innovation could drive the Belt and Road Initiative.

A report by Boston Consulting Group forecast that as information technologies continue to revolutionize industries like retail, entertainment, finance and manufacturing, the country's digital economy will reach about $16 trillion by 2035, up from $1.4 trillion in 2015.

Bounsaleumsay Khennavong, Laos' vice-minister for posts and telecommunications, said the initiative to deepen cooperation in digital economy will bring new growth potential and create a community of shared interests.

Khennavong said he expects more companies from China and other countries to partner with Laos in the information communication technology sector.

The countries also called for deepening cooperation in fields like e-commerce, internet-based entrepreneurship and innovation. They stressed efforts to collectively leverage digital opportunities to support micro businesses, and small and medium enterprises.

They agreed to work together to create a transparent policymaking mechanism for digital economy and promote cooperation in drafting and implementing international standards.

Sun Pishu, chairman and CEO of Inspur Group Co Ltd, a major server maker and big data company, said the Belt and Road Initiative is not only about connecting ports, railways and highways but freeing up the flow of information and data, to enhance digital links among the economies.

"China is one of the most sophisticated IT markets and the largest data producer in the world," Sun said. "Our four decades of experience in building information infrastructure is of great value to other developing countries and regions."

In November, Inspur formed an alliance with global tech giants and Chinese financial institutions to provide IT solutions to economies participating in the Belt and Road Initiative.

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## cirr

*China counting down to 5G commercialization*

2017-12-07 15:09 Xinhua _Editor: Mo Hong'e_

Downloading a 6-gigabyte file in less than two seconds using 5G technology is not a far stretch, as China is preparing for the commercialization of the next generation of mobile communication technology.

During the Fourth World Internet Conference held in Wuzhen, Zhejiang Province, this week, Huawei shared the honors with other tech giants such as Apple, Alibaba, Baidu and Microsoft at the World Leading Internet Scientific and Technological Achievement awards.

Huawei will launch a smartphone which supports 5G communication in 2019 with a self-developed chip, according to Xu Zhijun, rotating CEO of the company.

Currently, 5G standards are still under development by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). Last October, Huawei achieved a speed of 27Gbps in 5G field tests using polar codes for channel coding. Huawei's polar coding was approved as part of the global standards for 5G.

As well as Chinese high-tech companies, its telecom operators are also eager to participate in formulating 5G global standards and promote commercialization.

Bi Qi, chief technical officer at the China Telecom Research Institute, said Chinese telecom carriers have invested heavily in 5G, carrying out tests in several major cities.

China Mobile, the world's largest telecom carrier by subscribers, has been devoted to developing 5G technology, and plans to launch a fully commercialized 5G network in 2020. ( The company will also begin a pre-commercial 5G service next year and deploy more than 10,000 5G base stations by 2020, according to Sha Yuejia, vice president of China Mobile.

The world's largest 5G test field with about 30 telecom base stations has already been established in Beijing's Huairou District. China Mobile, Huawei, ZTE as well as a number of foreign companies have completed China's second phase of 5G testing.

China is expected to be the world's largest 5G market by 2025, according to a report by GSMA Intelligence, a global mobile think tank, and China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT).

The CAICT predicted that 5G will drive 6.3 trillion yuan (946.8 billion U.S. dollars) of economic output in China by 2030.

Wen Ku, director of the telecom development department at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said China has started its third phase of 5G technical tests, and will increase efforts on network planning, systems, chips and other products to get pre-commercial 5G service ready as soon as possible.

Global telecom carriers will invest 3.3 trillion yuan in mobile infrastructure by 2020, said John Hoffman, CEO and director of GSMA, adding that up to 500 billion yuan will come from China.

According to a Qualcomm report, the emerging 5G mobile communications technology is expected to generate 3.5 trillion U.S. dollars of output and 22 million jobs in the global telecom industry by 2035.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/12-07/283595.shtml

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## JSCh

*Kenyan, Chinese firms partner to launch faster, cheaper internet *
Source: Xinhua | 2017-12-07 21:11:57 | Editor: huaxia





A woman uses Tecno mobile phone in front of a Tecno Mobile shop in downtown Nairobi, capital of Kenya, May 9, 2017. (Xinhua/Sun Ruibo)

NAIROBI, Dec. 7 (Xinhua) -- Kenya's telecommunication firm Jamii Telecom has partnered with Chinese firm ZTE to introduce the country's fastest and cheapest mobile internet in a move Kenyan officials said will help spread the benefits of internet to more people.

The service, Faiba 4G Mobile Network, will operate under the prefix 0747 and will be the first to provide voice over LTE.

Faiba 4G Mobile will offer free voice calls, and will be able to do high definition voice and video after 50 million U.S. dollars were invested in its network infrastructure and commercial trials were successfully launched.

Jamii Telecom becomes Kenya's fifth mobile telephone services operator, helping increase competition which is attributed to lower costs of mobile telephone and data services in East Africa's largest economy.

"We have already been serving clients across the country with the fiber network but now we have also introduced mobile services to enable as many Kenyans as possible to access cheaper and faster internet," Jamii Telecom's Chairman Joshua Chepkwony said on Friday evening.

Chepkwony said the demand for internet in Kenya is increasing by day with the cost of bandwidth and speed being key considerations for customers.

"For instance we have noted a consistent increase in demand for home internet. Whereas all homes may not be reached through fiber optic cable, they have now had a mobile channel they can use," said the chairman.

The company also becomes the first to offer free voice services. "Voice will be free as long as the customer has bought a bandwidth bundle," said Chepkowny.

ZTE will be the company's strategy partner, enabling it to be the first in eastern and central Africa to launch the 4G Voice over Long Term Evolution (VoLTE) which is a standard for high-speed wireless communication for mobile phones and data terminals ensuring the best voice, video and internet quality and speeds.

The Chinese company termed the new development as historic for the east African country.

Kenya regulators Communication Authority of Kenya (CAK) said the launch on new faster and cheaper mobile and fiber data is a continuation of innovation in country's information communication sector which has helped continuously disrupt the industry.

"What we now need as a country are data analytics to guide us on the best way to structure data so that it becomes useful," said CAK Director-General Francis Wangusi.

Wangusi said the industry regulator is working to complete the IT-aided national addressing system by 2018 in a move that will make it easier to do electronic commerce.

Henry Rotich, Kenya's Cabinet Secretary for The National Treasury, said the government will continue to work on policy and related measures to encourage private investments like those being done by Jamii Telecom.

He said the government has also invested in laying fiber optic cables across the country in a bid to make delivery of services efficient.

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## cirr

*In boost for national security, China missile firm domesticates computer network*

2017-12-08 08:49 Global Times _Editor: Li Yan_

*Missile firm localizes computers*

China's largest missile weapon designer and manufacturer has created the country's largest computer network system based on domestically developed processors in a bid to boost information security, the company announced Thursday.

The company's research and manufacturing departments have installed domestic processors in more than 20,000 computers to safeguard information and prevent manipulation by overseas technology monopolies, Gu Peng, director of the network and information security department of Institute 706 at the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC) in Beijing told the Global Times on Thursday.

Domestically made means "we know everything about the processors and operating systems at hand and we can fix problems and update them from the basics and avoid the backdoor loopholes hidden inside by overseas developers, which will effectively defend against hackers," Gu said.

Most of China's key information infrastructure, systems and personal computers depend on overseas processors, operating systems and storage appliances that might contain safety loopholes and lock-ins, the People's Daily reported on Monday.

"The very survival of the country's information system is under threat," Gu said.

The corporation began replacing its computer network in 2014 with homegrown and controllable products including Loongson processors and Kylin operating systems, the People's Daily reported.

"Terminals based on Loongson CPU can fully meet daily office requirements and work as well as their overseas counterparts," according to a Loongson statement sent to the Global Times on Thursday.

The processors have been deployed in dozens of State projects including China's GPS-like BeiDou Navigation Satellite System, the statement said.

Kylin is an operating system developed since 2001 at the National University of Defense Technology in Beijing.

A State-owned high-tech company under direct administration of the central government, CASIC is the country's largest missile weapon designer and manufacturer.

By 2015 the company had completely localized 18 operating systems and a network of more than 1,000 computers handling State-level classified information.

Institute 706 leads the way, cooperating with more than 100 Chinese information technology companies to form a complete industrial chain for home-grown information-related products including CPUs, operating systems, database and cloud platforms, according to Gu.

http://www.ecns.cn/military/2017/12-08/283638.shtml

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## JSCh

*China Telecom to become Philippines’ third telecoms player*
2017-12-11 10:25 GMT+8 




State-run China Telecom could become the Philippines’ third telecoms player, officials of the southeast Asian nation said on Sunday, as the government looks to stir up competition in an effort to boost notoriously poor services.

President Rodrigo Duterte last month offered China the “privilege” of challenging a longstanding duopoly that has frustrated consumers because of slow and intermittent Internet and mobile phone services.

“The Chinese government selected China Telecom to invest in the Philippines upon invitation by President Duterte during the bilateral meeting on November 16,” Eliseo Rio, secretary of the Department of Information and Communications Technology, told Reuters.

Chinese companies could not operate alone in the Philippines and would need to partner with a local company.



A longstanding duopoly in the Philippines has frustrated consumers because of slow and intermittent Internet and mobile phone services. /Photo via Reuters

The government is now looking at who will partner with China Telecom on a 60-40 basis, Rio said.

The Philippine constitution’s 40 percent cap on foreign ownership of domestic telecoms companies has kept interest from multinationals at bay in the market of more than 100 million people. 

Presidential Communications Secretary Martin Andanar said the state-owned Chinese company should partner with a reputable Philippine company with an existing telecoms franchise.

“The government is fast-tracking this because consumers are getting annoyed with dropped calls and slow Internet connections,” Andanar said in a radio interview on Sunday.

Also seeking to be a major player is Philippine Telegraph & Telephone Corp, which had said it was talking with China Telecom and Datang Telecom about strategic partnerships to challenge the nation’s dominant duo of PLDT Inc and Globe Telecom Inc.

Source(s): Reuters

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## JSCh

*China, Finland in talks about Arctic telecom cable*
by Janne Suokas Dec 14, 2017 13:09 TRADE INVESTMENT BELT AND ROAD INITIATIVE



The new Arctic data link would cut the time delay from Asia to Europe in half.  _Christopher Michel_   _Flickr_   _CC BY 2.0_ 

China is reportedly in talks with Finland about a high-speed telecommunication cable connecting Europe and Asia through the Arctic Ocean, a sign of the country’s growing interest in developing the Arctic region.

State-owned China Telecom Corp expressed interest in participating in the cable project in September, while the Chinese Ministry of Industry Information and Technology sent officials to the project’s first senior-level meeting in March, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing Finnish officials.

The Finnish-led project seeks to lay a 10,500km-long seabed fiber optic cable from Japan and China to Kirkenes, Norway and the Kola Peninsula in Russia, and from Norway through Finland to central Europe.

The cable could provide the fastest Asia-Europe data link as early as 2020. Cinia Group Oy, a Finnish state-owned information and communications technology company, puts the estimated cost of building the cable at 700m euros (US$820m).

China Telecom told Bloomberg that it was open to a “win-win cooperation” but that no concrete plans had yet been formed regarding the project.

A study led by former Finnish prime minister Paavo Lipponen for Finland's Ministry of Transport and Communications last year found that the project was both “politically and technologically feasible” and noted that Russia, China, Japan and Norway were interested in it.

*China steps up Arctic cooperation*
China is yet to release its highly-anticipated Arctic strategy, but it has shown clear interest in exploring and developing the region, where melting ice due to global warming is expected to provide new shipping and natural resource extraction opportunities.

In June, China formally included a sea route connecting it to Europe through the Arctic Ocean to its Belt and Road initiative, which seeks to increase trade between Asia, Europe and Africa through massive investments in railroads, ports and other infrastructure.

The 'Ice Silk Road' link received a boost last week with the launch of a major Arctic liquefied gas project on Russia’s Yamal Peninsula. The China National Petroleum Corporation and the Silk Road Fund, set up by Beijing to fund Belt and Road investments, hold a combined 29.9 percent stake in the US$27bn project.

Meanwhile, Chinese shipping companies have sent 12 vessels through the Northeast Passage in the Arctic Ocean this year, up from five last year, while Chinese icebreaker Xue Long sailed the Arctic Ocean for almost three months, including its first trips through the Transpolar Sea Route and the Northwest Passage.

Beijing has also stepped up diplomacy with the Nordic countries, with President Xi Jinping becoming the first Chinese leader to pay a state visit to Finland since 1995 in March.

Last month, Finland became the first Nordic country to join China’s Belt and Road initiative with the launch of a direct cargo train link connecting the Finnish city of Kouvola with Xi’an in China.


China, Finland in talks about Arctic telecom cable | GBTIMES

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## cirr

*Huawei, NTT Docomo achieve breakthrough in 5G field trial*

2017-12-20 13:35 chinadaily.com.cn _Editor: Gu Mengxi_

Huawei, a Chinese telecommunications giant, and NTT Docomo Inc, Japan's largest telecommunications company, have successfully completed a joint field trial for 5G mobile communications over a long distance with 39 GHz Millimeter Wave (mmWave) band in Yokohama, one of the largest commercial areas in Japan.

In the trial, the downlink data transmissions were recorded at a maximum speed of over 2 Gbps on a testing vehicle equipped with a user equipment (UE), equivalent to a mobile phone, while driving at over 20 kilometers per hour.

This successful trial opens up a new door for applications and deployments of 5G mmWave.

Long-distance mobility transmission over 5GmmWave is one of the enabling technologies to realize 5G enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB) and ubiquitous connectivity of massive data rate while fully leveraging the current macro-cellular sites investment by operators.

Takehiro Nakamura, the vice-president and managing director of 5G Laboratory at NTT DOCOMO said, long-distance transmission over 39GHzmmWave will enable 5G network deployments on a large scale.

"It opens up the new stage of the 39GHz mmWave technology and will deliver the ultra-fast experience with 5G high data speed," he said.

Wen Tong, Huawei fellow and CTO of Huawei Wireless Networks, said it's a technological challenge and opportunity to use the long-distance transmission of 5G mmWave Mobile Communications technology.

The wireless industry, he said will start using the new spectrum 100 times broader than current network to foster next wave of innovations.

"The 5G mmWave technology will help our customers to reuse the existing network infrastructure, especially for sites resource, to protect their investment. Huawei will continue to innovate to make 5G mmWave a success," Wen said.

Achieving wide area coverage and mobility performance on 5G mmWave is still a technological challenge for 5G industry. High propagation loss of mmWave signals limits its coverage, while narrow directional beam required to focus the transmission power makes the mmWave beam to track the mobile device, becoming more difficult.

The joint field trial conduced in November 2017 successfully demonstrated that 39GHz mmWave can be used for the long-distance transmission in both stationary and mobility scenarios even in urban complex deployment environments.

The partners recorded over 3 Gbps downlink throughput on the stationary user equipment (UE) at a distance of 1.5 km and over 2 Gbps at a distance of 1.8 km on 39GHz mmWave.

The trial has validated and proved the effectiveness of two companies' mmWave technologies to provide range of 5G services which require wide area coverage.

The test system was made up of one base station on Yokohama Media Tower that works on the 39GHz band and an UE on a testing vehicle.

This trial boasted the innovative materials based compact focal lens antenna with advanced beam forming (maximum gain of 31 dBi) technique to concentrate the radio waves in a certain direction to enable long-distance transmission.

The advanced beam tracking technique is employed to trackUE on a testing vehicle travelling at speeds of over 20 km per hour. This is the industry-first filed trial to verify the long-distance mmWave transmission for mobility application in macro-cell coverage scenarios.

The invented mmWave beam processing algorithms are used to allow the best beam selection, fast beam tracking, and fast beam switching for the best performance for mobile terminal. Moving at about 25 km per hour, the terminal user experienced the high-speed transmission and stable throughput.

Huawei and Docomo jointly worked on the 5G innovation and successfully conducted a series of large-scale field trials since December 2014. Currently, the developments of 5G have entered a new era, with the first version of 3GPP 5G standard of Release-15 expected to be completed in 2018. The industry is thus entering the 5G pre-commercial stage.

"Huawei will continue to work on research and development of mobile communications technologies in cooperation with partners around the world to offer new services that utilize 5G in diverse scenarios for 2020 and beyond," Wen said.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/12-20/285211.shtml

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## TaiShang

cirr said:


> *Huawei, NTT Docomo achieve breakthrough in 5G field trial*
> 
> 2017-12-20 13:35 chinadaily.com.cn _Editor: Gu Mengxi_
> 
> Huawei, a Chinese telecommunications giant, and NTT Docomo Inc, Japan's largest telecommunications company, have successfully completed a joint field trial for 5G mobile communications over a long distance with 39 GHz Millimeter Wave (mmWave) band in Yokohama, one of the largest commercial areas in Japan.
> 
> In the trial, the downlink data transmissions were recorded at a maximum speed of over 2 Gbps on a testing vehicle equipped with a user equipment (UE), equivalent to a mobile phone, while driving at over 20 kilometers per hour.
> 
> This successful trial opens up a new door for applications and deployments of 5G mmWave.
> 
> Long-distance mobility transmission over 5GmmWave is one of the enabling technologies to realize 5G enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB) and ubiquitous connectivity of massive data rate while fully leveraging the current macro-cellular sites investment by operators.
> 
> Takehiro Nakamura, the vice-president and managing director of 5G Laboratory at NTT DOCOMO said, long-distance transmission over 39GHzmmWave will enable 5G network deployments on a large scale.
> 
> "It opens up the new stage of the 39GHz mmWave technology and will deliver the ultra-fast experience with 5G high data speed," he said.
> 
> Wen Tong, Huawei fellow and CTO of Huawei Wireless Networks, said it's a technological challenge and opportunity to use the long-distance transmission of 5G mmWave Mobile Communications technology.
> 
> The wireless industry, he said will start using the new spectrum 100 times broader than current network to foster next wave of innovations.
> 
> "The 5G mmWave technology will help our customers to reuse the existing network infrastructure, especially for sites resource, to protect their investment. Huawei will continue to innovate to make 5G mmWave a success," Wen said.
> 
> Achieving wide area coverage and mobility performance on 5G mmWave is still a technological challenge for 5G industry. High propagation loss of mmWave signals limits its coverage, while narrow directional beam required to focus the transmission power makes the mmWave beam to track the mobile device, becoming more difficult.
> 
> The joint field trial conduced in November 2017 successfully demonstrated that 39GHz mmWave can be used for the long-distance transmission in both stationary and mobility scenarios even in urban complex deployment environments.
> 
> The partners recorded over 3 Gbps downlink throughput on the stationary user equipment (UE) at a distance of 1.5 km and over 2 Gbps at a distance of 1.8 km on 39GHz mmWave.
> 
> The trial has validated and proved the effectiveness of two companies' mmWave technologies to provide range of 5G services which require wide area coverage.
> 
> The test system was made up of one base station on Yokohama Media Tower that works on the 39GHz band and an UE on a testing vehicle.
> 
> This trial boasted the innovative materials based compact focal lens antenna with advanced beam forming (maximum gain of 31 dBi) technique to concentrate the radio waves in a certain direction to enable long-distance transmission.
> 
> The advanced beam tracking technique is employed to trackUE on a testing vehicle travelling at speeds of over 20 km per hour. This is the industry-first filed trial to verify the long-distance mmWave transmission for mobility application in macro-cell coverage scenarios.
> 
> The invented mmWave beam processing algorithms are used to allow the best beam selection, fast beam tracking, and fast beam switching for the best performance for mobile terminal. Moving at about 25 km per hour, the terminal user experienced the high-speed transmission and stable throughput.
> 
> Huawei and Docomo jointly worked on the 5G innovation and successfully conducted a series of large-scale field trials since December 2014. Currently, the developments of 5G have entered a new era, with the first version of 3GPP 5G standard of Release-15 expected to be completed in 2018. The industry is thus entering the 5G pre-commercial stage.
> 
> "Huawei will continue to work on research and development of mobile communications technologies in cooperation with partners around the world to offer new services that utilize 5G in diverse scenarios for 2020 and beyond," Wen said.
> 
> http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/12-20/285211.shtml



Beneficial cooperation. NTT Docomo is a behemoth.

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## cirr

*Approval of 5G standards big step forward for mobile tech*

2017-12-22 14:26

chinadaily.com.cn _Editor: Li Yahui_

The first version of global 5G standards for the non-standalone New Radio network was passed Thursday, signaling that telecom equipment suppliers and manufacturers can start developing 5G hardware, a big step forward in the commercialization of 5G technology.

The 3rd Generation Partnership Project, or 3GPP, a global organization that oversees cellular standards, has agreed on the specifications for Non-Standalone 5G NR (New Radio) at a meeting in Lisbon, Portugal.

The move signals major progress in the commercialization of 5G, or the next generation of mobile communication technology, which will allow consumers to download an 8-gigabit movie in seconds and execute tasks that are thrilling but impossible in the 4G era.

*China Mobile*, as the sole entity that conceived of the 5G System Architecture project, led research on application scenarios and demand for 5G NR technology.

Yang Chaobin, president of Huawei Technology's 5G product line, said phase 1 of the 5G standardization was completed "with great progress" thanks to collaboration between regulatory agencies, governments, research organizations, academia and industry.

"Huawei will keep working with global partners to bring 5G into the period of large-scale global commercial deployment from 2018," he said.

China Telecom senior vice president Liu Guiqing said the carrier would be looking to launch field trials in many Chinese major cities during 2018.

http://www.ecns.cn/2017/12-22/285527.shtml

*Global 5G standard finalized*

2017-12-22 16:11

shine.cn E_ditor: Huang Mingrui_

The world may soon see the birth of 5G commercially because the first global 5G standard was finalized yesterday, which will boost commercial development and network construction of the next-generation standard, said telecommunications firms and 3GPP, the organization that governs cellar standards.

China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom and technology giants like Huawei and ZTE are some of the major corporations that will be involved in harnessing the 5G standard which allows network speed of 20 to 50 times faster than the current 4G networks. The 5G networks are expected to roll out around 2019, according to market observers.

Huawei said in a statement yesterday it will accelerate construction of mass scale network and commercial use of the new 5G technology.

China Mobile partners 112 companies to develop new applications on 5G, including drone, bike sharing, parking, wearable computing and robotics, said the world's biggest mobile carrier with more than 880 million users.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/12-22/285555.shtml

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## cirr

*Chinese telecom firms set the 5G ball rolling*

2017-12-23 12:12

China Daily _Editor: Huang Mingrui_





Visitors using China Mobile-enabled phones at a recent exhibition of telecommunication products in Guangzhou, Guangdong province. (Photo by Li Zhihao/for China Daily)

Global telecom equipment suppliers and device makers can now start developing 5G hardware, after the first implementable global 5G specification was finalized, taking a big step forward to the commercialization of the next generation mobile communication technology.

The move comes as Chinese telecommunication companies are evolving from being followers into pioneers in the global telecoms arena and making greater contributions to industry standards.

The 3rd Generation Partnership Project, or 3GPP, which is a global organization that oversees cellular standards, agreed on the specification for nonstandalone 5G new radio technology at a meeting in Lisbon, Portugal, on Thursday.

Non-standalone 5G deployment offers a way for companies to set up 5G stations by partially relying on current 4G network infrastructure. It offers a faster way to roll out the super-fast technology. New radio technology is a new way to connect smartphones, base stations and other hardware.

Xiang Ligang, a telecom expert and CEO of telecom industry website Cctime, said 3GPP has set the specifications for 5G equipment in both towers and smartphones alike.

"It signals that network and radio engineers can all work on a single platform for all 5G devices. Features, functions, services and standards are set for carriers, phone and radio equipment makers. They now have a basis to begin to produce 5G equipment. It is another big step towards making 5G a reality," Xiang said.

Chinese companies are playing a bigger part in drafting 5G standards. Last year, China Mobile Communications Corp, the world's largest telecom carrier by mobile subscribers, outgunned foreign rivals to lead the global 5G System Architecture project, which will determine the "structure of 5G networks".

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/12-23/285597.shtml

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## Bussard Ramjet

cirr said:


> *Chinese telecom firms set the 5G ball rolling*
> 
> 2017-12-23 12:12
> 
> China Daily _Editor: Huang Mingrui_
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Visitors using China Mobile-enabled phones at a recent exhibition of telecommunication products in Guangzhou, Guangdong province. (Photo by Li Zhihao/for China Daily)
> 
> Global telecom equipment suppliers and device makers can now start developing 5G hardware, after the first implementable global 5G specification was finalized, taking a big step forward to the commercialization of the next generation mobile communication technology.
> 
> The move comes as Chinese telecommunication companies are evolving from being followers into pioneers in the global telecoms arena and making greater contributions to industry standards.
> 
> The 3rd Generation Partnership Project, or 3GPP, which is a global organization that oversees cellular standards, agreed on the specification for nonstandalone 5G new radio technology at a meeting in Lisbon, Portugal, on Thursday.
> 
> Non-standalone 5G deployment offers a way for companies to set up 5G stations by partially relying on current 4G network infrastructure. It offers a faster way to roll out the super-fast technology. New radio technology is a new way to connect smartphones, base stations and other hardware.
> 
> Xiang Ligang, a telecom expert and CEO of telecom industry website Cctime, said 3GPP has set the specifications for 5G equipment in both towers and smartphones alike.
> 
> "It signals that network and radio engineers can all work on a single platform for all 5G devices. Features, functions, services and standards are set for carriers, phone and radio equipment makers. They now have a basis to begin to produce 5G equipment. It is another big step towards making 5G a reality," Xiang said.
> 
> Chinese companies are playing a bigger part in drafting 5G standards. Last year, China Mobile Communications Corp, the world's largest telecom carrier by mobile subscribers, outgunned foreign rivals to lead the global 5G System Architecture project, which will determine the "structure of 5G networks".
> 
> http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/12-23/285597.shtml




Do you have some figures for how much of the SEP patents do Chinese firms own in 5G? I have heard wildly different estimates from mere 7% all the way up to 20%. 

Also, when are Chinese companies releasing 5G modems? The only news I have heard is that Huawei will launch a phone by 2019, but Intel and Qualcomm have already launched their 5G modems.


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## qwerrty

*Top companies leading 5G development*
09 Nov, 2017





5G is expected to be the next game-changer in ICT. This latest upgrade in cellular technology promises to meet the need for faster internet speeds, better security, and the ability to accommodate billions of connected devices in the coming years. And it’s almost here. According to industry analysts, 5G will be rolled out in most countries by 2020.

There’s tremendous activity around the development of 5G network and devices. According to Netscribes research, there has been a 300% increase in the number of related patent publications in 2017 since 2015.





Fig 1: Number of 5G patent publications from 2012 to 2017



What’s more interesting is that 31% of 5G patents are assigned to only six companies. Samsung has a major share with over 600 patents and is followed by other large corporations such as Intel, Nokia, Huawei, Ericsson, and ZTE.





Fig 2: Top 5G patent assignees

*1. Samsung*

Samsung has already unveiled a slew of pre-commercial versions of end-to- end 5G mobile network products and solutions, including home routers, maintenance and operation systems and 5G RF Integrated Circuit (RFIC) chipset and ASIC modems.


Samsung has also announced that it will focus on extending its portfolio with support for the millimeter wave spectrum and spectrum below 6 GHz. In addition, Samsung has completed several 5G trials across Seoul and the US in collaboration with mobile operators such as SK Telecom, Charter Communications, Verizon, and AT&T.

*2. Intel*

Intel recently launched its 5G Mobile Trial Platform which is powered by Intel’s field-programmable gate array (FGPA) circuits and Core i7 processors, enabling it to implement the latest communications protocols and air interfaces. The company is driving the development of technologies through extensive partnerships and collaborations with tier-1 service providers, telecom equipment manufacturers, and infrastructure partners.

Intel is also actively conducting end-to-end interoperability developmental tests across countries in different conditions. It has been working closely with the standards bodies and plays a major role in the standards evolution that will help define the 5G market in the coming years.

*3. Nokia*

Based on the technical specifications outlined by the Verizon 5G Technology Forum ecosystem, Nokia’s 5G FIRST solution aims to help mobile operators deploy advanced 5G networks quickly and smoothly even before the standards are finalized. According to Nokia, the solution comprises its radio access network (RAN), including Nokia AirScale massive MIMO Adaptive Antennas, packet core, and mobile transport solutions as well as a full-service offer using Intel architecture and the Intel 5G modem for initial deployments starting in 2017.

*4. Huawei*

Huawei is making important strides in bringing 5G into reality. In 2016, Huawei announced its breakthrough in polar coding. More recently, Deutsche Telekom installed the first 5G antennas in Berlin that were manufactured by Huawei. Huawei has also partnered with Intel to launch 3GPP 5G New Radio (NR) based Interoperability Development Testing (IODT) to verify 5G technologies and their degree of maturity. In India, it has partnered with Bharti Airtel to launch the country’s first massive MIMO antenna technology to expand existing network capacity by five to seven times.

*5. Ericsson*

The Swedish telecommunications giant is focused on helping telecom operators and industries be ready for 5G by offering a range of products and solutions. Ericsson’s 5G Radio Prototypes, for example, enables operators to test 5G capabilities live in their own network environments.

Ericsson recently introduced its first 5G NR radio for frequency division duplex (FDD) massive MIMO, AIR 3246, which supports both 4G/LTE and 5G NR technologies.

Ericsson’s Radio System Software brings together LTE FDD and TDD, WCDMA and GSM into a unified architecture. This provides one O&M system for all standards, which helps operators better manage the network.

*6. ZTE*

ZTE has developed a series of innovative technologies for implementing the new 5G air interface such as filters OFDMA FB-OFDMA, MUSA, MIMO, UFS, smooth virtual cell (SVC) and so on. Its 5G network architecture is based on Software Defined Networking (SDN) / Network Functional Virtualization (NFV) technology. ZTE has been actively involved in patent filings in the last five years. Most of its patents are focused on Radio Transmission systems, SDR systems, Orthogonal Multiplex Systems, synchronization corrections systems, distributed coding technology, network latency, network planning, and network security.

The fifth generation of wireless communication is set to impact major industries such as media and entertainment, automotive, public transport, healthcare, and energy and utilities. IoT is expected to play a larger role in day-to-day lives and change the way companies interact with customers. To stay prepared, understanding the shifts in the market, technology, and competitive landscape as-they-happen is paramount.

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## cirr

*China telecom firms steer 5G*

2017-12-25 10:42 Global Times _Editor: Li Yan_

*Big 3 telecoms boast larger database, markets*

China has played a key role in setting the faster standards for 5th-generation (5G) mobile networks and wireless systems thanks to its burgeoning telecommunications market and gigantic user database, experts told the Global Times on Friday.

Hardware specifications for the Non-Standalone 5G New Radio standards were ratified at a meeting of the third Generation Partnership Project group in Portugal, US-based wireless communications news website fiercewireless.com reported on Wednesday.

China's three big operators -China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom - are members of the group and China Mobile leads a 5G research project, the Beijing Morning Post reported on Friday.

China has a gradually increasing say in the telecom standards that will form the basis of commercial 5G products, telecom expert Xiang Ligang told the Global Times on Friday. "Whoever has a say in the standards has a say in the market," he said.

Faster 5G speed will slash 4G download latency. The new standards result from discussions among major global telecommunication companies, Xiang noted, "but in the past, China had little discourse power in those discussions."

When 1G standards were first set, most of the standards were set by the US, he explained.

"Later European and Japanese companies joined the competition for 2G standards and at that time, all China could do was to decide which side to support," he said.

When China invented its own TD-SCDMA telecommunications standard, it was the "turning point for domestic brands to start gaining the upper hand over overseas firms in the domestic mobile phone market," Xiang said.

After TD-SCDMA, overseas companies gradually started to take the Chinese standard into consideration when setting 3G and 4G standards.

"*Now for 5G, Chinese companies can decide more than half of the standards*," Xiang said.

The increasing power results from the increasing competence and business scale of Chinese telecommunication companies and hardware manufacturers like Huawei Technologies, said Liu Xingliang, head of the Data Center of China Internet.

"This is also a reward for those companies' strong investment in technological research," Liu told the Global Times on Friday.

China's bigger say would also boost China's competitiveness in the global telecommunications market, he noted.

"If Chinese companies can decide the standards, they can produce phones that meet those standards earlier than overseas competitors," he said.

http://www.ecns.cn/business/2017/12-25/285731.shtml

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## JSCh

* World's first mimic DNS server operates in China *
_ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2018-01-24 13:18:20_|_Editor: Yamei_





ZHENGZHOU, Jan. 24 (Xinhua) -- World's first mimic DNS (Domain Name System) server went into operation Tuesday in Central China's Henan Province, a proactive move to prevent cyber attacks.

The server is in use by China Unicom's Henan provincial branch. It marks the first practical application of the mimic security theory proposed by Chinese scientists, according to the Henan Communication Administration.

The mimic DNS server will not change the current network structure but can effectively prevent various known and unknown attacks targeting the system, it said.

"Mimic DNS server is just our first application. The mimic web server, mimic cloud, mimic data center and other network devices will be launched in the future," said Wu Jiangxing, a Chinese Academy of Engineering academician and head of the research team.

Inspired by Mimic Octopus, the master of disguise in nature which can change appearance to adapt to the environment, Chinese scientists have proposed an idea of mimic computing in 2007 and produced the world's first mimic computer prototype in 2013.


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## Dungeness

JSCh said:


> * World's first mimic DNS server operates in China *
> _ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2018-01-24 13:18:20_|_Editor: Yamei_
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ZHENGZHOU, Jan. 24 (Xinhua) -- World's first mimic DNS (Domain Name System) server went into operation Tuesday in Central China's Henan Province, a proactive move to prevent cyber attacks.
> 
> The server is in use by China Unicom's Henan provincial branch. It marks the first practical application of the mimic security theory proposed by Chinese scientists, according to the Henan Communication Administration.
> 
> The mimic DNS server will not change the current network structure but can effectively prevent various known and unknown attacks targeting the system, it said.
> 
> "Mimic DNS server is just our first application. The mimic web server, mimic cloud, mimic data center and other network devices will be launched in the future," said Wu Jiangxing, a Chinese Academy of Engineering academician and head of the research team.
> 
> Inspired by Mimic Octopus, the master of disguise in nature which can change appearance to adapt to the environment, Chinese scientists have proposed an idea of mimic computing in 2007 and produced the world's first mimic computer prototype in 2013.



Sounds like a NMD for cyberspace.


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## nang2

JSCh said:


> * World's first mimic DNS server operates in China *
> _ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2018-01-24 13:18:20_|_Editor: Yamei_
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ZHENGZHOU, Jan. 24 (Xinhua) -- World's first mimic DNS (Domain Name System) server went into operation Tuesday in Central China's Henan Province, a proactive move to prevent cyber attacks.
> 
> The server is in use by China Unicom's Henan provincial branch. It marks the first practical application of the mimic security theory proposed by Chinese scientists, according to the Henan Communication Administration.
> 
> The mimic DNS server will not change the current network structure but can effectively prevent various known and unknown attacks targeting the system, it said.
> 
> "Mimic DNS server is just our first application. The mimic web server, mimic cloud, mimic data center and other network devices will be launched in the future," said Wu Jiangxing, a Chinese Academy of Engineering academician and head of the research team.
> 
> Inspired by Mimic Octopus, the master of disguise in nature which can change appearance to adapt to the environment, Chinese scientists have proposed an idea of mimic computing in 2007 and produced the world's first mimic computer prototype in 2013.


I found very little information about this technology, other than those from Chinese news web.


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## JSCh

nang2 said:


> I found very little information about this technology, other than those from Chinese news web.


Well, it is a Chinese innovation -> Cyber Mimic Defense - Wikipedia


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## nang2

JSCh said:


> Well, it is a Chinese innovation -> Cyber Mimic Defense - Wikipedia


thanks for the link. unfortunately, it has way too many big words for me to get some sense out of it.

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## cirr

*Intelligent speakers becoming indispensable*

2018-01-25 10:57

China Daily _Editor: Zhang Shiyu_







Like TVs, refrigerators and air conditioners -- all of which have been modified to be "smarter" and thereby improve peoples' lives -- smart speakers have also gradually become an indispensable family appliance in many homes.

As an upgraded and intelligent new product, smart speakers can help construct a mini smart home ecosystem by fulfilling family members' needs in music, online shopping and weather forecasts, among other requirements.

The second generation of voice-activated smart home speaker, Dingdong 2, has been released by LingLong Co, a joint venture between Chinese e-commerce giant JD and leading intelligent speech technology company iFlytek, to meet the demands of increasingly tech-savvy Chinese consumers.

Priced at 799 yuan ($125), the product comes with improved speech recognition capability, allows users to set up their own wake-up language, and features an LED display that enables users to make direct commands by gestures. It is also China's first screen-equipped smart speaker.

With its LED touch-screen, Dingdong 2 can display the home's network connection, Bluetooth, volume, weather, time and other information. The screen can also play a supporting role in interaction by responding to a series of commonly used commands, such as play, pause and display.

"China's smart speakers and voice interfaces are still in the initial stage and it will take cross-sector cooperation to make multiple terminal devices and application scenarios possible," said Fang Lyu, vice-president of LingLong.

The Dingdong 2 smart speaker is designed to challenge the dominant position of Amazon Echo and Google Home, as well as to contend with Jingling X1, the domestic rival product of Alibaba's Tmall.

According to a new research report of Strategy Analytics, a market research consultancy, the number of smart speakers will increase 10 times from 2017 to 2022, reaching a market size of more than $5.5 billion.

Foreign and domestic technology giants are both expanding their presence in the smart speaker industry, relying on their existing advantages in resources, technologies and channels.

Smartphone maker Xiaomi Corp, for example, has moved into the entry-level segment with its Mi AI speaker at a competitive price of 299 yuan.

Chinese internet search giant Baidu launched its own product, Raven H, at the 2017 Baidu World conference in Beijing. Relying on Baidu's own DuerOS software to provide services, this multi-functional device can recite search results or order a taxi.

According to GfK, a German market research firm, China's smart speaker sales will experience a sharp increase in 2018, with the sales number expected to hit approximately 1.2 million, and the combination of screen vision and voice interaction may become the future trend.

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## JSCh

*Xiongan tests 5G-based remote driving with nearly 10 times faster response time*
By Gong Zhe
2018-03-27 11:50 GMT+8




A lot of people are still wondering what benefits can the highly anticipated 5G bring to our phone networks.

A recent remote-controlled car test in China's Xiongan New District serves as a demonstration of 5G's superiority.

Chinese AI and autonomous companies have teamed up to achieve a less than 6 milliseconds response time during the test, almost 10 times faster than 4G.

The testers drove a car remotely using a 5G network for 20 kilometers, performing accelerations, turns and brakes. The response time was within 6 milliseconds for the whole duration of the test.

There are 1,000 milliseconds in one second. Typical 4G response time is 50 milliseconds.

*Fast in another meaning*

Response time is the time between users issuing commands to devices actually receiving them.

When we talk about Internet speed, we usually mean how fast we download, or transfer data. But the speed can also be translated to response time.

Although the theoretical speed of our data transfer is the speed of light, it can be much slower in reality.

Response time, or latency, lag, has been troubling Internet gamers for a long time. In intensified shooting and racing titles, lag can be literally a game changer.

Also general office work requires remote control, which can be a bad experience with high lag.

With 5G, lag can be greatly reduced, paving the way to many life-changing applications like remote-surgery for hospitals and, in this news piece, remote driving.

Xiongan New District was planned in 2017 to become a satellite city of China's capital Beijing, bringing a package of favored policies to the area.

One of them is the permit for autonomous car testing. Qualified companies can test their technology in specific areas in Xiong'an.

The technology, namely 5G-V2X, can also be applied to other vehicles or devices, according to a local report.

Chinese business newspaper Securities Times reported that a branch of China's State Council confirmed the news.


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## JSCh

*In phone call, ZTE dials up 5G success*
By CHENG YU and MA SI | China Daily | Updated: 2018-04-03 07:07
















Visitors drop by ZTE's booth at the MWC Americas 2017 on Wednesday in San Francisco. LIA ZHU / CHINA DAILY

Chinese telecom company ZTE Group announced on Monday that it has succeeded in making the first phone call enabled by 5G technologies as Chinese smartphone makers scramble to work on 5G in hopes of applying this next-generation mobile communication technology to their products as soon as possible.

The move comes as China evolves from being a follower into a pioneer in the global telecom arena, experts said. The country is expected to commercialize 5G by 2020 and become the world's largest 5G market by 2025.

"The success moves China a step forward in developing 5G technologies, which will accelerate its speed in commercializing 5G," said Xiang Ligang, a telecom expert and chief executive of telecom industry website Cctime, adding that the call was one of the world's first using 5G technology.

The 5G phone call, as a collaboration between ZTE and China Mobile Communications Corp, was based on ZTE's end-to-end system of 5G, which will be taken for commercial use. It also follows the latest standard of 3GPP, a body that governs global cellular standards.

"Compared with 4G and 3G, calls enabled by 5G generate better quality," Xiang said.

China has gained momentum during the process of 5G development. It was reported recently that Chinese telecom carriers are likely to be issued 5G licenses in the second half of next year at the earliest. China will be among the first countries to issue 5G licenses.

In the past, China lagged behind other countries in issuing 4G and 3G licenses. But with 5G, the nation has already played an important role in finalizing the global standard and raced ahead in research and development.

The company invested 20 billion yuan ($3.2 billion) last month on a 5G product base in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, to develop the technology and devices.


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## JSCh

*China’s Big Three Carriers Get Green Light to Pilot 5G Networks*
LIAO SHUMIN 
DATE: THU, 04/19/2018 - 11:43 / SOURCE:YICAI





China’s Big Three Carriers Get Green Light to Pilot 5G Networks​
(Yicai Global) April 19 -- Chinese authorities have given the country’s big three mobile operators the go-ahead to pilot 5G networks in Beijing and other cities, boosting smartphone download speeds by as much as 10 times.

China United Network Communications Ltd., China Telecom Corp. and China Mobile Ltd. all got the green light, Beijing Daily reported, citing the three carriers. China Unicom’s Shandong unit already ran tests as early as last month in the eastern city of Qingdao.

Ultra-fast 5G networks will bring revolutionary changes to mobile internet applications, insiders said. They will gradually burn out the concept of downloading and networks will function essentially like a hard drive, with movie downloads taking just seconds. The technology will also help autonomous and connected vehicles better interact with control centers real-time and get up-to-date traffic information.

China Mobile will build 100 base stations each in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Suzhou and Wuhan, it said, adding that it will also test networks in 12 other cities, including the capital.

China Unicom plans to run its trial programs in 16 cities, including Beijing, Tianjin, Qingdao, Nanjing and Wuhan, while China Telecom will hold pilot schemes in Xiong’an New Area, Shenzhen, Shanghai and nine other cities.

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## JSCh

*5G test network enters operation in Chongqing*
Source: Xinhua| 2018-04-23 20:57:35|Editor: pengying




CHONGQING, April 23 (Xinhua) -- The first 5G test network was launched in the southwestern metropolis of Chongqing Monday, another step towards 5G commercialization in China.

Chongqing is among the first batch of cities to build and test run 5G networks in China.

According to China Mobile's Chongqing branch, the test network has entered operation in the municipality's Liangjiang New Area, and will be expanded to the whole city step by step.

The test network is open to companies and individuals that have the intention of jointly carrying out 5G innovations, including in areas such as the Internet of Vehicles, automatic driving, smart cities and online AR/VR. The test period will last until the official 5G commercialization.

The company said it would cooperate with manufacturers, higher education institutions and research institutions in products design and development, verification of key technologies and exploration of business models.

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## TaiShang

Weibo First-Quarter Profit Rises 111% to $99.1 Million, Revenue Up 76% to $349.9 Million

https://k.caixinglobal.com/#anchor1525859513000


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## JSCh

JSCh said:


> * World's first mimic DNS server operates in China *
> _ Source: Xinhua_|_ 2018-01-24 13:18:20_|_Editor: Yamei_
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ZHENGZHOU, Jan. 24 (Xinhua) -- World's first mimic DNS (Domain Name System) server went into operation Tuesday in Central China's Henan Province, a proactive move to prevent cyber attacks.
> 
> The server is in use by China Unicom's Henan provincial branch. It marks the first practical application of the mimic security theory proposed by Chinese scientists, according to the Henan Communication Administration.
> 
> The mimic DNS server will not change the current network structure but can effectively prevent various known and unknown attacks targeting the system, it said.
> 
> "Mimic DNS server is just our first application. The mimic web server, mimic cloud, mimic data center and other network devices will be launched in the future," said Wu Jiangxing, a Chinese Academy of Engineering academician and head of the research team.
> 
> Inspired by Mimic Octopus, the master of disguise in nature which can change appearance to adapt to the environment, Chinese scientists have proposed an idea of mimic computing in 2007 and produced the world's first mimic computer prototype in 2013.


*‘Game-changing’ Chinese cyberspace defense system defeats hackers at contest*
By Shan Jie in Nanjing Source:Global Times Published: 2018/5/13 20:53:41

A "game-changing" domestically developed cyber defense system presented to the world for the first time will strengthen China's cyberspace security, its chief designer said on Saturday.

The new mechanism successfully defended attacks from 22 white-hat, or ethical, computer-hacking teams from five countries at the Qiangwang International Elite Challenge on Cyber Mimic Defense (CMD) in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province on Saturday.

"This is the first time using the CMD system as the 'target machine' in the world," said Wu Jiangxing, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering in Beijing and founder of the theory of CMD, a proactive system whose randomness increases the difficulty attacks based on vulnerability and backdoors. 

The test conducted by top hackers was of great significance in proving the effectiveness of the CMD mechanism, Wu believed.

Digging holes, creating backdoors, planting viruses, hiding a Trojan horse and other traditional attack methods proved ineffective, Wu said. 

"The CMD, as a game-changing technology, will strengthen national cyberspace security and offer a way to build a healthy global cyberspace with a shared future," Wu told the Global Times on Saturday.

Russian hacking team LC↯BC finished the contest in first place with the most points, followed by Japan's TokyoWesterns and 0ops of Jiaotong University in Shanghai.

The system still needs testing, Wu said, but can be expected to be used in fields including finance, electricity and high-speed railways.

Inspired by Mimic Octopus, the master of disguise in nature which can change appearance to adapt to the environment, Chinese scientists proposed the idea of mimic computing in 2007 and produced the world's first mimic computer prototype in 2013.

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## JSCh

*China to complete industrial Internet infrastructure by 2020*
2018-06-08 14:38:55 Ecns.cn 





A foreign investor consults a staff member of Industrial Internet cloud platform. (Photo/China News Service)​
(ECNS) - China aims to build infrastructure for industrial Internet and industrial systems by the end of 2020, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) on Thursday.

More than 300,000 industrial enterprises will integrate cloud services over a three-year period and more than 300,000 industrial apps will be created, according to the ministry's "Action Plan for the Development of Industrial Internet (2018-2020)" released on Thursday.

The action plan identifies eight core tasks including improving infrastructure, establishing an industrial Internet name administration system, achieving breakthroughs in core technologies standards, and boosting safety measures.

Yu Xiaohui, chief engineer at the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT), said industrial Internet has become the focus of global industrial competition.

The Alliance of Industrial Internet, founded with the support of the MIIT and CAICT, has introduced a series of research results in core areas, in pace with international progress, said Yu. 

Industrial Internet is thought to be a major component in the strategic layout for the “Made in China 2025” strategy, a blueprint for upgrading and transforming the manufacturing sector. In the last year, the State Council approved guidelines on developing the industrial Internet, promising streamlined administration and fiscal support.

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## JSCh

*China rolls out ambitious plan for industrial internet development*
Xinhua Finance in www.cfbond.com
2018-06-10 21:14

Nearly three years ago, the American manufacturing giant, General Electric (GE), launched the world's first industrial cloud service platform named Predix, which provided industrial companies around the globe with more than 250 industrial APPs.

"GE should not only be a company with a market capitalization above the level of $100 billion," said Jeffrey Immelt, former chairman of GE, at the time. "We should also envision GE as a superstore as well as a global knowledge exchange center."

The advent of Predix sparked global competition in the area of the industrial internet, with industrial titans like Siemens and Asea Brown Boveri (ABB) all launching their own industrial cloud service platforms subsequently.

"Now, the industrial internet is becoming crucial for major global powers to reach the commanding heights in the industrial field," noted Chen Zhaoxiong, Chinese vice minister of Industry and Information Technology, during last year's China Industrial Internet Conference held in Guangzhou.

Being aware of the significance of the industrial internet to the future development of a country's manufacturing sector, China, which now has the world's largest and most complete industrial system, has also decided to explore this emerging area.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) rolled out a three-year plan for the development of industrial internet on Thursday, kicking off China's effort to develop this new technology.

According to the plan, the period from 2018 to 2020 will be the preliminary stage for the building of China's industrial internet system, which will lay a foundation for the development of the country's real and digital economy.

China's goal at this stage is to complete the construction of the infrastructure and an industrial system which can support the industrial internet.

To be specific, China plans to build a reliable and customizable inter-enterprise internet infrastructure which has a wide coverage and is equipped with a large broadband network by 2020. It will also transform the internal systems for at least 100 enterprises in the key industries, including, among others, car manufacturing, aerospace, petrochemical, and machinery manufacturing.

To connect the numerous so-called islands of information, China will also make efforts to establish an identifier resolution system, which is expected to contain five top-level nodes and at least ten service nodes for the resolution of public identifiers by 2020.

Another important task for the development of the industrial internet is to build a group of industrial internet platforms. China aims to foster about ten cross-industry and cross-area enterprise-level industrial internet platforms over the next three years. It will also bring more than 300 thousand industrial enterprises to its industrial cloud platform and develop over 300 thousand industrial APPs.

"Industrial internet platforms are one of the major pillars for industrial digitalization as well as the upgrading of the manufacturing sector," said Yang Lichun, director of the Information Research Center of the CCID Industry and Information Technology Institute. "Since such platforms are also the important carriers through which China can participate in the global competition, China must build national-level industrial internet platforms."

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## JSCh

*Huawei Completes Industry's First Live Demo of a 600G Single-Wavelength Ultra-High-Speed Optical Transmission System*
Jun 26, 2018

[Nice, France, June 26, 2018] Today, Huawei announced the completion of the industry's first live demo of a 600G single-wavelength ultra-high-speed optical transmission system at the Optical Network Innovation Forum 2018. Based on Huawei's latest optical transmission platform, the system adopts Huawei's own unique channel-matched shaping (CMS) technology and an AI neuron module designed for optical networks. Boasting an adjustable single-wavelength rate of up to 600G and a single-fiber capacity of 40Tbit/s, the system can further improve the efficiency of network operations and enable smooth evolution from existing traditional networks to intent-driven networks.

Taking advantage of the rapid development of technologies such as 5G, cloud computing, and Big Data, the optical network industry has fully entered the ultra-high-speed era. According to a report by independent analyst and consultancy firm Ovum, Huawei shipped over 127,000 100G+ ports in 2017, which was more than 1/3 of the total shipments for the global optical network market. Today, 200G is maturing and 400G and 600G are nearing commercialization. The coherent oDSP algorithm is the core technology that powers and commercializes ultra-high-speed optical transmission. It provides core functions such as modulation and demodulation of higher-order modulation signals, multiplexing of polarized optical signals, compensation for fiber link damage, and signal clock recovery. Such importance makes coherent oDSP a critical arena of competition for all vendors in the industry.

The 600G single-wavelength ultra-high-speed optical transmission system adopts Huawei's latest coherent oDSP algorithm, which improves the performance from the following aspects:


Ultimate transmission capacity and distance: This is the first time the CMS technology has been introduced in a transmission system. CMS improves the equivalent bandwidth of transmission links, satisfying the requirements of high-speed transmission channels and maximizing the spectral efficiency. By leveraging CMS, the system features the industry's best-performance transmission at 400G to 600G single-wavelength rates, increasing single-fiber capacity by a maximum of 50% to 40T and transmission distance by 30–50%.
Optimal power consumption efficiency: The industry-leading 16-nm FinFET manufacturing technique and simplified chip architecture reduce the power consumption per bit by 30%.
More intelligent: Huawei's unique built-in AI neuron module enables smooth upgrade to the intelligent management and control of optical networks. Using the optical-layer labeling technology and oDSP algorithm, the module performs real-time labeling, detection, and data collection for all wavelengths directly at the optical layer on the optical transmission network. This eliminates the need for any additional modules or optical-to-electrical conversion processes. In addition, the AI algorithm of the Huawei Network Cloud Engine (NCE) platform provides functions like autonomous optimization, self-protection, and advance warnings of performance deterioration for optical networks. These features help carriers smoothly evolve their traditional networks to intent-driven networks.
Richard Jin, President of Huawei Transmission Network Product Line, said, "Huawei has long been leading the field of 100G, 200G, and 400G ultra-high-speed optical transmission, thanks to our strategic investment in optical networks. The new 600G system provides AI capabilities for optical networks, using Huawei's sixth-generation coherent oDSP algorithm and an additional optical-layer AI neuron module. This will help our customers build intent-driven networks based on user experience."

At the 20th Next Generation Optical Networking (NGON) conference in Nice, France from June 26 through 28, Huawei will perform a live demo of its board-based 600G single-wavelength transmission system at its booth. Find details about the conference at www.huawei.com/en/press-events/events/optical-innovation-forum-2018.

More information about the system is available in the white paper _Constructing Intelligent Ultra-High-Speed Optical Networks with Ultimate Performance_.



Huawei Completes Industry's First Live Demo of a 600G Single-Wavelength Ultra-High-Speed Optical Transmission System - Huawei Press Center


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## JSCh

*China Unicom to put 5G into practice by 2020*
Xinhua Finance in www.cfbond.com
2018-07-01 20:15

One of China's leading telecom operators, the China United Telecommunications Co. Ltd. announced on Thursday that it is now testing the commercialization of 5G and planning to put it into practice by 2020.

China Unicom noted it would continue to provide a stable network to high-definition videos, Virtual Reality (VR) video games, and videos in the cars among others.

It also rolled out its autonomous driving, VR and smart home applications.

The company joined hands with Tencent to set up a 5G innovation laboratory to research edge computing, network slicing, and positional accuracy among others.

Meanwhile, it also collaborated with Baidu on a joint venture to construct a 5G plus AI laboratory to develop AI, Big Data and car networking technologies.

China Unicom will focus on an Enhance Mobile Broadband (eMBB) to improve customer experiences.

Partnering with Huawei Technologies and Intel Corporation, the company will innovate in the areas of 5G Mobile Edge Computing (MEC).

Tang Xiong Yan, a senior expert from China Unicom noted the company's operations would be automated further in the future.

"We are now rolling out testings in 16 cities regarding 5G technology," said Tang.


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## JSCh

*5G Technology Joint Laboratory Established by CNIC and China Unicom*
Jul 06, 2018

The Computer Network Information Center (CNIC) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Network Technology Research Institute of China Unicom signed a cooperative agreement during the Mobile World Congress Shanghai 2018 on June 28 to establish a 5G Technology Joint Laboratory.

By establishing the joint lab, the two sides will strengthen cooperation in 5G technology development in the near future, and in the long run collaborate on a series of key technologies such as edge computing, network slicing, Internet of Things and industrial Internet. 

5G technology is the key strategic direction of the country's scientific and technological development, which has far-reaching impact on economic development and research paradigm and shift. The previous collaborative activities between CNIC and China Unicom have paved the way for a more strengthened partnership for the joint development of 5G technology and its application in supporting scientific research. 

"China Unicom has been attaching great importance to 5G technology innovation and its applications in new areas," said ZHANG Yong, Director of the Network Technology Research Institute of China Unicom.

The lab will release joint research results, develop advanced applications based on China Unicom's 5G industrial environment and the application environment of China Science and Technology Cloud, and promote industrialization and standardization of key technologies. 

The lab will also explore the use of 5G technology in supporting field science stations and scientific expeditions.

The establishment of the joint lab will foster the development of the next-generation network technology and the technical testbed, one of the prioritized areas of CNIC during the 13th Five-Year Plan. The cooperation will lay a solid foundation for the convergence of 5G technology and other technologies such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things and visualization, and for the development of China Science and Technology Cloud.

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## JSCh

*Huawei wins A$136m 4G telecoms rail contract in spite of security concerns from some Australian lawmakers*
_The contract award comes after the Chinese company refuted claims by some Australian lawmakers that it posed a security risk, calling the criticism “ill-informed”_

PUBLISHED : Monday, 09 July, 2018, 11:50am
UPDATED : Monday, 09 July, 2018, 11:50am







Li Tao

Huawei Technologies, the world’s largest telecom equipment vendor, has scored an A$136 million (US$101 million) contract to build and maintain the digital radio systems that deliver voice and data services across Perth’s rail network, in spite of security concerns raise by some Australian lawmakers.

The Chinese company will make and install the fourth generation (4G) communications system for Perth’s rail network by 2021 as part of a joint venture with Australian engineering company UGL. The technology will control signalling on Perth’s expanded 180 kilometre electrified rail network, part of which will link the city with the airport.

Huawei’s Australia Chairman John Lord said the Public Transport Authority contract reinforces Huawei’s strong long-term investment focus on Australia, and pointed out that the company has been providing similar communications technology services to Sydney Trains and Ambulance New South Wales “safely and securely” for nearly a decade.

“Huawei is extending its trusted portfolio of solutions towards industry and strengthening its customer base in mission critical market segments,” Lord said in a July 6 statement posted on Huawei’s official website. Huawei won the contract over fellow Chinese company ZTE, Ericsson Australia, Optus and Japan’s Ansaldo.

The deal comes less than a month after the Shenzhen-based company refuted claims by some Australian lawmakers that it posed a security risk, calling the criticism “ill-informed” in an open letter in mid-June. It also occurs at a time when Huawei is lobbying the Australian government not to block it from supplying broadband equipment for Australia’s 5G mobile services roll-out amid concerns from US intelligence officials and local politicians that it poses a security threat. Authorities in the US remain concerned about Huawei’s alleged ties with the Chinese government.

Huawei says ‘unfounded’ lockout by US costing its own consumers US$20 billion

Huawei said on Monday it has no further comment on the matter.

Huawei has already been blocked from constructing an undersea cable from the Solomon Islands to Australia, with the Australian government saying in April it would take on the project itself.

“Recent public commentary around China has referenced Huawei and its role in Australia and prompted some observations around security concerns … Many of these comments are ill-informed and not based on facts,” Lord and two board directors of Huawei’s Australian operation wrote in the June 18 open letter.

In February, Huawei’s deputy chairman Ken Hu Houkun told reporters that accusations by the US that there are security concerns around using Huawei products were “groundless and unfair”, after reports that Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull had been briefed about the risks of Chinese involvement in 5G networks during a meeting with the heads of the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security in the US.

“It is not fair to us if our strong track record on security over the past 30 years has been disregarded while the accusations (about Huawei posing a security risk) are based on groundless suspicions,” said Hu, who added that the company would welcome a discussion on the issue based on facts.

Huawei founder bets Sino-US trade war won’t happen – but could he be wrong?

Both Huawei and ZTE Corp, however, are expected to languish on a US blacklist because of US security concerns, according to analysts. That outcome would primarily stem from a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposal to prohibit the purchase of equipment or services for a government-subsidised programme, the US$8.5-billion-a-year Universal Service Fund (USF), from any company that poses as a national security threat as a way to safeguard US networks.

Huawei said in a filing to the FCC last week that blacklisting the company because of “unfounded allegations and suspicions” about its alleged ties with the Chinese government would mean higher infrastructure costs and less innovation in the US market.

Meanwhile, a departing ZTE executive, recently thanked Huawei in a farewell letter, saying that it was because of competition with Huawei that ZTE had been able to grow and develop over the past two decades.

“I sincerely hope that Huawei will stiffen its spine and face the inevitable future challenges,” said the former executive vice-president of ZTE, who had his contract terminated by ZTE has part of the company’s settlement agreement with the US government to replace senior management.



Huawei wins A$136m 4G telecoms rail contract in spite of security concerns from some Australian lawmakers | South China Morning Post


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## JSCh

*1st land-based China-Pakistan cross-border optical fiber inaugurated*
Source: Xinhua 2018-07-14 00:15:30

ISLAMABAD, July 13 (Xinhua) -- The first ever land-based cross border optical fiber project between China and Pakistan was inaugurated Friday, a significant digital achievement under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.

The project, signed in April 2007 between Pakistan's Special Communication Organization and China Telecom, was approved in 2010.

The 820-km underground cable starts from Rawalpindi and ends at Khunjerab bordering China and connects with optical fiber in the Chinese side.

Pakistani interim Prime Minster Nasir-ul-Mulk said in the inauguration ceremony that the connection of both countries' communication facilities will improve Pakistan's telecommunication infrastructure, push forward the development of its communication technology and facilitate the communication connectivity between the two countries and the entire region.


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## JSCh

*Malta, Huawei sign 5G infrastructure agreement*
Source: Xinhua| 2018-07-14 21:24:14|Editor: ZX







Maltese Parliamentary Secretary for Financial Services, Digital Economy and Innovation Silvio Schembri delivers a speech at the signing event in Ta'Qali, Malta, July 14, 2018. Malta and Chinese technology giant Huawei signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on Saturday that will improve Malta businesses via 5G, especially digital infrastructure for smart cities. (Xinhua/Yuanyun)

VALLETTA, July 14 (Xinhua) -- Malta and Chinese technology giant Huawei signed a memorandum of understand (MOU) on Saturday that will improve Malta businesses via 5G, especially digital infrastructure for smart cities.

The agreement, which was signed by Huawei Technologies Italia CEO Miao Xiaoyang and Maltese Parliamentary Secretary for Digital Economy Silvio Schembri, comes two years after Malta and Huawei signed another MOU that had seen the company test its flagship 5G internet connectivity in Malta.

Speaking at the signing event, Miao said that Malta had already been included in Huawei's global 5G program, noting that the technology would offer greater bandwidth and facilitated mass connections that could eventually be harnessed to create smart cities.

Miao said Huawei wanted to invest more in Malta, particularly in the security and green energy sectors, among others, which he said 5G connectivity could be the key.

Schembri said that through the MOU, Huawei would be committing itself to sustaining academic research with a focus on addressing real world challenges related to public safety, video analytics, data processing and IT systems.

The MOU would also create opportunities through education, starting with an ICT training program for Maltese students at Huawei's training centre in China.

Schembri said he was very happy that Huawei had selected Malta to test its "avantgarde 5G technology", stressing that the collaboration had been of great benefit to both sides.

Schembri said he was also very happy with the excellent relationship that had developed over the last two years between his country and Huawei, adding that the relationship would continue to be strengthened in the years to come.

"We believe it is now time to take the relationship a step further. We believe your expertise in this sector will enhance our ecosystem by entering into further collaboration with our local operators, businesses and citizens," said Schembri.

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## JSCh

*Huawei May Beat Samsung to 5G in Its Own Backyard*
By Sam Kim
July 16, 2018, 4:00 AM GMT+8

While Samsung Electronics Co. has become synonymous with technology in South Korea, a controversial rival could upstage it in the race to build fifth-generation wireless networks in its own backyard.

Huawei Technologies Co., the Chinese company slammed in the U.S. Congress as a security threat, is in the running to supply equipment to all three of South Korea’s national mobile carriers. At stake: initial contracts that could be worth 10 trillion won ($9 billion).

As South Korea pushes to become the first nation to roll out 5G networks, suppliers from around the world are vying to sell switches, base stations and other gear needed to make them work. While Samsung is best known for its smartphones and memory chips, having its equipment shut out of the most advanced wireless networks in its homeland would be a setback for a company that has suffered a number of recent black-eyes.

Huawei has grown to become the largest network gear maker and is pushing deep into 5G technology, investing heavily in research and becoming one of the biggest holders of patents. Its prospects came into focus earlier this year when President Donald Trump blocked Broadcom Inc. from buying Qualcomm Inc. as the U.S. cited risks that the deal could help the Chinese company take the lead in developing next-generation networks.

“Huawei has been aggressive and started development earlier than others,” Park Jin-hyo, executive vice president of SK Telecom Co., said in an interview. “We are looking with an open stance and no bias whatsoever.”

While aware of security concerns surrounding Huawei, Park said South Korea’s largest carrier is looking at other factors including technology and costs, adding the firm wouldn’t be considering the Shenzhen-based company if it fell short of global security standards.

Why U.S. Politicians Are Scared of China’s Biggest Tech Company

SK Telecom and smaller rivals KT Corp. and LG Uplus Corp. have more than 56 million subscribers, a number greater than the country’s population of just 51 million. Cost is a critical factor in deciding their equipment needs after they agreed last month to fork out 3.6 trillion won for 5G wireless spectrum.

LG Uplus has expressed willingness to choose Huawei while SK Telecom and KT are weighing the Chinese company as well as Samsung, Nokia Oyj and Ericsson AB. This week, the country’s technology minister is scheduled to meet with the heads of Korea’s three wireless carriers to go over their 5G rollout blueprint -- a confab at which Huawei will almost certainly come up.

The appeal of 5G technology comes down to its ability to transmit data fast enough to aid the operation of self-driving cars or download feature-length movies in seconds.

While Samsung has never had a huge share of the global market for wireless network gear, it has always been able to rely on hometown support. In Huawei, it faces a competitor that can undercut it on price but also seeks to emulate its reputation for customer service.

“Huawei’s appeal is its price competitiveness,” said Kim Hyun-yong, an analyst at Ebest Investment & Securities Co. “And it has a lead with its 5G devices developed well enough to be put to work immediately.”

Still, questions remain about Huawei and security. The company was founded in 1987 by a former Chinese military officer and it says it’s now owned by workers. But the U.S. has accused it of maintaining close links to the government and enabling spying by the mainland. It’s effectively been blocked from selling network equipment to the biggest U.S. carriers and struggled to get support for its mobiles in the country.

Security allegations resonate in South Korea, which is a U.S. ally hosting almost 30,000 American troops but at the same time needs China’s support to remove nuclear arms in North Korea. Petitions have appeared on the South Korean presidential website seeking to ban Huawei from the country, which after becoming the first major market to reach full 4G coverage wants to extend that to 5G.

Huawei didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment. Samsung declined to comment.

Huawei’s success in winning network contracts has seen it push heavily into consumer devices and it’s now the third-largest smartphone vendor, behind only Samsung and Apple Inc. While Samsung still enjoys a lead over Huawei in smartphones, that edge is shrinking. The maker of Galaxy phones had a 21.9 percent share while Huawei had 10.8 percent last year, according to TrendForce.

5G is important to Samsung, which seeks to boost its profile as a supplier of networking equipment by doing well in countries tapping the next-generation spectrum early, such as South Korea and Japan.

Samsung is already being challenged in its components businesses as Chinese rivals seek to catch up in televisions and memory chips, two sectors where the Suwon-based company is the world’s biggest.

“Supplying 5G equipment in a country that’s going to be the world’s first to go 5G has enormous symbolism to it,” said Hong Een-kee, a professor of wireless communications at Seoul’s Kyung Hee University. “Huawei stays competitive globally because it has a solid grip at home. Imagine what it’d mean if a South Korean company lost in its own backyard when it’s trying to raise its own share of the global market.”


Huawei May Beat Samsung to 5G in Its Own Backyard - Bloomberg

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## JSCh

*Yangtze River Delta to build China's largest 5G field trial network*
Xinhua Finance in www.cfbond.com
2018-07-19 09:05




Local governments of the Yangtze River Delta have signed an agreement with four Chinese telecommunication companies to collaborate on the 5G development project, the Economic Information Daily reported Wednesday.

China Telecom, China Mobile, China Unicom and China Tower will be involved through centering on the construction of 5G infrastructure in the area.

According to the agreement, China's largest 5G field trial network will be built within this year and it could become one of the pioneers to be put into commercial use in 2020.

Shanghai, Nanjing, Hangzhou and Suzhou cities have been selected as pilot cities to build their 5G infrastructure projects.

Take Shanghai as an example, three major carriers in China have declared that they would bring the best quality and highest standard to the 5G network in Shanghai.

Meanwhile, application tests will also be carried out on the internet of things, the internet of vehicles, smart cities, etc.

Three major carriers are expected to promote 5G network usage on public services in the regions, including health insurance, social security and public transport.

They will collaborate with local governments to build a cross-region supervisory platform on population, transportation and environment.

According to China's top-level blueprint on the development of cities within the Yangtze River Delta, the investments from the four companies mentioned will exceed RMB 200 billion on the building of the 5G infrastructure by 2021.

Moreover, a world-class information communication hub based on the existing network infrastructures in Shanghai, Nanjing and Hangzhou will be created, according to the blueprint.

A report from the Shanghai Securities News on Wednesday said that provinces and cities in the Yangtze River Delta region would join hands on not only the development of telecommunication but that of transportation, energy, technological innovation, industry, credit, public services, environmental protection, business and finance, among others.

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## JSCh

*China officially greenlights virtual telecom operator businesses*
Source: Xinhua| 2018-07-23 16:39:06|Editor: ZX




BEIJING, July 23 (Xinhua) -- China has granted the official greenlight for virtual telecom operator businesses after piloting the practice for almost five years.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has issued official licenses to 15 private virtual telecoms to resell internet access, the ministry said in a statement released Monday on its website.

These virtual operators, including Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Xiaomi, do not maintain the network infrastructure but rent wholesale services like roaming and text messages from the country's three major telecom infrastructure operators China Mobile, China Unicom, and China Telecom.

In a move to further open up the telecom sector, China started to issue pilot licenses in 2013 to private companies to allow them to offer repackaged mobile services to users. A total of 42 Chinese enterprises received pilot licenses to operate virtual telecom businesses.

Granting virtual telecom operators official licenses is aimed at encouraging mobile telecom business innovation and improving the sector's overall service quality, the statement said.

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## JSCh

*Huawei demonstrates 5G technology in Bangladesh*
Source: Xinhua| 2018-07-26 01:11:58|Editor: Li Xia






Bangladeshi Prime Minister's ICT Affairs Adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy delivers a speech at the Bangladesh 5G Summit 2018 in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on July 25, 2018. Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei conducted Bangladesh's first trial of fifth generation network (5G) teaming up with the Bangladeshi government's Posts & Telecommunications Division, the Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology and Robi, a joint venture of Axiata Group Berhad (Malaysia), Bharti Airtel Limited (India) and NTT DoCoMo Inc. (Japan), at a ceremony in the capital Dhaka on Wednesday. (Xinhua)

DHAKA, July 25 (Xinhua) -- Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei has conducted Bangladesh's first trial of fifth generation network (5G).

Huawei conducted the trial teaming up with the Bangladeshi government's Posts & Telecommunications Division, the Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology and Robi, a joint venture of Axiata Group Berhad (Malaysia), Bharti Airtel Limited (India) and NTT DoCoMo Inc. (Japan), at a ceremony in the capital Dhaka on Wednesday.

The 5G trial ceremony was inaugurated by Bangladeshi Prime Minister's ICT Affairs Adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy.

Officials said the purposes of this event are to show how a 5G ecosystem can be cultivated in "Digital Bangladesh" and how to use 5G to respond to the economic transformation of Bangladesh as well as the operators.

This next generation of wireless technology is expected to change the way of everyday life. 5G will play vital role in automatic driving, Artificial Intelligence, Virtual Reality, Big data, Internet of Things, Smart City and network, they said.

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## JSCh

*Beijing enters 5G era*
China.org.cn, August 14, 2018

At 10 a.m. on Aug. 13, Beijing officially entered the 5G era as a live video was projected onto the big screens in the Beijing Unicom Building.

The new generation wireless data network is being introduced by China Unicom, one of the major telecommunications carriers in China. According to a staff member at the company's Beijing branch, the 5G network could be used to transmit 4K high definition (HD) signals, with sharpness 16 times higher than what could be transmitted through 4G. The staff member said 5G-capable mobile phones will become available in the first half of next year, and China Unicom will begin recruiting field testers.

According to a person in charge at the Beijing branch, China Unicom has built four 5G base stations in Beijing, and it is aiming to finish building experimental networks for testing, application incubation, and business promotion by the end of this year. The 5G base stations will first cover some key areas in the Chinese capital such as its subsidiary administrative center, the new airport, Chang An Avenue, Finance Street, the International Horticultural Exposition Area, and the 2022 Winter Olympic Park. The Beijing International Horticultural Exposition will be the first event in the city to use the 5G network.

According to reports on China's timetable for developing the 5G network, the country plans to kick off test runs this year, pilot commercial uses in 2019, and realize large-scale commercial expansion in 2020. To compensate for the small number of 5G base stations at the beginning, 4G and 5G networks will coexist for a couple of years in Beijing. This means that telecom companies will continue to service 4G mobile phones, and that 5G-capable phones will be backward-compatible with 4G signals.

Officials from the Beijing Municipal Communications Administration said that they have worked out schemes to speed up the overall planning and construction of 5G capabilities in Beijing. Meanwhile, the Beijing Municipal Commission of Economy and Information Technology will be working to promote the 5G information and communication industries by supporting network carriers to develop 5G model applications for driverless vehicles, healthcare services, industrial networks, smart cities, and ultra HD videos. Already, the Beijing branch of China Unicom has started collaboration with Baidu and other companies in such fields as driverless vehicles and big data.

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## JSCh

*First Cable Connection Between Africa and South America*
LIAO SHUMIN 
DATE: THU, 09/06/2018 - 18:43 / SOURCE:YICAI




China Unicom Leads First Cable Connection Between Africa and South America​
(Yicai Global) Sept. 6 -- A consortium led by telecoms giant China United Network Communications has completed work on the first-ever subsea optic cable connection between the continents of Africa and South America.

The South Atlantic Inter Link consortium, which also includes Cameroonian utility Camtel, has installed a 6,000 kilometer cable linking base stations in the central African nation’s coastal town of Kribi with Fortaleza in Brazil, China Unicom said in a statement.

The cable boasts a design capacity of 32 terabits per second and marks an infrastructural milestone for the southern hemisphere. It will provide a new channel for web traffic with high reliability, security as well as low latency and large capacity.

China Unicom, Camtel and Huawei Marine Networks signed a construction contract for the project in June last year.

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## cirr

*中科院发布域名系统基础软件及全球最快域名服务器*

2018-09-14 07:30:46 来源：新华网

关键字:域名系统基础软件红枫 红枫软件

导读
会上发布了由域名工程中心自主开发的互联网基础软件“红枫”（Maple DNS），还发布了自主研发的高性能域名服务器。根据国际同行网站显示，该高性能服务器运行速度是国际同行最快服务器的1.6倍。

据新华网9月13日报道，9月12日，互联网域名系统北京市工程研究中心（简称域名工程中心，英文缩写ZDNS）在中国科学院软件园发布了自主开发的域名系统基础软件“红枫”系统及首台国产化域名服务器。中国工程院院士胡启恒、中国科学院研究员钱华林、中国科学院计算机网络信息中心主任廖方宇、曙光公司副总裁吴宗友等专家出席仪式。






域名工程中心主任毛伟表示：当前RPKI正在全球开展部署，这是一次触及互联网“互联互通根基”的安全升级，将对网络安全保障工作和互联网治理工作产生重大影响。中国专家起草的标准被接纳为核心标准，将有助于推动我国互联网社群对全球互联网治理工作的深度参与。






胡启恒说，这让中国互联网不仅是受益者，也开始成为全球基础网络安全升级、从可用走向可信的积极贡献者，更重要的是，这次的技术贡献深入到了核心底层互联网标准领域。

*互联网基础软件：域名工程中心推出“红枫”软件*






会上发布了由域名工程中心自主开发的互联网基础软件“红枫”（Maple DNS）。据邢志杰介绍：“我国互联网发展迅速，应用的深度和广度都走在世界前列，传统的域名服务软件已经不能适应中国市场需求。红枫软件是域名工程中心花了8年时间打磨出来一套高性能、智能化的基础软件，达到了国际领先水平。”

与目前国内主要使用的免费开源软件Bind9相比，红枫软件由于采用全新架构设计，在高性能解析、多线路智能调度、快速数据更新、扩展性等多方面优于Bind9。例如Bind9一般情况下每秒可以处理5万次查询请求，红枫软件可以轻松实现百万级查询能力。






基于红枫软件，域名工程中心和中科曙光联合推出首台国产化域名服务器。该服务器首次实现了域名解析基础软件系统在国产芯片的实践落地，扩大了国产芯片的使用生态。会上，域名工程中心总经理邢志杰和中科曙光公司副总裁吴宗友共同签署了战略合作协议。

*刷新性能记录：域名工程中心发布全球最快域名服务器*

会上发布了一款自主研发的高性能域名服务器。根据国际同行网站显示，该高性能服务器运行速度是国际同行最快服务器的1.6倍。该服务器单台处理每秒800万次查询，相当于100台常规域名服务器，但峰值能耗却为1/25，空间相当于1/30。单台高性能服务器可防护10G带宽流量。该服务器将有力应对针对域名系统的DDoS攻击，从而帮助运营商级别的机构大大提升网络安全保障能力。

对此，廖方宇指出，当前正处于科技创新的黄金期，包括域名工程中心在内的广大科技工作者要把握大势、抢占先机，直面问题、迎难而上，瞄准世界科技前沿，引领科技发展方向，肩负起历史赋予的重任，勇做新时代科技创新的排头兵。

*打造全流程服务：域名工程中心“标准+硬件+软件+云平台”体系成形*

除了互联网国际标准、高性能设备和红枫软件之外，本次会议期间，域名工程中心还发布了“ZDNS域名云服务平台2.0”、“ZDNS企业网络基础设施IPv6升级解决方案”、“基于k8s平台的企业级云DNS解决方案”、“ZDNS企业品牌顶级域名解决方案”、“ZDNS域名系统维保服务体系升级版”等一系列产品和服务。

邢志杰表示，作为我国首家域名领域工程研究中心，域名工程中心将一如既往地致力于互联网基础资源技术创新与服务，为企业向IPv6快稳步平滑过度、私有云部署，以及申请运营顶级域名等提供完整的解决方案。






对此，钱华林表示，这一系列技术标准和技术产品和服务的发布，让我们看到域名工程中心在互联网基础技术领域在用心、专注做事。

此次发布，不仅是对我国在互联网底层核心技术方面创新实力的集中展示，也把域名工程中心“标准+软件+硬件+云平台”的业务布局和发展前景勾勒地更加清晰。

胡启恒表示：“我看到了中国年轻一代技术人员的活力和实力。我真心要为他们加油、为他们点赞。”

https://www.guancha.cn/industry-science/2018_09_14_472005.shtml

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## JSCh

*4G network installed to ensure mining safety in Hubei*
Xinhua | Updated: 2018-09-16 11:21

















Miners hold an emergency drill in Hubei province on June 13, 2013. [Photo/VCG]​WUHAN - High-speed 4G network has been installed in an iron mine 500 meters deep in Central China's Hubei province to improve mining safety and production efficiency.

"Miners are able to send photos, videos and voice messages from underground via 4G network, so that experts can give instructions and solve problems from the control center," said Sun Baoping, an engineer at Chengchao mining company, a subsidiary of Wuhan Iron and Steel Group.

Most Chinese mines now use 2G networks for underground telecommunications, which can not meet the needs for the use of more information technology in the mining industry, Sun said.

Sealed barrels were used to contain optic cables to avoid spark-triggered explosion in gas-rich mine shafts, and antennas were integrated and kept in remote radio units to stay away from dusts and enhance signal, said Zhang Liang from China Mobile's Ezhou city branch.

So far 4G signals have covered three tunnels of the iron mine, providing better telecommunication service, improving the efficiency of production and emergency rescue, and facilitating the use of "intelligent mining" technology in the future, Sun said.

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## JSCh

*Huawei moves to help Italy in 5G in a clear rebuttal to scrutiny in other Western countries*
Source:Global Times Published: 2018/9/26 22:23:40
*
Huawei helps Italian telecom carrier launch first 5G base station*
The launch of the first 5G base station in Italy, which featured Chinese telecom equipment producer Huawei's end-to-end (E2E) 5G equipment, marked a milestone in 5G cooperation between China and Europe.

It also served as a rebuttal to some Western countries' ban on Chinese devices over alleged security concerns, an expert said.

Huawei helped Italian telecom carriers TIM and Fastweb launch the country's first 5G base station in compliance with 3GPP standards and put it into commercial use, according to a statement on Huawei's website on Tuesday. The station uses Huawei's E2E 5G equipment. 

The partners also demonstrated several user cases as part of their cooperation, including smart city and transport uses, virtual reality and augmented reality, as well as smart culture and tourism, the statement noted.

Xiang Ligang, chief executive of telecom industry news site cctime.com, told the Global Times Wednesday that the partnership shows the huge potential of cooperation between China and Europe in the 5G industry. 

Chinese firms have participated in the construction of 4G networks in many countries and "developed a deep understanding of the local situation."

"European carriers, taking account of the cost and their limited budget, will expand their 5G networks based on 4G infrastructure. So choosing a long-term partner could help the local operators to transit more smoothly from 4G to 5G," Xiang said.

Bids from Chinese firms, compared with other rivals, are more cost-effective while ensuring competitive technology as well as responsive and good services, Xiang said.

Xiang added that the collaboration demonstrates the safety of Chinese telecoms equipment. 

"Otherwise, why would Italy choose to work with a partner that would allegedly 'threaten its national security'?" Xiang asked, suggesting that the US and Australia should not politicize business deals.

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## JSCh

*Huawei ships 10,000 5G base stations globally*
By Wang Yi Source:Global Times Published: 2018/11/21 22:43:41
*
China expected to lead development of next-generation services: analysts
*




A view of Huawei's stand at the PT Expo China held in Beijing in September Photo: VCG​
Domestic technology giant Huawei has urged operators to trust its fifth-generation (5G) vision as it has shipped over 10,000 base stations globally, which experts said shows that China is expected to lead the game in 5G network development, because all links in the nation's industry are strong.

Huawei has told operators its 5G connections have achieved milestones in development and commercialization is also accelerating.

"154 mobile operators in 66 countries and regions around the world are conducting 5G technical testing or field testing. Huawei has shipped more than 10,000 5G base stations to customers around the world," said Ken Hu, rotating chairman of Huawei, at the Huawei Mobile Broadband Forum (MBBF) in London on Tuesday, according to the press release Huawei sent to the Global Times Wednesday.

"5G is still in the testing phase now, and large-scale commercialization is expected in the second half of 2019," Xiang Ligang, chief executive of Chinese telecoms industry news website cctime.com, told the Global Times Wednesday.

"The number of 10,000 5G base stations is just a beginning. By 2025, millions of 5G base stations are expected to be built across the world," Xiang said.

"According to GSMA figures, 110 markets in the world will deploy 5G facilities," said Hu at the MBBF. "5G innovation is bringing information and communications technology to a whole new level. Revolutionary change is expected to be seen in all walks of life in the coming 5G era."

GSMA, or GSM Association, is a trade body that represents the interests of mobile network operators worldwide. 

Xiang said that transformation caused by 4G has already been reflected in all walks of life, and the 5G world will be more intelligent. All things will be connected by the network.

"China is already leading 4G development," Xiang said. "We have witnessed and lived through the great transformations of bicycle-sharing, online car-hailing and mobile payments, which are all based on 4G technology."

"5G is ready in three key areas of availability, economy and application," Hu said. "However, 5G has met obstacles in terms of spectrum and site resources."

Hu called for governments across the world to coordinate and open wide bandwidth 5G spectrum and make more public resources available for site deployment.

Governments are expected to support 5G development, Xiang said, because the technology will benefit economic development and social management.

Liu Dingding, a Beijing-based technology analyst, agreed that spectrum and site resources will not be a problem holding 5G development back.

"The same concern of resources waste and overlapping construction was raised when the 4G era came, but the resources distribution was optimized in the end.

"Because the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, governments and relevant departments will offer support."

As some countries, like the US or Australia, have already banned Chinese companies from their 5G infrastructure building effort, MBBF has attracted operators and partners from Europe, the Mideast and the Asia-Pacific, according to the Huawei press release.

In terms of 5G technology development, China and the US are at about the same level, Xiang said.

"Huawei has not entered the US market, but in the future, it may have a chance to get into Australia," Xiang said. "Even in the US, there are operators and consumers who want to buy Huawei's equipment and devices."

China's 5G development is promising, because all links in the industry are strong, Xiang noted. "We have good telecom operators, device manufacturers and mobile internet developers."

"Take 5G mobile phones as example. Chinese companies will lead the game, and based on the open information, Huawei is the first company in the world that has delivered 10,000 5G base stations," Liu said.

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## JSCh

*Chinese experts set foot in 6G research*
Source: Xinhua| 2019-01-03 21:47:53|Editor: Liangyu




NANJING, Jan. 3 (Xinhua) -- Southeast University in eastern China's Jiangsu Province said Thursday that a team has begun to research 6G mobile networks.

You Xiaohu, a professor with the university and the team leader, said they have set sights on the early research and development of 6G mobile networks, based on the 5G technologies.

You said that compared with 5G technologies, 6G will cover a wider range of fields with higher speed and greater security. The early research and development will mainly focus on intelligent mobile communications, massive wireless communications, millimeter wave/submillimeter wave wireless communications, optical wireless communications and broadband satellite mobile communications.

"There's still a long way to go in applying 6G technologies into our daily life. Experts predict that 6G technologies will go into commercial operation by 2030. However, the 6G competition has already begun among many enterprises," You said.

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## JSCh

13 March 2019
*New technology developed at CityU saves at least 4.5% of energy in mobile networks*
Kenix Wong


​(From left) Mr Stephen Chau, Dr Eric Wong Wing-ming, and Professor Henry Chung Shu-hung.

A research project conducted by the Department of Electronic Engineering (EE) at City University of Hong Kong (CityU) has developed technology that can optimise mobile network design and reduce the energy consumption of the base stations by a minimum of 4.5%. If all the base stations in Hong Kong adopt this technology, the energy saved could be enough for at least 5,000 households per year as electricity.

As it is estimated that the energy consumption of the base stations will increase due to high volume data in future, the team has started to look at ways of applying this newly developed technology for the new mobile network in the near future.

“Base stations account for 70 to 80% of total energy consumption of a mobile network. They contain radio transceivers which maintain communication between the network and the mobile users through radio links. Most of the time, many base stations are not heavily loaded even though they consume a lot of energy. Hence there is huge energy waste, especially during low-traffic hours,” explained Dr Eric Wong Wing-ming, Associate Professor at EE, who leads the research.

“Everyone knows it is energy-saving to let the transceivers go into sleep mode, a low-energy-consumption mode, when not in use during low-traffic hours. However, the sleep mode of the base station causes a reduction in the total available capacity of the network, and so the quality of service may be degraded. Hence, we need to decide how to halt and how many transceivers that we can halt so that the quality of service would not be sacrificed from a macro and systematic perspective,” said Dr Wong.

With funding from the government’s Innovation and Technology Fund (ITF) and technical support from SmarTone, the team has developed technology to efficiently evaluate the trade-off between quality of service and power consumption in a cellular network with the base station sleeping. The new technology estimates power consumption based on realistic traffic data and energy models, and then evaluates the quality of service by using the accurate and computationally efficient analytical technique called Information Exchange Surrogate Approximation for Cellular Networks (IESA-CN), which has also been developed by the team.



​Dr Wong explains how the new technology can help save the energy consumption of the base stations.

“The advantage of IESA-CN is that it is much faster in computation than using computer simulation, a traditional evaluation means to assess the quality of service,” explained Dr Wong. “In terms of computational efficiency, the running time of IESA-CN (about 0.2 second) is over 50,000 times faster than that of simulation (about 3 hours). Given its reasonable level of accuracy, our proposed IESA-CN can be used for searching for optimal solutions to trade-off between power consumption and quality of service in cellular networks.”

With several rounds of testing at different scales of base stations, Dr Wong said the new technology could help save energy consumption of the base stations by at least 4.5% while maintaining service quality at a satisfactory level. The team estimated that if all the base stations in Hong Kong adopt this technology, the energy saved could be enough for at least 5,000 households per year as electricity. He added that the software could help mobile network operators optimise the network design and hence save energy consumption based on the service quality they want to provide.

“As a leading mobile network operator, SmarTone has been supporting academic research and promoting the development of novel technology in the utilisation of network resources to pave the way for future network development, and to contribute to environmental protection,” said Mr Stephen Chau, Chief Technology Officer of SmarTone. “In providing technical support to the Department of Electronic Engineering at CityU through the ITF project, we can get a more accurate picture of the electricity consumption characteristics and patterns of the base stations. This will enable our technical team to attain higher energy efficiency when planning network resources in the future, and to promote green energy.”

Dr Wong pointed out that in the near future, the number of the base stations and the consequent energy consumption would increase when the new generation of mobile network is adopted. The problem of energy waste, as compared with that of the 3G and 4G networks, will be even more serious. The team is now conducting research to enhance the application of this newly developed technology. Dr Wong believed that the capacity of the new technology to save energy would be even more notable when it is widely adopted in the new mobile network.


New technology developed at CityU saves at least 4.5% of energy in mobile networks | CityU NewsCentre

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## cirr

*China steps up deploying IPv6-based network*

2019-05-04 09:32:25 Xinhua Editor : Mo Hong'e

China is accelerating the deployment of the Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6)-based network, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT). 

China will launch a special campaign to upgrade the network infrastructure, improve IPv6 service and make the terminal equipment better support IPv6, said an official with the MIIT. "We decided to finish transforming 13 internet backbones to the IPv6 network by the end of 2019."

The country will strengthen the security in the IPv6 network and support relevant companies and institutions to carry out research on the prevention of risks in the IPv6 network in emerging industries, including the Industrial Internet, Internet of things and car networking, the ministry said.

The IPv6 is considered the next generation of the internet, allowing much higher theoretical limits on the number of IP addresses than the current IPv4 system.

China in 2017 issued a plan to encourage large-scale adoption of the IPv6 network. According to the plan, by the end of 2025, network and terminal devices will fully support the adoption of IPv6 in China, and it will have the largest number of IPv6 users in the world by the end of 2025.

http://www.ecns.cn/news/society/2019-05-04/detail-ifzhxrpw8974320.shtml

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## cirr

*中国新一代物联网开始落地建设 *

13.05.2019

48分钟前

*新一代物联网（以下简称“物联网”）是全球第二套计算机通讯网络系统，能全球兼容运行互联网，是由我国多个机构历时20多年潜心研发和实用化而来。我国已经自主建成物联网1条母根，13条主根（N-Z根），开始向全球提供IP地址，并能全面寻址、域名解析，实现跨国界、跨语言、跨系统的通信。*

2014年12月4日，经过世界各国多年竞争博弈后，ISO/IEC国际标准组织在其发布的未来网络国际标准中（国标委外函[2014]46号）正式确认：由中国主导未来网络的《命名与寻址》、《安全》等核心标准的制定，并由中国拥有核心知识产权。目前，中国新一代物联网是唯一符合“国际未来网络标准”的计算机通讯网络，代表着新一代互联网的发展方向。值得注意的是，由于英文只有26个字母，分别被中美各13条根服务器占用(首字母索引)，导致世界上难以产生第三套计算机通讯网络系统。

新一代物联网抛弃了传统互联网的底层架构及缺陷，其网址基本长度为256位（预留至1024位），其中保留128位用于兼容互联网，实际新增2^128个有效网址，能满足未来700年发展的网址需求。未来太空移民时，再启用预留的网址。物联网采用先认证再通讯、地址可加密等新技术，有效解决互联网的安全架构缺陷。








（新一代物联网应用场景图）

新一代物联网真正实现了万物互联（Internet of Things 简称IoT），其能为带电的物分配一个专属静态IP地址，可通过网络进行解析和联结；也能给不带电的物分配一个专属的物联网编码（RFID电子标签），可通过网络进行解码和查询。我们可以把物联网编码理解为一个简单的IP地址，其对应的是一串简单文本构成的信息链。例如一个苹果，消费者扫一扫其物联网编码，就能显示这个苹果相关的种植、施肥、采摘、包装、售价、发货、运输、签收、购买者、相关日期等信息链。一些厂家宣称已研发出不用IP地址的IoT，这些都是伪IoT，原理无非是构建一个类似聊天群的通讯系统，为每个设备分配一个号，通过添加好友的模式进行物物联结。这些伪IoT只能在自己的软件系统内运行，一旦跨系统，就无法互联。

我国建设和使用物联网，不仅可以节约巨额的互联网使用费，还可以向全球输出更具性价比的物联网服务，进入互联网最具价值的领域，获取巨大的经济利益。随着物联网的建设和使用，我国将能对网络进行大幅度提速、降费，惠及广大人民和企业，极大促进我国网络应用市场和相关产业的蓬勃发展。

由于互联网是虚拟的，极其容易被利用进行违法犯罪活动和网络攻击。近年来，利用互联网虚拟特性进行诈骗的事件层出不穷。另根据中国国家互联网应急中心抽样检测显示： 2011年，有近5万个境外IP网址作为木马或僵尸网络控制服务器，参与控制了我国境内近890万台主机，其中有超过99.4%的被控主机，源头在美国。新一代物联网通过先认证再通讯、网络地址加密等新技术，可以有效打击电信诈骗和抵御网络攻击。未来基于区块链技术的数字经济（如国家数字货币）的关键应用，目前还只有新一代物联网具备支撑能力。

截止目前，新一代物联网在系统技术、知识产权、国际标准、国家政策、软硬件、服务能力等方面都已充分准备就绪。新一代物联网商用平台已经落地，开始为商用物联网提供根服务、IP地址发放、域名解析等底层网络服务。






新一代物联网应用

新一代物联网“*.chn*”已得到国家机构、国企等带头应用，并获得北斗系统、诚平商城等平台实用化验证，打破了国外对全球定位、精准授时、互联网根服务等核心技术的垄断。诚平商城是原产者专属的物联网+新电商，以物联网产品编码为去假存真手段，以线下60万个社区和村级服务站的大学生为抓手，为原产者电商赋能，让5亿原产者直供产品多卖钱，让12亿消费者直采商品少花钱，很快将形成十万亿级的无假货新电商生态圈。物联网的商用序幕已经拉开，物联网产业开始进入蓬勃发展的新时代。


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## JSCh

JSCh said:


> *‘Game-changing’ Chinese cyberspace defense system defeats hackers at contest*
> By Shan Jie in Nanjing Source:Global Times Published: 2018/5/13 20:53:41
> 
> A "game-changing" domestically developed cyber defense system presented to the world for the first time will strengthen China's cyberspace security, its chief designer said on Saturday.
> 
> The new mechanism successfully defended attacks from 22 white-hat, or ethical, computer-hacking teams from five countries at the Qiangwang International Elite Challenge on Cyber Mimic Defense (CMD) in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province on Saturday.
> 
> "This is the first time using the CMD system as the 'target machine' in the world," said Wu Jiangxing, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering in Beijing and founder of the theory of CMD, a proactive system whose randomness increases the difficulty attacks based on vulnerability and backdoors.
> 
> The test conducted by top hackers was of great significance in proving the effectiveness of the CMD mechanism, Wu believed.
> 
> Digging holes, creating backdoors, planting viruses, hiding a Trojan horse and other traditional attack methods proved ineffective, Wu said.
> 
> "The CMD, as a game-changing technology, will strengthen national cyberspace security and offer a way to build a healthy global cyberspace with a shared future," Wu told the Global Times on Saturday.
> 
> Russian hacking team LC↯BC finished the contest in first place with the most points, followed by Japan's TokyoWesterns and 0ops of Jiaotong University in Shanghai.
> 
> The system still needs testing, Wu said, but can be expected to be used in fields including finance, electricity and high-speed railways.
> 
> Inspired by Mimic Octopus, the master of disguise in nature which can change appearance to adapt to the environment, Chinese scientists proposed the idea of mimic computing in 2007 and produced the world's first mimic computer prototype in 2013.




__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1131076886769987585





Global Times
✔@globaltimesnews

China-proposed network endogens security testbed (NEST) is now ready for 24-hour real-name cyber attacks from any individual or organization in the world. The theory behind NEST-Cyber Mimic Defense-is developed by Wu Jiangxing, an academic at the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

1:58 PM - May 22, 2019


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## JSCh

*Chinese Cyber Mimic Defense system ready for global challenges*
By Zhang Dan in Nanjing Source:Global Times Published: 2019/5/23 20:18:41




Contestants from 10 countries attack the China-proposed Cyber Mimic Defense (CMD) system at the 2nd "Qiangwang" International Elite Challenge on CMD in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province, on Thursday. Photo: Zhang Dan/GT


Contestants from 10 countries attack the China-proposed Cyber Mimic Defense (CMD) system at the 2nd "Qiangwang" International Elite Challenge on CMD in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province, on Thursday. Photo: Zhang Dan/GT

China-proposed Cyber Mimic Defense (CMD) system successfully blocked attacks from top world white-hat from 10 countries and opened a 24-hour network testbed for global white-hat to test its performance for the first time, showing the country's great confidence and openness in cyber security, said its chief designer on Thursday. 

Twenty-nine teams from China, US, Russia, Germany, Japan, Iran, Poland and others have attacked the mechanism more than 2.9 million times at the 2nd Qiangwang International Elite Challenge on CMD in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province on Wednesday and Thursday. However, none succeeded.

"The competition was a test opened to the world, showing our great confidence in the CMD structure that can resist harm in cyberspace created by loopholes and backdoors," Wu Jiangxing, an academic of the Chinese Academy of Engineering in Beijing and founder of the CMD theory, told the Global Times on Thursday the CMD system leads the world's cyber security defense. 

Chinese hacking team ROIS won, followed by a team from China's KonwnSec 404 and Nu1L team. Last year, Russian hacking team LC↯ BC took first place. 



Contestants from 10 countries attack the China-proposed Cyber Mimic Defense (CMD) system at the 2nd "Qiangwang" International Elite Challenge on CMD in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province, on Thursday. Photo: Zhang Dan/GT

Inspired by Mimic Octopus, the master of disguise that can adapt to the environment, Wu and his team proposed the idea of mimic computing in 2008.

The competition was a battle of humans versus machines. Contestants attacked six CMD machines which appeared as virtual octopuses on the screen. Once an attack took place, the tentacles of the virtual octopuses were broken. 

Among the 29 teams, only two created disturbance for the black box but failed to breach the shield. White box tests were also opened to the contestants. 

Four students from Fuzhou University in East China's Fujian Province formed the team ROIS and praised the CMD system. Team leader Zheng Shixin from the College of Mathematics and Computer Science told the Global Times that, to some extent, the CMD system is unbreakable. 

Last year, CMD passed the online test carried out by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. CMD servers have been used at the Henan branch of China Unicom to carry out trial applications and evaluation since January 2018. 

It also welcomed real-name individuals or organizations to test its performance at the network endogens security testbed (NEST) from the world.


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## JSCh

*ZTE, NetCologne Debut First Commercial Super-Fast 212MHz Gigabit Network*
XU WEI
DATE : JUN 24 2019/SOURCE : YICAI





ZTE, NetCologne Debut First Commercial Super-Fast 212MHz Gigabit Network​
(Yicai Global) June 24 -- China's ZTE and German telecom operator NetCologne today announced their joint launch of the world's first commercial Gigabit network over G.fast@212 Megahertz profile solution.

It enables NetCologne's residential customers to subscribe to high-speed data internet connectivity of up to 1 Gigabit.

NetCologne eliminates users' fiber-optic transformation process through the G.fast@212Mhz solution provided by Shenzhen-based ZTE, realizing high-speed data internet connectivity of up to one Gigabit based on copper resources of the existing network, which greatly saves network transformation and civil engineering costs, China Securities Journal reported.

NetCologne will start to offer an ultra-high-speed data flat rate of one Gigabit in its commercial network to more than 250,000 residential customers from this month. In doing so, NetCologne continue to expand Cologne's leading position as Germany's most digital city, said Timo von Lepel, the firm's managing director.

"Providing the World's first network on G.fast@212Mhz solution is a giant technical milestone, it underlines ZTE's leading position in broadband technologies and our aim to support NetCologne to be a leading supplier of Gigabit connectivity in Germany," said Sun Jie, Managing Director of ZTE Deutschland.

ZTE has made remarkable achievements in the field of G.fast via continuous investment in technological innovation. NetCologne and ZTE penned a cooperation agreement in February 2017, since when the latter has provided the former with advanced network equipment, including the industry's first G.fast@212Hz profile data process unit in April this year.

ZTE has deployed more than 10 million lines of optical fiber and copper integrated products worldwide. Its G.fast has gone into commercial use in Japan and Germany and been tested or trialed by over 30 operators all over the world.

NetCologne is a German fiber network operator providing telecom services to users in and around Cologne.

G.fast is a digital subscriber line (DSL) protocol standard for local loops shorter than 500 m, with performance targets between 0.1 and 1 Gbit/s, depending on loop length. One MHz is 1,000,000 Hertz. One Hz is the SI base unit of frequency defined as one cycle per second. The unit is named for Heinrich Rudolf Hertz. A gigabit is one billion bits. It is a common measure of the amount of data transferred in one second between two telecommunication points


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## JSCh

*China creates 6 mirror DNS name servers as backup*
By Cao Siqi Source:Global Times Published: 2019/6/27 22:27:54



Thales' Cybersecurity Operation Center in China's Hong Kong. Photo: Courtesy of Thales

China created six mirror copies of root name servers, a critical part of the internet infrastructure that help users connect to the internet, a move that analysts said will improve Chinese netizens' internet speed and offer the country more backups when facing a breakdown of the internet led by the US. 

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology made the announcement on Wednesday, permitting the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) to operate, maintain and manage the six mirror copies of root name servers. 

The ministry requires CNNIC to formulate and continuously improve the management system of root name servers and assign dedicated personnel to run, maintain and manage them, and establish a fixed contact mechanism.

A root name server is the highest-level domain name system (DNS), which helps computers connect to the internet or a private network. There are 13 root name servers and 10 of them are controlled by the US. 

China has no root name servers but has established mirror copies. 

Lu Feng, an industry analyst at Beijing-based consultancy firm CCID Consulting under the ministry, told the Global Times that establishing mirror servers does not change root name servers situation being controlled by other countries

There are nearly 1,000 mirror servers in the world and establishing mirror servers will help speed up internet access, Lu said.

Deng Huan, director of the security research institute at internet security firm Baimaohui in Beijing, told the Global Times that since the internet infrastructure is controlled by foreign countries, developing mirror copies helps China avoid the impact if they completely shut down their servers. 

Some technology insiders noted that netizens' IP addresses will finally flow to root name servers, which means that if China has none of its own root name servers, security would remain a problem and countries like the US would still have the ability to access Chinese netizens' IP addresses.


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## JSCh

15:01, 12-Jul-2019
*China's Ipv6 network users account for 20% of total internet users*
CGTN

"Although the number of active users has seen a rapid growth, the proportion of Ipv6 network traffic to the overall internet traffic is relative low," Wu noted during the 18th China Internet Conference, which opened in Beijing on Tuesday.

According to the report released in 2018, among China's 829 million online users, only a small portion uses IPv6-based network.

A total of 23,430 blocks/32 of IPv6 addresses had been allocated in the Chinese mainland by the end of 2017, according to Yang Weiping, deputy head of the R&D department of the China Internet Network Information Center. "The number is the second-largest in the world, but the actual application level is still quite low," said Yang.

"We've suggested the government websites to play a leading role in the network deployment, and indeed, they have done a good job, so do the state-owned enterprises," Wu added. "But for those private websites, a lot of work is expected to be done."

Apart from websites, China's Ipv6-based network also needs to upgrade the household network gateway, as well as the internet connectivity between different network operators, Wu explained.

China has planned to have up to 200 million active IPv6 users by the end of 2018, and have more than 500 million such active users by 2020, according to an action plan issued in 2017.


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## JSCh

JULY 25, 2019
*Turning the tables on the terrorists*
by David Bradley, Inderscience



Credit: CC0 Public Domain

It is known that much terrorist activity utilizes the power and immediacy of online social media and social networking tools to coordinate its attacks, rally support and spread the various agendas of the different groups and networks. Writing in the International Journal of Grid and Utility Computing, a team from China explains how we might turn the tables on the terrorists and use those tools to analyse terrorist activity and so make predictions about future scenarios and so have the weapons to thwart them in their malevolent endeavours.

Xuan Guo, Fei Xu, Zhiting Xiao, and Hongguo Yuan of the National University of Defense Technology, Wuhan and colleague Xiaoyuan Yang of the Engineering University of PAP, in Xi'an, have demonstrated how they can look at two kinds of different intelligence sources in China and apply social network analysis and mathematical statistics to understand the information. First, they used the social network analysis tool to construct an activity meta-network for the text information. This allowed them to extract four categories of information: person, places, organisations and time. They could then decompose the intelligence into person-organisation and person-location, organisation-location, organization-time. They then applied statistical methods to this extracted data for the years 1989 to 2015.

The team says that the use of big data can help in combating terrorism whether that emerges from networks and cells within a terrorist organization or even the so-called "lone wolf" attack. We will never eradicate terrorism, but if more attacks can be thwarted through such analysis and the development of predictive tools, then its toll on lives and society as a whole might be reduced.

More information: Hongguo Yuan et al. Winning the war on terror: using social networking tools and GTD to analyse the regularity of terrorism activities, _International Journal of Grid and Utility Computing_ (2019). DOI: 10.1504/IJGUC.2019.10022137


Turning the tables on the terrorists | TechXplore


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## JSCh

22:53, 06-Oct-2019
*Ant Financial's OceanBase outstrips Oracle, breaks world record*
CGTN





VCG Photo​
From 5G mobile networks to high-end chips and software, China has been striving to achieve self-reliance in vital information technologies (IT). The country has just achieved yet another breakthrough - this time in the database sector. 

Ant Financial, a subsidiary of Chinese giant Alibaba, has outstripped veteran player Oracle's rival product with its self-developed database called OceanBase to become the world's No.1 in terms of performance, according to the latest test results released by the Transaction Processing Performance Council (TPC), a worldwide consortium that establishes standards for database. 

In the TPC-C benchmark test, which is known as the "World Cup" of the database sector, OceanBase broke the world record, which was maintained by Oracle for nine consecutive years, making Ant Financial the first Chinese company to top the list ever. 



Ant Financial's self-developed database OceanBase ranks No. 1 in the TPC-C benchmark test. /Screenshot from TPC website.

Li Guojie, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Engineering specializing in computing technology, called it "a major breakthrough made by China in the area of basic software." 

The database, just like an operating system, is an important basic software for the IT industry. 

China has been developing its own database for the last four decades, but it had lagged behind international giants such as Oracle and IBM, whose products dominated the Chinese market for a long time. This not only resulted in high software service costs for Chinese companies, but also posed potential risks to information security in key areas. 

Only 10 years ago, Alibaba had to rely on Oracle for database services. But now, OceanBase has not only met its own demands to enable hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers to shop online and make mobile payments anytime they want, but it has also started to serve other domestic sectors, such as banking and insurance.

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## JSCh

16:07, 21-Oct-2019
*15 world-leading sci-tech achievements awarded at the 6th WIC*
CGTN




The sixth World Internet Conference (WIC) unveiled 15 world leading Internet scientific and technological achievements in the east Chinese water town of Wuzhen. A group of 39 experts selected the achievements in artificial intelligence (AI), 5G, cloud computing, digital manufacturing and industrial internet.

These major achievements were selected by a recommendation committee consisting of 39 representatives from home and abroad led by Honorary Chair Wan Gang, who is also chairman of the China Association for Science and Technology, and Chinese Co-Chair Wu Hequan and Foreign Co-Chair Whitfield Diffie.

Here is the list:

1. Huawei's server processor--Kunpeng 920

2. Tsinghua University's hybrid AI chip--Tianjic

3. Microsoft's machine reading comprehension (MRC) technology

4. 360 0Day bug-radar system

5. Tesla's full self-driving chip

6. Baidu's open-source deep learning platform Paddle Paddle

7. Alibaba's cloud database POLARDB

8. Cambricon's AI chip MLU270

9. Tencent: Tech for good

10. Megvii's AI learning system Brain++

11. Sugon's silicon cube immersion liquid cooling computer

12. China Telecom's IPv6

13. German software company SAP's in-depth application of AI in intelligent enterprises

14. Xilinx Versal ACAP

15. COMAC Intelligent Manufacturing System

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## JSCh

*Alibaba Cloud Achieves World Record in Big Data Performance and Decision Support, Business News - AsiaOne*
PR NEWSWIRE ASIA
Oct 22, 2019

HANGZHOU, China, Oct. 22, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Alibaba Cloud, the data intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group, today announced that MaxCompute, the company's general purpose, fully managed, multi-tenancy data processing platform has achieved a new set of global records in big data performance and decision support optimization. By publishing the industry's first 100,000 scale factor on the Alibaba Cloud's MaxCompute Cluster, the company has demonstrated its leadership in delivering high-performance cloud solutions to its customers in a cost-effective manner.

Released in September 2019 by the Transaction Processing Performance Council (TPC), an industry council which sets the standards for transaction processing and database benchmarking, Alibaba Cloud is the first cloud service provider to be evaluated based on a 100 TB data benchmark, following records the company set on 10 TB and 30 TB benchmarks. TPC's results were based on two sets of benchmarking rests - TPCx-Big Bench (TBCx-BB), which measures big data performance, and TBC-DS, which measures decision support.

"We are very excited to see Alibaba Cloud's core product MaxCompute represented so well in the international benchmarks released by TPC," said Yangqing Jia, Vice President of Alibaba Group and President and Senior Fellow of Data Platform, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence. "Receiving the industry-first and record-breaking results through the TPC further bolsters our confidence in delivering the best value for our customers and partners across our 61 availability zones across 20 regions around the world."

TBCx-BB measures the performance of hardware and software components of Hadoop-based big data systems by executing 30 frequently performed analytical queries in the context of retailers with physical and online store presence. Alibaba Cloud MaxCompute attained 25,641 BBQpm (Big Bench Query-per-minute) with price/performance ratio of up to $224.49/BBQpm on the TBCx-BB tests, placing the platform's performance ahead of the rest of the industry.

In the meantime, Alibaba Cloud's Elastic MapReduce (EMR) reached 14,861,137 QphDS (queries per hour) and a price/performance ratio of up to S$0.17/QphDS. This result showcased Alibaba Cloud's industry leadership as a general-purpose decision support system, with industry-leading performance relating to query response time.

A core product of Alibaba Cloud, MaxCompute supports Alibaba's machine learning platform PAI, to deliver best-in-class big data-driven insights for retail and e-commerce use cases across Alibaba ecosystem, supporting 99% of data warehousing and 95% of computing demand for platforms including Taobao and Tmall, and visual search engine Pailitao. Enterprises can also make use of MaxCompute's data-importing features and distributed computing models to effectively query massive datasets, reduce production costs, and ensure data security.

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## JSCh

*China software designers ready UOS for end-of-2019 release | DIGITIMES*
Staff reporter, Shanghai; Joseph Tsai, DIGITIMES
Friday 22 November 2019

Unity Operating System (UOS), an in-house developed operating system by China-based software designers including NewStart, Wuhan Deepin Technology and stated-owned CEC, is expected to make the first version available at the end of 2019.

The designers signed agreement to form a team for developing an operating system in May 2019 with the team officially coming online in July. The team is composed of a couple hundreds of engineers stationed in China's Wuhan, Nanjing and Beijing.

UOS already began testing in October 2019 and will support processors made by China-based makers including Loongson, ShenWei, FeiTeng, Hisilicon, Zhaoxin and Hygon.

UOS will be an open-source platform encouraging players in the supply chain and developers to participate in its R&D with unified app store and architecture.

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## JSCh

*New version of internet protocol to help integrate real, virtual economies*
By Ma Si | China Daily | Updated: 2019-12-03 09:04
















[Photo by Jin Yan/For China Daily]

China is making a big push to build the world's largest IPv6, or internet protocol version 6, network, which according to the top industry regulator will pave the way for a sound digital infrastructure to integrate the real and virtual economies.

IPv6 is the most recent version of the internet protocol, the communications protocol that provides a unique numerical address, or IP address, for every internet-connected device and every website on the internet. This address allows devices and websites to find each other online.

China's move came as the world has run out of IP addresses offered by IPv4, the former version of internet protocol. IPv6 can offer considerably far more IP addresses than IPv4, better designed for the internet of things era.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said in a document that developing the next-generation network based on IPv6 is the inevitable trend of internet evolution and upgrading.

It also meets the urgent need to deepen integration of the internet and the real economy and support the high-quality development of the economy. It is also of great significance to enhance the comprehensive competence of the country's cyber power, the ministry said.

To make better sense of the opportunities brought by the new-generation internet network, Yu Yingtao, CEO of Chinese IT solutions company New H3C, said in an earlier interview with Xinhua News Agency that "both IPv4 and IPv6 are like the internet's oil fields and the IP addresses are oil. Now that IPv4 resources are exhausted, it is hard to continue extraction. But oil is pouring out of IPv6."

As early as November, 2017, the State Council, China's cabinet, unveiled a guideline on accelerating efforts to build an IPv6 network. The action plan aims to cultivate 500 million IPv6 users in China by the end of 2020 and the country will take five to 10 years to build the world's largest commercial IPv6 network.

As of May this year, China had about 311 million active IPv6 users, with most of them often using video streaming and online shopping applications, according to the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology.

The research institute said China has made significant progress in the deployment of the IPv6 network, but the country is still in the initial stages and lags behind advanced countries in both data traffic and active user numbers.

But it is worth noting that China has taken steps to build the root servers for IPv6. In the era of IPv4, the world only has 13 root servers, and only one of them is located in Asia. That is in Japan. But China now has four root servers for IPv6, according to a report by IT news website IThome.

IPv6 is an important starting point for the whole online ecosystem, including big data, IoT, cloud computing and other applications, the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology said.

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## JSCh

*China greenlights establishment of root server*
Source: Xinhua| 2019-12-08 03:02:14|Editor: yan

BEIJING, Dec. 7 (Xinhua) -- China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has approved the establishment of a domain name system (DNS) root server by a research institute Friday.

The China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT) has been permitted to set up a root server and a corresponding operating organization, the MIIT said, requiring that the academy observe relevant laws and regulations and be subject to supervision and inspection.

DNS translates easily-remembered domain names to numerical IP addresses, which can be recognized and processed through the Internet. It facilitates the use of the Internet by locating and identifying online resources.

As one of the most important infrastructure, root servers are essential to the Internet and concern Internet operations and information security.

While ensuring the stable operation of the server and providing quality service to users, the CAICT should also protect users' information security and safeguard national interests, the MIIT said.


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## JSCh

*Chinese major software developers to jointly build operating system*
Source: Xinhua| 2019-12-08 22:14:53|Editor: ZX

BEIJING, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- China Standard Software Co., Ltd. (CS2C) and Tianjin Kylin Information Ltd. Co. (TKC) will jointly build a domestic operating system, according to China Electronics Corporation.

It is an urgent need to develop a domestic independent operating system with a unified technical system and ecosystem to provide better user experience, said He Wenzhe, a chief financial officer of China National Software and Service Co., Ltd.

The NeoKylin Linux operating system developed by CS2C and the Kylin server operating system developed by TKC are the two most important domestic operating systems in the market. The logo of the two systems is Kylin, an auspicious animal in Chinese culture.

The NeoKylin Linux operating system fully supports mainstream open hardware platforms at home and abroad, covering the server version and the desktop version, and it is compatible with more than 4,000 software and hardware products, said Han Naiping, general manager of CS2C.

After more than 10 years of development, the Kylin server operating system has formed three series of operating system products including a server, desktop and embedded products, as well as Kylin Cloud and Big Data.

The system has nearly 100 software copyrights and patents, and has core competitiveness in the fields of independent security products and technologies, said Kong Jinzhu, general manager of TKC.

At present, the two enterprises' products have been widely used and recognized in finance, energy, transportation, health care and other industries.

The two enterprises jointly won the first prize in the 2018 National Science and Technology Progress Award.

After the operating system was jointly built, the research advantages and innovation resources can form a joint force. With the expanded scale, the operating system products can be deeply integrated with each CPU faster and better, which can further meet users' needs and promote product innovation.

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## JSCh

JSCh said:


> *China software designers ready UOS for end-of-2019 release | DIGITIMES*
> Staff reporter, Shanghai; Joseph Tsai, DIGITIMES
> Friday 22 November 2019
> 
> Unity Operating System (UOS), an in-house developed operating system by China-based software designers including NewStart, Wuhan Deepin Technology and stated-owned CEC, is expected to make the first version available at the end of 2019.
> 
> The designers signed agreement to form a team for developing an operating system in May 2019 with the team officially coming online in July. The team is composed of a couple hundreds of engineers stationed in China's Wuhan, Nanjing and Beijing.
> 
> UOS already began testing in October 2019 and will support processors made by China-based makers including Loongson, ShenWei, FeiTeng, Hisilicon, Zhaoxin and Hygon.
> 
> UOS will be an open-source platform encouraging players in the supply chain and developers to participate in its R&D with unified app store and architecture.


*China-made processor and UOS completes adaption to provide Wintel-like experience - cnTechPost*
Dec 25, 2019




After being released yesterday, the China's homegrown processor Loongson 3A4000 has been fully adapted to China-made operating system Unity Operating System (UOS).

Union Tech, the company behind UOS said on Wednesday that its operating system and Loongson 3A4000 platform have been fully adapted, and UOS runs smoothly and stably on the Loongson platform.

In daily office work scenarios, the experience of word processing, audio and video entertainment, and online browsing is basically the same as that of using Windows and Intel, the company said.

The Loongson 3A4000 and 3B4000 were officially released by local maker Loongson Technology on Tuesday. It is the first quad-core processor based on the GS464v micro architecture in the Loongson 3 series processors.

Compared with the previous generation quad-core processor Loongson 3A3000, the overall performance of the chip is doubled.

Through the optimization of software and hardware at Union Tech and Loongson Technology, the use experience of the "UOS + Loongson" combination is more suitable for Chinese people. Habits have also greatly improved in performance.

At present, UOS has supported all domestic CPU brands, and has launched a full range of compatibility and adaptation work with domestic mainstream machine manufacturers and hundreds of software manufacturers.


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## JSCh

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1304223133461655554China Science @ChinaScience
China state-affiliated media

China has launched a new domestic cloud service platform CECloud with high security for government agencies, public services and state-owned firms. Based on the self-developed FT CPU and Kylin OS, CECloud is safe and advanced, developer China Electronics Corporation said.




9:00 AM · Sep 11, 2020


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## JSCh

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1306482948942622721CCTV+ @CCTV_Plus
China state-affiliated media

#Alibaba unveiled its first cloud computer named "Wuying" at Chinese giant's virtual Apsara Conference 2020 on Thursday. #Wuying is a "palm-sized" PC that weighs 60 grams and has no localhost or CPU. All of its hardware is stored at the cloud end's data center.






2:39 PM · Sep 17, 2020

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## JSCh

*Chinese lab develops server resistant to cyber attacks*
_Source: Xinhua_|_ 2020-10-29 16:01:49_|_Editor: huaxia_

NANJING, Oct. 29 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese laboratory has developed a high-performance server with an endogenous security design that can effectively resist cyberattacks.

A defense mechanism has been implanted in the server, enabling it to better fend off cyberattacks, according to researchers with Purple Mountain Laboratories based in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing.

The endogenous security design marks a step forward from the standard security pattern of repairing loopholes following cyberattacks and other issues.

Thus far, no equipment or system adopting the endogenous security design has been breached after undergoing numerous tests by domestic institutions and more than 6 million cyberattacks from across the globe.

The new server can support more processor cores and has stronger computing power than common commercial servers in the market, said Wu Jiangxing, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and head of the server's research and development team.

The server can support domestic and foreign processors such as Sunway, Phytium and ARM.

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## JSCh

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1384335643099074562CnTechPost @CnTechPost

China opens world’s largest Internet test facility backbone network




China opens world's largest Internet test facility backbone network - CnTechPost
cntechpost.com

10:38 AM · Apr 20, 2021


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## JSCh

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1448193598441328645


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