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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.


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China is already the world leader in mobile internet and this will strengthen its position.

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Chinese Net users top 731 million in 2016: report
(Global Times) 08:36, January 23, 2017

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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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China pools 100b yuan internet investment fund

By Dai Tian | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2017-01-22

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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
 
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.

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(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.
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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 ofThe Simpsons and the animation house that created Futurama createdClash-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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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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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.
 
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.
 
8,000 apply for Baidu Map collector vacancies
2017-01-16 08:29 | Xinhua | Editor: Mo Hong'e

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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.


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If you like travelling, this is a good job.
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145k USD is not bad at all
 
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.

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China's supercomputer Tianhe-1 carries out 1,400 tasks per day
 
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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.

6c0b840a2e381a022cb20a.jpg
China's supercomputer Tianhe-1 carries out 1,400 tasks per day
 
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
 
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.
 
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

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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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