Japanese tech giants step up to China's Internet market

Absrtact: SoftBank has become a bridge between Silicon Valley's innovation and the emerging Asian market, which is investing in start-ups in the US in exchange for the power to run their Asian operations.

Soft Silver Sun The Asian business of justice is to be a good bridge between Silicon Valley and China

June 1 News, according to foreign media reports, Japan's technology giants are speeding up the pace of the booming Chinese internet market. SoftBank is a good Asian business to be a bridge between Silicon Valley and China.

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Few people outside Asia know that Japanese technology giants are stepping up their march into the booming Chinese internet market.

SoftBank has overtaken Google in Japan, owning the country's most popular search engine and E-commerce site. SoftBank also operates one of the fastest-growing mobile phone operators in Japan and the largest broadband network. SoftBank is the sole distributor of Apple in Japan, and it is the only data service provider for the ipad.

But SoftBank's most promising investment is in China, where it invests some of the most famous internet companies.

SoftBank began investing in Alibaba since 2000, pushing its founder, Jack Ma, to set up Taobao. SoftBank is still one of Alibaba's main investors, with a 34% stake. This year, SoftBank will help to connect Taobao to its Japanese yahoo.

SoftBank has a 35% stake in the Oak Interactive, which has the most popular social networking renren and happy net. "We want to be the first in Asia's internet," said son, chief executive of SoftBank, who founded the company in 1981. ”

At the same time, SoftBank has become a bridge between Silicon Valley's innovation and the emerging Asian market, which is investing in start-ups in the United States in exchange for the power to run their Asian operations.

Boosted by a strong mobile business, SoftBank net profit of 2009 was $1.04 billion trillion, up 1 time times more than a year earlier, with revenues soaring 20% to 465.9 billion yen. SoftBank forecasts that revenues will reach 500 billion trillion yen this year and plans to increase capital investment by 180 billion yen to 400 billion yen.

China's restrictions on overseas internet companies have been a vexing problem. Google, ebay and Yahoo have struggled to survive in the Chinese market, and Facebook, MySpace and Twitter are not even accessible.

American companies also complain that China does not have a fair competitive environment. But SoftBank has avoided a lot of trouble by investing in business electronics, local social networks and online gaming. At present, SoftBank believes that E-commerce and entertainment will become China's new growth point of the Internet.

Son is a Korean-descent Japanese, which gives him a pan-Asian feel. But more importantly, he worked with Chinese start-ups to build strong partnerships. Jack Ma, Chairman and CEO of Alibaba Group, has become a director of SoftBank Group, and son is also an important shareholder of Alibaba Group.

SoftBank executives stress that Asia's success will depend on mobile technology, as many users in the region are crossing fixed lines and using mobile networks directly.

In China, SoftBank operates both a complete mobile business and an online business. The development of China's 3G network has been slow, but the user does not seem to mind. This is a huge market: China has nearly 800 million mobile subscribers, Internet users close to 400 million, and the data will continue to grow.

"We can integrate mobile business operations, as well as mobile phone and application experience, these are priceless." "Matsumoto, senior executive vice president of SoftBank Corp., said. "We no longer regard ourselves as a Japanese company, or a mobile phone operator," he said. Our goal is to become a global company on the Internet. ”

Nomura Securities analyst Daisaku Masuno, described SoftBank as a mobile phone company that led the trend. "Few companies have such huge networks in both major markets in China and Japan," he said. He said, and "mobile operators in other parts of the world do not understand the Internet, can not keep up with the times, internet companies do not have the financial resources or the technical know-how to operate mobile networks." ”

"SoftBank added," soft silver in this combination of unique, and began to recover costs. ”

Son is good at dealing with different corporate culture. As an early investor in Yahoo, son changed Yahoo, making Yahoo Japan's biggest portal, including music, games and other content, beyond a simple search for information.

In 2006, son borrowed a lot of money to buy the UK's Vodafone (BT) business in Japan, and to turn it into a profit.

Son then combines many different businesses. For example, users who use SoftBank's Japanese mobile phone network can jump to Japan's Yahoo mobile page with one click, which attracts more search engine visitors.

Although many opponents believe that smartphones lack the needs of many Japanese users, son brought the Apple iphone into Japan two years ago. The iphone has been a big success in Japan. According to the Tokyo MM Institute data, as of March 31 in the 2009 fiscal year, the iphone shipments increased by more than one times, up to 1.69 million units in the Japanese smartphone market share reached 72%.

SoftBank recently invested in Silicon Valley with video sites Ustream and RockYou. SoftBank says it will introduce the two sites in Asia.

Still, the company faces many challenges. While SoftBank's interests in China are well secured, most still have no returns, says Nathan Ramler, a Macquarie analyst at Tokyo Macquarie Technology. For some of son's latest ideas, such as linking SoftBank phones to Twitter, Rummler said he didn't know how son could make money.

Rummler says the sophisticated business of SoftBank is inherently risky, with new ideas emerging that will always pose a risk to existing business models.