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Baidu, Rakuten Join Hands on B2C Online Shopping Mall [tradingmarkets.com]Chinese-language Internet search service titan Baidu, Inc. and Japan's No.1 e-commerce Web site Rakuten jointly announced that they will invest USD 50 million in the coming three years to form a joint venture in an attempt to create a super large Chinese-consumer-oriented B2C online shopping mall.
The two parties have inked cooperation agreements and now are gearing up for the online shopping mall, which will be in service in the second half of 2010. Rakuten will take a 51% stake in the venture and Baidu will hold the remaining 49% stake.
I wonder how Alibaba and other existing players will react to this.
Baidu Strengthens Japanese Ties [asiamediajournal.com]
An alliance with Japan's largest online shopping site may help Baidu, China's largest search engine, in more ways than one: stimulating revenue from Japanese advertisers while stepping up the fight against some of Baidu's biggest rivals at home.
Competition in China's booming internet shopping sector is set to be fierce, with the country's two biggest consumer-to-consumer sites - Taobao from e-commerce giant Alibaba and PaiPai from social network heavyweight Tencent - building their own online malls.
However, Baidu's plans to run a rival site with Rakuten, a major player in Japan, gives the Chinese search engine something its rivals may struggle to get - access to Japanese clients who want to sell directly in China, and vice versa.
