Sina CEO Cao Chao: the Future of mobile internet opportunities is huge

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On the morning of April 15, Sina CEO and chief executive Cao Chao said yesterday at the Boao Forum for Asia 2011 annual "Mobile Internet Future" sub-forum that the mobile Internet opportunities are huge, mobile Internet application innovation and development key in the entertainment field. In the mobile Internet development, Weibo is the mobile internet, one of the killer applications, and currently Sina is not in a hurry to commercialize microblogging.

The future of mobile internet is huge

At the Boao Forum for Asia 2011 Annual Conference "Mobile internet Future" sub-forum, a reporter asked the participants asked: "In your heart what is the future of the Internet?"

Before the reporter asked questions, he had said a lot about the mobile Internet, and he answered him with one sentence: "The future of mobile internet is huge."

As for the development trend of mobile Internet, Chao thinks, "We talk about mobile Internet, is to a great extent the change of mobile terminal." "From the Chinese market, there are some numbers that are really exciting," he said. Last year, mobile terminal shipments of about 20 million units, may be to 60 million next year, we estimate that by 2014 or 2015 years, China Mobile terminal Internet population will exceed the PC Internet population, may be slightly slower than some of the world's advanced countries, but his growth rate is very alarming. ”

"Mobile Internet is a great opportunity, he represents more Internet terminals, more people use, more coverage, he brings business opportunities is also huge, the key is that we can find some core applications, to the user's platform to build up." "said Chao.

Mobile Internet participation threshold low to give small companies more opportunities

Is the mobile internet a trap or an opportunity for small developers and entrepreneurs? For such a question, Chao said, "This may be an unavoidable situation, and always 20% of the application accounts for 80% of the revenue or opportunity." But I think that mobile Internet at least allows us to see a point that allows more people to participate there is no doubt that the threshold is relatively low. ”

Cao said that we can not avoid the law: "Mobile internet or PC, or in our talk on the mobile, always a small number of operators, a small number of companies to make most of the money, I think this is a rule, we talk about the PC Internet age is also a small number of companies they account for the majority Also accounted for the majority of the use of time and use of users. ”

But he also believes that "the trend in mobile Internet is actually more diversified, giving more small companies a chance." At least he does not need to build a platform to build a very large product to make his application become popular, he can be very focused on such as the development of a game, do a small application, his opportunity I feel more. ”

Mobile Internet application innovation and development key in entertainment

In the mobile Internet application innovation direction, Chao said very optimistic. "China's first step must also be infrastructure, but China's second step will undoubtedly be entertainment, so I would argue that the key to the innovation and development of Chinese applications is entertainment," he said. There are several important places for entertainment, such as games, music, video, socializing, communication, and these are the few places I think have the most potential for innovation. ”

"Why does America have such a big lead on the internet today? Because the US started early and then there was a time when America had the world's largest number of Internet users, and on that basis, many things were invented for the first time because the United States had only internet users." "he said.

In contrast to the development of China's Internet, Chao said, "China has accumulated a lot of mobile users in the past few years, but the launch of the mobile internet has only recently begun to explode, especially since the 3G has not been particularly satisfying yet." But I think that in the next two or three years, China has the largest mobile Internet user base, in the ability to have good 3G standards and use, price, innovation is inevitable. The mobile internet in the United States is actually first infrastructure, browser, search, and then business applications, especially e-mail, especially the rise of BlackBerry, and then slowly have the iphone and other. ”

But he also thinks the mobile internet in China and the United States is not the same: "Because China Mobile internet users are much younger than the United States, may be from more than 40 to more than 20 years old difference." So China's first step must also be infrastructure, but China's second step will undoubtedly be entertainment, so I would argue that the key to the innovation and development of Chinese applications will be entertainment. Entertainment I think there are several important places, games, music, video, social, communication, these are the few places I think have the most potential for innovation. ”

Weibo is the killer app for mobile internet

Cao said that the combination of social networks and mobile Internet terminals is a very important trend in the Internet or mobile internet. He said that this way "in addition to the Internet anytime, anywhere, he realized that we are at any time, anywhere, with people's way, can make our internet more casual, more innovative, more intelligent, this is our development trend." ”

What products on the mobile internet can become killer apps? "Weibo may be one of those," he said. We speak of mobile is a kind of at any time, everywhere, with people on the Internet, Micro Bo is very effective use of each of our users this period of time, he can use anytime, anywhere. ”

In addition to being consistent with the trend of mobile Internet development, Chao said that "Weibo is a very good and comprehensive use of mobile Internet terminals and social media and social networks." ”

"So far, we see China Mobile Internet use of the number of people is not particularly high, the proportion is not special, it should be said that the real mobile internet population less than half of our PC Internet." But we can see a phenomenon, on Sina Weibo usage on the mobile terminal has accounted for nearly half of the amount. We can imagine that in the future with the increasing popularity of the mobile internet population, this ratio will continue to rise, so he may be a mobile Internet killer application. "said Chao.

There is no rush to commercialize Weibo

"Now a lot of people than I also care about Sina Weibo after the business model, profitability prospects." "Once again facing media reporters questioning Sina Weibo's business model, Chao said with a smile."

Sina's management, he says, has been studying the business model of Sina Weibo from the start. "I believe a good internet product, platform, its success is a product, we call the success of the user platform, the other is the success of the business model." Both are indispensable and complementary. If a huge user platform does not have a very good scale business model, its long-term competition is in fact worrying. From this perspective we have been studying the business model of the microblogging platform from the outset. ”

"Of course, the Internet business model is no less than a few, one is free advertising, the internet also has a lot of e-commerce to do trading opportunities, the third is entertainment, where the side includes games, music, video, film and so on." I believe in these three areas, there will be opportunities on Weibo. These three blocks are likely to show revenue patterns and revenue opportunities on Weibo, but for now, I believe we are not doing it deliberately. For example, the demand for advertising now is very large, many of our former advertisers, agents have a strong demand for us to open the advertising platform to enable them to advertise. "said Chao.

"In the near-stage, Sina Weibo includes our main focus, or our focus, on how to provide better service and gather more users." Cao said that with the user-scale platform can become the most important barrier in China's Internet competition, and may be the only barrier.

"The size of the user, the scale of the platform may be the most important barrier, so this is our first priority, and then talk about other projects." In fact we are all planning, but we are not in a hurry to commercialize our microblog. "said Chao.