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MySpace announced its launch in China Thursday,
following months of speculation about the Rupert Murdoch-controlled
social networking site's plans for the nation's 137 million Internet
users.
MySpace China introduced itself as a "locally owned, operated
and managed company" in which News Corp-owned MySpace Inc was
only one among several investors.
"Our team here will have the sole right to decide the operation
model, the technology platform as well as the product
strategy," said MySpace China CEO Luo Chuan, a former Microsoft
executive.
"It's very unlike the other multinationals you might have heard
about or seen in the Chinese market."
MySpace China may have been spurred to emphasise its local identity
by the fact that international Internet companies' attempts to enter
China have so far tended to end in failure, observers said.
"I think they're trying to distance themselves from the long
line of previous blunders," said William Bao Bean, a partner
with Softbank China India Holdings and an expert on Asian technology
issues.
"There's no example of foreign Internet companies coming into
China and being successful that I can think of," he said.
Despite MySpace China's efforts to differentiate itself, MySpace Inc
will be represented with three board members.
They include Murdoch's wife, Wendy Deng, as well as MySpace founders
Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, Luo said.
Investors in MySpace China also include International Data Group and
China Broadband Capital Partners, an investment company founded by
former China Netcom Group Corp chief executive Edward Tian.
Luo declined at a briefing to give specific details about the size
of the investment or the share that MySpace Inc accounts for.
Analysts have said that it was necessary for MySpace Inc to enter
into a partnership with local companies in order to gain access to
China's tightly controlled Internet.
"Generally, in order to get a license, especially an Internet
license, you have to be a local company," said Bean.
"Most of the 'foreign' sites use a joint venture contract-based
structure with a local entity in order to run their business in
China."
MySpace is one of the world's most popular websites, but the MySpace
China community is still in its test stage, adapted from the US
version, and will gradually be developed to meet the needs of
Chinese users, the company said.
"Based on the MySpaced global brand and technology platform, we
will develop products and features that are tailored to today's
Chinese citizens," Luo said.
Negotiations have been in progress since News Corp chairman Murdoch
announced last October that he would bring MySpace to China,
according to earlier reports.
"In those discussions, there's always something that you need
to negotiate back and forth," said Luo, responding to a
question about the lengthy wait for the launch.
"Ideally, when rolling out a business in a new market, speed is
very, very critical. But more important is the way of doing it, and
looking at optimizing the structure and ownership is the critical
factor."
-- AFP
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