China :: Business :: Deals

Tencent to Develop New Microblog Content Monitoring Tools caijing.com.cn, 10/31/11 Pony Ma, chairman and CEO of Chinese internet giant Tencent (0700.HK), today disclosed the company is developing new ways to monitor content on its microblogging platform, but refused to reveal any specifics. Ma described the proliferation of false rumors on Tencent Microblog as a difficult problem, and added that without oversight it would become "very chaotic."

Source : Bloomberg News By Cathy Chan and Natasha Khan China Mengniu Dairy Co., the nations biggest dairy company, may bid for Pfizer Inc. (PFE)s infant-nutrition business, two people with knowledge of the matter said. Mengnius consideration of a potential bid is at an early stage, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. The company wont decide whether to proceed until more financial data on the unit is available, one of the people said. Mengniu said in a stock-exchange filing today that it isnt in any direct negotiation with Pfizer. The infant-nutrition business may fetch as much as $10.5 billion, and draw interest from companies including Danone (BN), Abbott Laboratories (ABT) and Nestle SA (NESN), people familiar with the transaction said in July. Mengnius market value is just over half that amount, and shares in the cheese and milk producer fell today after its interest was reported. The deal size for the whole global division is really a bi...

Chongqing Unicom Begins Out-of-Home Display Trials Chongqing Daily, 10/28/11 Wo Xun Media, Chongqing Unicom out-of-home-display subsidiary, recently began preliminary trials of over 3,000 interactive terminals. The terminals, which boast 32-inch screens, have been installed in elevators and other areas with high pedestrian traffic flow including commercial properties, high-end residential areas, shopping malls, supermarkets, hospitals, government buildings and on campuses in central Chongqing. Plans are to expand trials to 10,000 terminals spread across 40 districts and counties in the city in 2012. China Unicom (NYSE: CHU; 0762.HK; 600050.SH) broadband and 3G network connections allow Wo Xun Media to remotely manage ad circulation on the terminals, as well as target advertising by location or time of day.

This may reek of hyperbole, it may strike you as overly dramatic, it may sound like me departing from my usual optimism, and you may be right on all counts. But deep inside I believe what I am about to say is true and will have an impact on many aspects of doing business in China. Beijings announcement that a sweeping and thorough new regime of restrictions, censorship and retrenchment on media content and consumption and its desire to dictate what is and is not proper for the Chinese public to consume could have the unintended consequence of stopping Chinas breakneck development of the last 20 years in its tracks. This, not the real estate bubble, not tax and land protests, not the underground banking or reverse merger fiascos or the polluted air, water and land, this could be what sets China back 10 years on its road to being a true, not paper, global power. The most striking instance occurred Tuesday, when the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television ordered 34 major satel...

China Television Media Halts TV Ads in Line with SARFT Rules Shanghai Stock Exchange, 10/26/11 Television ad agency and media service firm China Television Media (600088.SH) has been notified that it must cease inserting TV ads at the end of programs on CCTV-1 and CCTV-8 during primetime hours beginning October 25. The move is in accordance with the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television's (SARFT) recent "Notice Regarding Further Improvements to Management of Television Advertising." Editor's Note: The ads China Television Media had been inserting at the end of these channels' programs consist of a company logo and slogan overlay for a duration of 5 seconds. For more background on this topic, please see " SARFT Reiterates TV Ad Regulations " MD 10/12/11 issue.

Kanbox Lands USD 20 Mln in Second-Round Funding Techweb, 10/25/11 Chinese cloud computing services provider Kanbox announced today that it has won a total of USD 20 mln in second-round funding led by US VC firm Doll Capital Management (DCM). The company previously received angel investment from Chinese angel investor Xue Manzi and first-round funding scaled in the tens of millions of USD. Kanbox today also announced that DCM founder and partner David Chao will now join the company's board of directors. The number of Kanbox registered users rose to 1.5 mln in Q1 2011, and is expected to reach 8 mln by the end of the year. Users currently have over 2 bln files stored in Kanbox's cloud servers, and continue to upload more than 20 mln new files each day. Kanbox also recently released applications for both the Android and Mac OS operating systems. Also included in today's announcement came the news that Beijing-based investment bank China Renaissance has come on as sole financia...