Alibaba IPO to Bypass Hong Kong and Head to NASDAQ? (techinasia.com)

Alibaba IPO to Bypass Hong Kong and Head to NASDAQ? (techinasia.com)

by Steven Millward

http://www.techinasia.com/news_ticker/alibaba-ipo-bypass-hong-kong-instead-to-nasdaq/
According to sources close to Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post, e-commerce giant Alibaba might bypass the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and instead take its huge IPO to NASDAQ. The paper claims that Alibaba executives met with NASDAQ representatives for a secret meeting in the Chinese principality yesterday afternoon.
Alibaba, which runs online stores like Taobao and Tmall, previously listed its Alibaba.com B2B service on the Hong Kong markets, before de-listing it last year in readiness for an Alibaba Group IPO. A listing could value the company and all its sites at well over $40 billion.
It was previously assumed that Alibaba Group would list in Hong Kong, but US markets might yet steal it away. Read more at the source.
[ Source : South China Morning Post ]

IDC: Smartphone Sales Way Up in China, Now Account for 73.2% of All Mobiles Sold (techinasia.com)

by Steven Millward

http://www.techinasia.com/idc-2012-q4-china-smartphone-sales-213-million/
The China division of the market research firm IDC has said that Chinese consumers snapped up a grand total of 213 million smartphones in 2012 as a whole – representing 73.2 percent of all mobiles sold in the country. That smartphone stat is up 112.1 percent on 2011, showing that China’s shift to smartphones like Android, iPhone, and Windows Phone is now moving at top speed.
Though China has over a billion mobile subscriptions – though that doesn’t equate to the same amount of people – mobile sales overall still grew 135 percent from 2011 to 2012, so that 362 million new mobiles were sold last year. That’s a lot of old phones being replaced.
IDC also looked at just the final quarter of 2012 to find that 96 million mobiles were sold in Q4 alone.
Today’s smartphone numbers – these all being estimates – differ somewhat from the recent Digitimes figures stating that 189 million smartphones were sold in China in the past year – with as many as 86 percent of those being Android-powered. Little wonder that China’s tech ministry is worried about Google having undue influence over the nation’s smartphone landscape.
While you’re thinking of Chinese smartphone buyers, you might be wondering which brands they prefer to buy. According to recent Gartner data, Apple has slipped to sixth in China, while Samsung is up top, fending off strong challenges from a host of Chinese-made phones.
(Source: Xinhua, via Sinocism newsletter)

China’s Top E-Commerce Site to Launch Product Searches Inside WeChat App (techinasia.com)

by Steven Millward

http://www.techinasia.com/china-taobao-search-wechat/
The 300-plus million users of China-made messaging app WeChat can already use it for video calls, finding dates, or following brands and celebrities – and soon it will gain another aspect. China’s biggest e-commerce site, Taobao, is testing out a sort of e-commerce search engine inside WeChat. Once up and running, it’ll allow WeChat users to directly message Taobao on their phones by typing a kind of product that they’re looking for; then the app will respond with a link to the desired items.
Basically, it’s just an extension of the brands platform that WeChat already has in place, and which is used for social marketing by all kinds of stores and media outlets – from Starbucks to Chinese fashion magazines. All it requires is for Taobao to make use of WeChat’s brand platform to automate the text queries and auto-generate a relevant link. It’s pretty simple, but it helps users to search Taobao more easily than having to jump to a web browser or open up the actual Taobao app.
The ‘Taobao Search’ account is already on WeChat (add it by scouring for “tbsearch” within WeChat), but when we tested it out, the Taobao Search account didn’t respoond to my query about a Xiaomi phone (pictured above). Once this goes live, it will work as described. This is aimed at Chinese users, but there’s nothing to stop other companies implementing this kind of social searching in the popular messaging app.
According to Marbridge Daily, the Taobao Search account within WeChat will also show products for the sister site Tmall. Both are run by Alibaba Group.
Once the search function is working, all those product searches can be turned into mobile purchases in the normal way, by jumping into the Taobao app to complete the e-commerce purchase. This might boost the ratio of Taobao’s mobile purchases slightly – but mainly it looks to be a new and social avenue for searching for products.
Alibaba already has a dedicated product search engine in the form of eTao, which scours pretty much every online mall in China.

Government Signals China Might Finally Get a 4G Network This Year (techinasia.com)

by C. Custer

http://www.techinasia.com/government-signals-china-finally-4g-network-year/
The folks over at China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) sure know how to play hard to get. They hold all the keys to China’s 4G network dreams — without permits issued by MIIT, no company is allowed to operate a 4G network — but they have remained coy about when, exactly, they’re going to unlock the door so that China Mobile can sprint through it and start rolling out its TD LTE network.
Yesterday, MIIT Minister Miao Wei gave the latest in a long line of teases that this could finally be the year for 4G networks in China. Meeting with the Qinghai legislative delegation, the Minister said that 4G licenses could probably be issued this year. Of course, as usual, the key word there is probably. Miao also said that the domestic 4G network still needs more development both in terms of the network infrastructure that provides 4G service and also in terms of 4G handsets and other devices, which are quite thin on the ground in China (although that’s partially because MIIT doesn’t approve them).
Of course, the issuance of a 4G license this year doesn’t necessarily mean that 4G service will be commercially available in 2013. If MIIT does issue a license but waits until the end of the year, it’s possible China Mobile might not be able to launch its network nationwide until 2014. And of course, there’s still no guarantee MIIT will issue the network permits this year anyway.
Personally, I think I speak for everyone when I say: quit leading us on, MIIT! We all know you’re going to issue the permits sooner or later, so let’s just set a date and stick to that. Enough of this “maybe” and “probably” vagueness!
(People’s Daily via Sina Tech)