Ushi, The Business Social Network Is China's LinkedIn
China with its huge internet market is now gearing up to give competition to Linkedin. In the coming two years, this social networking site which has a large professional base is hoping and planning to have as many as 10 million users taking the count up from the existing 300,000 users. Dominic Penaloza, Founder, USHI, said in an interview that they were expecting to generate revenue of $5 million by the end of June.
#-Link-Snipped-#With Facebook and Twitter blocked over censorship issues in China Linkedin stands out to be one of the very few social networking sites to still have access in the country’s huge internet market. #-Link-Snipped-# allows the users to add connections and send messages to others but all these features are still on the preliminary phase, i.e. a new user can join only after receiving an invitation from a present user. The firm is planning to open the site to the public by the end of this year.
Dominic Penaloza also stated, "We're aiming to ultimately serve a very large portion of China's 40 million Internet users who are white collar or entrepreneurs. Call it 10 million in two years." Chinese internet firms are receiving excellent response from venture capitalists and private equity funds. With Ushi trying to be Linkedin companies such as Youku and Dangdang are marketing themselves as the YouTube and Amazon substitutes or even better of China.
The China’s 450 million user’s internet market is huge enough to compete with world’s known and well established websites. Ushi with the support of Milestone Capital, US-based Richmond Management, Li & Fung private equity and Simon Murray & Co was launched in October 2010. The number of users is growing steadfastly with the user base doubling from 160,000 to 300,000 in duration of about 2 months from March and April. The firm raised 10 million yuan ($1.54 million) in the first fundraising round.
Filipino-Chinese who grew up in Canada said "There's more proportion of Chinese who will only do business with people they have met before and people who have a mutual friend." Considering this condition Ushi focuses more on offline events as Chinese are comfortable doing business transactions which occur in person. Penaloza added, “If you ask them to pay $25 equivalent in Reminbi for a three-hour networking party they would not hesitate to pay, they would line up to pay. Chinese people are like that in general."
Penaloza said that being called the LinkedIn of China has some benefits as the general public is now aware of the type of services the firm offers. He stated in quotes, “It’s kind of like LinkedIn and inspired by LinkedIn but it is not the same. Ushi will work better for Chinese people because it is made in China, made by Chinese, made for Chinese and that's a huge difference."
However, Linkedin knowing that the market in China is complicated still seeks opportunities to capitalize on its existing massive number of users.
Source: Times of India
#-Link-Snipped-#With Facebook and Twitter blocked over censorship issues in China Linkedin stands out to be one of the very few social networking sites to still have access in the country’s huge internet market. #-Link-Snipped-# allows the users to add connections and send messages to others but all these features are still on the preliminary phase, i.e. a new user can join only after receiving an invitation from a present user. The firm is planning to open the site to the public by the end of this year.
Dominic Penaloza also stated, "We're aiming to ultimately serve a very large portion of China's 40 million Internet users who are white collar or entrepreneurs. Call it 10 million in two years." Chinese internet firms are receiving excellent response from venture capitalists and private equity funds. With Ushi trying to be Linkedin companies such as Youku and Dangdang are marketing themselves as the YouTube and Amazon substitutes or even better of China.
The China’s 450 million user’s internet market is huge enough to compete with world’s known and well established websites. Ushi with the support of Milestone Capital, US-based Richmond Management, Li & Fung private equity and Simon Murray & Co was launched in October 2010. The number of users is growing steadfastly with the user base doubling from 160,000 to 300,000 in duration of about 2 months from March and April. The firm raised 10 million yuan ($1.54 million) in the first fundraising round.
Filipino-Chinese who grew up in Canada said "There's more proportion of Chinese who will only do business with people they have met before and people who have a mutual friend." Considering this condition Ushi focuses more on offline events as Chinese are comfortable doing business transactions which occur in person. Penaloza added, “If you ask them to pay $25 equivalent in Reminbi for a three-hour networking party they would not hesitate to pay, they would line up to pay. Chinese people are like that in general."
Penaloza said that being called the LinkedIn of China has some benefits as the general public is now aware of the type of services the firm offers. He stated in quotes, “It’s kind of like LinkedIn and inspired by LinkedIn but it is not the same. Ushi will work better for Chinese people because it is made in China, made by Chinese, made for Chinese and that's a huge difference."
However, Linkedin knowing that the market in China is complicated still seeks opportunities to capitalize on its existing massive number of users.
Source: Times of India
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