Virtual China: Information Technology - Press Reviews, January 13, 1999

Weekly Press Review

January 13, 1999

Topping China Internet news over the past seven days was Nicholas Negropronte's highly promoted visit to China. In Beijing last Friday, Negropronte ventured into controversial territory when he commented that a "healthy disrespect for authority" is one of the primary ingredients for a truly digital society. In the same speech, Negropronte praised his Chinese audience for their willingness to engage in open debate and predicted that China net usership would reach 10 million by the end of next year. In related news, several online news outlets, including the South China Morning Post, Yahoo Singapore, and Newsbytes Pacifica, carried Matrix East's own projections for China Internet growth: 13 million Internet users by the middle of 2001.

This past week saw positive news from two Chinese content and service companies. Charles Zhang, chief of leading domestic (and recently renamed) portal Sohu, announced that the web site has broken even after only 11 months of operation, and expects to show a profit next year. Also this week, bilingual career oriented web site Zhaopin announced a ten fold increase in revenues over last year. The site generates 30 to 40,000 page views a day and serves clients like Dow Jones China.

Also this week, The Ministry of Information Industry has finally announced its formal decision to restructure China Telecom. The telecom body will be split into four companies: fixed telephone, mobile phone, satellite transmission and pager services. The plan will have little effect on China Telecom's monopoly of fixed phone service but could put China Unicom on more equal footing with the newly independent mobile telephony company.

Rounding out the past weeks news, an article in the government run China Daily stressed the importance of the Internet to China's development. The article called the Net "crucial to the development of the nation's information industry, the future lifeline of the national economy" and said the Internet has bright prospects despite current infrastructural limitations. "Since the Internet will allow individuals and companies to make global contacts, create corporate or brand images as well as learn about financial and trade information, those with Internet access will have a distinct advantage," the article said.

Current Review

October 22, 1999

Past Reviews

	September 10 19 24
	August 1 8 13 20 29
	July 12 19 26
	June 7 14 21 28
	May 3 10 24
	April 7 14 26
	March 3 10 17 24 31
	February 3 10
	January 6 13 20 27