Internet stalwart NetEase (Nasdaq: NTES) is prettying up its popular e-mail and other messaging services as it prepares to spin off its older portal business into a separate company, bringing focus back to these services that were once its bread and butter but later became neglected as it moved its attention to online games. Chinese media are reporting that just weeks after telling the world of its plans to spin off its portal business, most likely into a separate unit that will become publicly listed (previous post), NetEase is releasing some figures for its e-mail service, once a leader in China, that still look relatively impressive. The company says it now has more than 400 million registered e-mail users, whose accounts will be integrated with its mobile, instant messaging and other platforms. (English article) It goes on to add that the e-mail business, banking on advertising and income from other value added services, is already profitable. Old timers will remember that NetEase’s 163.com and 126.com were among China’s earliest e-mail services, and at one point were nearly synonymous with e-mail in China. Of course the same can be said of AOL, which is now a shadow of its former self. But in NetEase’s case, I think these portal and messaging products never really fell from grace quite as badly as AOL and were rather just neglected. That said, I’m quite confident NetEase can revive these products without too much effort if it tries and, if it does, create a nice “new” product to compete with old rivals Sina (Nasdaq: SINA) and Sohu (Nasdaq: SOHU) in an IPO that should be fairly profitable and attractive.
Bottom line: NetEase’s renewed attention to its e-mail is the latest step as it prepares its portal business for an IPO that should be quite attractive.
互联网公司网易<NTES.O>在筹备剥离门户网站、成立单独公司之际,正在装扮网易电邮与其他信息传送功能。昔日相关服务曾是网易的核心业务,但因网易後来把重点放在了网游上,这些业务被冷落。几周前网易刚刚对外公布要分拆门户业务,很可能要成立一家单独的公司,将来还可能会上市。中国媒体报导网易正公布其电邮服务相关数据,曾经电邮领域的领头羊现在表现仍算不错。公司称网易目前拥有注册电邮用户4亿人,用户的账户将与其他平台整合。而且网易还表示得益於广告与其他增值服务,电邮业务已开始盈利。老客户应该还记得,网易的163.com和126.com属中国最早的一批电邮服务,甚至一度是中国电邮的代名词。当然你也可以说美国在线(AOL)也发生过类似的事。但就网易而言,我认为,网易的门户和讯息类产品从来都没有像AOL那样跌得那麽惨,它们充其量只是被忽视了而已。可以这麽说,如果网易尝试,我相信其可以不费吹灰之力地重振这些产品,并在IPO中创建一个可以抗衡新浪<SINA.O>和搜狐<SOHU.O>的新产品。
一句话:网易重新关注其电邮服务是准备为其门户业务上市所迈出的最新一步。
Related postings 相关文章:
◙ NetEase Looks to Reinvigorate Portal 网易似要重振门户
◙ Sohu: New Media Fox or Just Another Game Player? 搜狐:新媒体巨头还是一个网游公司?
◙ Sina Gets Serious on SNS With New “Blogging Light” 新浪推出轻博客 大力进军社交网络业务
It seems investors aren’t the only ones getting jittery about Chinese accounting standards in the current crisis of confidence surrounding US-listed China stocks. Domestic media are reporting that up-and-coming group buying site 55tuan, which just two months ago raised $200 million from a group including Goldman Sachs (
After weeks of seeing one IPO scrapped after another as market sentiment toward China listings evaporated, especially in the Internet space, it’s nice to see there’s still healthy demand for a good, solid offer like hypermarket operator Sun Art Retail Group’s (HKEx: 6808) $1 billion IPO. After pricing at the top of their range, Sun Art’s Hong Kong listed shares soared as much as 43 percent on their first trading day, in one of the best debuts this year and in sharp contrast to the many flops for Chinese companies going public in Hong Kong and the United States. (
China seems destined for a big glut in its car-building capacity, with Nissan Motor (Tokyo: 7201) becoming the latest global auto maker to announce a major expansion in the market, with plans to spend $7.8 billion to nearly double its capacity over the next four years. (
from that part of China, which has also seen neighboring cities like Xian and Chongqing grow quickly as China offers strong incentives for companies to set up shop in its relatively underdeveloped western interior. As a longtime tech writer, I’ve been particularly impressed with Chengdu, which seems to have a strong ability to attract some of the world’s top-tier technology names to the city with its abundance of college graduates, good transport networks and of course its tasty Sichuan food. Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) was one of the earliest players in the city when it set up a chip manufacturing plant there seven years ago, and Texas Instruments (NYSE: TXN) opened up shop in the city last year when it took over a plant from SMIC (HKEx: 981; NYSE: SMI). Most major PC players have also opened plants there in the last 2-3 years, including both Hewlett Packard (NYSE: HPQ) and Dell (Nasdaq: DELL), (
which raised $350 million in a May IPO, isn’t blocked in China, but also that it hasn’t made an especially strong effort to cultivate the China market. Frankly speaking, I think the market for a more professional-type service like Linked In in China is probably relatively small, as most people who use SNS in China tend to be quite young and like to mostly chatter on these sites. But as these same young people grow up and move into white collar jobs, sites like Dajie could easily become a hot ticket in the China Internet market, and I wouldn’t be surprised at all if Linked In takes a serious look at China in the next 2 to 3 years as that happens, assuming that China doesn’t lock it out the way it has with other social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. (
China Internet bellwether Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) has just announced its latest quarterly results, which continue to show a company with strong growth but a worrisome inability to diversify beyond its core online search business that is showing early signs of slowing. First the good news, which has clearly captured investor attention, with Baidu’s revenue up about 80 percent and profits up an even stronger 90 percent in the second quarter, thanks to surging sales for its online search advertising services. (
The accounting confidence crisis continues to take its toll on New York-listed China firms, with some mixed signs coming from the struggling solar sector and a very “shark-like” announcement from a US law firm looking to take advantage of the situation. The China Daily reports the crisis has already claimed Longtop Financial, ShengdaTech and China MediaExpress as victims, all of which have been delisted (