Facebook gains by aiding nation's exporters
Source: chinadaily.com.cn View: 254 Date: 2014-05-07

United States-based Facebook Inc, operator of the world’s largest social networking site, said its business aiding China’s exporters to reach global markets is seeing fast growth even as its mainInternet services remain blocked in the nation.

Facebook also has "thousands" of application developers in China, Vice-President VaughanSmith told the Global Mobile Internet Conference in Beijing on Tuesday.

Smith didn’t comment on the outlook for offering Facebook’s social network in China, it’saccessible only through proxy services that sidestep government censors.

Facebook said in the prospectus for its 2012 listing that "substantial legal and regulatorycomplexities" prevented its entry into China, home to the world’s largest number of Internet users.That has led the company to instead focus on supplying marketing services to exporters.

"We have a rapidly growing business in China helpingpeople that are exporting - exporters China reachingcustomers around the world," Smith said. "We’ve got 1.3billion people on Facebook and it turns out that marketing tothose people China works really well."

Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg in September metwith the government agency that oversees controls on theInternet in China. Sandberg and Cai Mingzhao, head of theState Council Information Office, discussed issues includingthe "important role" that Facebook plays in helping Chinesecompanies expand overseas, according to a statementposted on the agency’s website at the time.

Along with Facebook, most other US-basedsocialnetworking services, including Google Inc’s YouTube and that of Twitter Inc, are also blocked in China. That leavesLinkedIn Corp, which set up its local professional networkingsite in Chinese in February, as the biggest US social mediacompany active in China.

Without entering China, LinkedIn couldn’t accomplish itscorporate vision, Derek Shen, the company’s president for China, said Tuesday.

"We have to accomplish our global mission to connect all professionals across the world," Shensaid. "China has a lot of excellent professionals but they don’t have a good global platform."

China has room for more social networks and there is nothing to stop companies the US orelse entering, Weibo Corp Chief Executive Officer Wang Gaofei told the conference.Weibo, China’s most popular micro blog service, was spun off by Sina Corp last month in aninitial public offering.

"The market is open - no matter whether it’s Sina, Tencent, LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook, they can all do it," Wang said. "With the increasing number of mobile Internet users, users’ demandwill become more specific, which will lead to a more diversified social networking market."

 

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