Tencent Confirms Plans To Open Auction Site By Year End

[bargainbloodhound]

http://www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/article.as...ntid=28892

China's largest instant messaging service provider Tencent confirmed plans to open an auction site by year end.

Poor Meg, it would be a pity if eBay finished in 3rd place.  :twistedevil:

[mandy]

A longer article on Tencent from the 25/08/2005 issue of China's The Standard newspaper

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/stdn/std/B...5Ae07.html

The four seasons of why Taobao and eBay Eachnet should worry:

Tencent is the largest instant messaging provider in China with 76 percent market share and 170 million active user account

eBay Eachnet claims 11 million users and Taobao lays claim to over 7 million.

[mandy]

China's leading instant messaging company TenCent has launched their PaiPai auction site and as predicted it is already challenging Chinese market leaders Ebay Eachnet and (Alibaba owned) Taobao.  TenCent has 170 million instant messaging customers in China (for comparison purposes the eBay and Taobao auction sites each have under 15 million Chinese users).

The site's 1-week Alexa traffic ranking already ranks it as the 434th busiest web site in the world (Taobao is ranked 25th and eBay China 49).

related post predicting TenCent (PaiPai) will win China: http://community.tuliptools.com/index.ph...ml#msg3502

[bargainbloodhound]

[quote author=mandy link=topic=248.msg5245#msg5245 date=1132914198]
China's leading instant messaging company TenCent has launched their PaiPai auction site and as predicted it is already challenging Chinese market leaders Ebay Eachnet and (Alibaba owned) Taobao.  TenCent has 170 million instant messaging customers in China (for comparison purposes the eBay and Taobao auction sites each have under 15 million Chinese users).

The site's 1-week Alexa traffic ranking already ranks it as the 434th busiest web site in the world (Taobao is ranked 25th and eBay China 49).

related post predicting TenCent (PaiPai) will win China: http://community.tuliptools.com/index.ph...ml#msg3502
[/quote]

The fact that TenCent has a virtual monopoly on the Chinese instant message market with over a 70% market share (and the 170 million customers that go with that market share) is the reason us TulipHeads  expect its PaiPai site  to be the decisive winner in the battle to be the #1 Chinese auction site.

Unlike in the US where email is king, the average Chinese Internet user prefers to communicate via instant messenger rather than email.  The fact that TenCent can advertise PaiPai to its huge instant message user base for free while competitors Taobao and eBay are forced to spend lavishly on advertising gives it a huge advantage over its competitors.

[mandy]

An article on Tencent (PaiPai.com) and C2C retailer Dangdang.com

WHILE eBay and Alibaba argue about who's No. 1 in China's online auction sector, newcomers such as online chat provider Tencent and cyber retailer dangdang.com have debuted their own consumer-to-consumer services to tap a market valued at 6.7 billion yuan (US$832.9 million).

Tencent launched its C2C service in September and now lists 1.1 million products online from 70,000 sellers. Its registered members have reached 2.13 million, one-fifth of Alibaba's taobao.com and one-seventh of eBay's, according to Tencent, whose QQ chat service has attracted more than 100 million users.

Meanwhile, dangdang.com said recently in Shanghai it will invest 400 million yuan to expand its C2C business scope and will kick off the service in January.

The company is now known for its competitively priced books, audio and video CDs and has 15.6 million registered users.

full article: http://www.shanghaidaily.com/art/2005/12...to_C2C.htm

related topics:
eBay to allow China users to set up online stores for free http://community.tuliptools.com/index.ph...801.0.html
Rivals Taobao, eBay clash on whether free is best http://community.tuliptools.com/index.ph...802.0.html

[amy]

DangDang has too much on its front page.  :blinkie:

Holiday observation: PaiPai and Taobao have snowmen on their front pages.  eBay China has a (European) Santa.