If Yahoo agrees to Microsoft’s buyout offer, the deal would still have to be pass muster with antitrust regulators here in the U.S, in Europe, and in China. As John Markoff points out in the NYT, a new Chinese law that will go into effect in August gives the Chinese government regulatory oversight over any merger that “involve acquisitions of Chinese companies or foreign businesses investing in Chinese companies’ operations.” Yahoo owns a big stake in Chinese Web marketplace Alibaba, which also runs Taobao, Alipay and Yahoo China. It is unclear what China’s position would be on a Microsoft-Yahoo merger, but it could be the first big test of how it is going to exert its new regulatory muscles. Speeding up the deal before the Chinese law goes into effect probably wouldn’t help avoid a Chinese regulatory review, since it is unlikely that any deal would be approved by both the U.S. and Europe before August. (DoubleClick took a year, XM/Sirius took longer).
If China tries to use this opportunity to extract unreasonable concessions from Microsoft, there is always the option to sell Yahoo’s Alibaba stake, which is worth at least $3 billion. But that would mean abandoning a strong foothold in China, a market no Web company can ignore. On the other hand, China could go the other way and show its pro-market stance by being the first to approve the deal. That would be a great goodwill gesture to put out there during the Beijing Olympics.
- Yes, The Chinese Will Try To Squeeze Too Many Concessiosn Out Of Them
- No, the Deal Will Sail Through. They Revere Bill Gates.
Total Votes: 588
Started: March 28, 2008
(Photo by HVargas).
See all
Post
Does anyone know what’s the equivalent of DoubleClick, or Google Adsense in China?
We have lots of traffic in china, but poor Ad revenue.
The startup to pull this off (monetizing with global ad-network China, Brazil, and the rest of asia and south america), will be hughe. Ad-sense sucks.
As for this article, I’m not sure what the chinese will do.
China is starting to annoy me now. Their starting to act like the big boys just like the United States used to be.
Id like to nuke their entire government before they get to big for their boots and start being unanswerable to noone.
Microsoft should just sell the alibaba stake. Alibaba is overrated and full of cheap / tacky items.
thats a good point, it could be a deal killer no?
http://www.geocities.com/poi243
China has the right and responsibility to review the impact of the potential deal, and protect the best interest of China.
Comment like #2 reminds us that this right and responsiblity should be safe-guarded fully, since there are so many arrogant morons in the West who think they are entitled to other people’s property.
Hi, you are bankrupt, remember? Of course you need to be reguated.
Interesting, so currently Alibaba group practically owns Chinese internet and somehow moving Yahoo’s share of it from Yahoo to MS would make a difference in the market?
Erick, change the CrunchBase info…Yahoo acquired 40% of Alibaba for$1B,..the impression when I read that on CrunchBase is that Yahoo! bought Alibaba for $1B…
@6
How exactly does Alibaba Group owns the Chinese Internet? Seriously..
China, pro-market?
They are COMMUNISTS
Wouldn’t that be “wwench”?
Harry “deprecating to the end” Wang
China cares first and foremost about China. I imagine the deal will be in China’s interests with a few potential concessions. Keeps the comapnies alive, stimulates competition, and it matters less to China because their own companies are kicking ass in the China’s internet market already.
Probably won’t be 100% smooth sailing, but I don’t think they would bog the deal down if it’s handled well enough.
Given the way China pretty much extorts anyone running a business in the country anyway, I would think they’d happily allow this to go through quickly. The sooner they can get even bigger pockets invested in there the better.
No big deal.
Just make it a public issue and SHAME them into agreeing.
Done.
SAI reports that China may now be the largest Internet market. With 1.4 billion population, it’s not surprising. With plenty of Internet cafes at cheap prices, anyone can gain access without buying a computer or leasing broadband.
These are good trends since TV and newspaper publishing is closely regulated by the communist party. The Internet provides open communications to the masses.
I’ve met the founding group at Alibaba. They are western educated and their ops copy the famous GE process. It’s first class. The core model is B2B, thus not very flashy.
In regards to advertising, there are few small advertisers to feed an AdSense-like market. Most of the Chinese Internet companies have their own sales staff and marketing services group who work direct with marcom. CTS Media is a good example. This advertising market is a tiny fraction of the global market. FYI.
Governments everywhere insert their 2cents. China is no different.
I’d like to correct the WRONG company information following this blog post.
Alibaba was not acquired by Yahoo!
Instead, Yahoo Inc. signed a deal to buy 40 percent of Alibaba.com for one billion dollars cash while handing over the running of its China operations (Yahoo! China) to the Chinese online retailer, AFP reported.
See, e.g., http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/e.....468252.htm
This can also be verified by the latest news
China’s Alibaba plans to buy Yahoo-held stake amid Microsoft bid: report
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20.....0319132713
google it …
2.
To #9: Do you still believe that China is a communist country? Don’t be naive. It is now the most pro-capitalism country of the world!
As for the news. Chinese government is the most unpredictable in the world. So I don’t make any prediction.
Many people including the bloggers of techcrunch.com are quite curious about the China Internet market. Although I have left China for a couple of years, I can still feel that some articles and their comments regarding China do not make much sense. Sometimes some views are even ridiculous and you can immediately know those people have never been to China or have never had a good study of China.
Sorry if you are offended but I just want to tell my honest observation. If you agree with me, I assume the founder of techcrunch.com, Michael Arrington, may consider hiring a China team who knows the inside out of China Internet market but at the same time be good at English writing. Then instruct this team to write China articles in English. I think these articles will be greatly satisfying all the western people who are keen to understand the China Internet market. Then based on that they can make informed decisions if they happen to be investors who are interested in investing in China or businessmen who want to explore the biggest Internet market.
Interesting that China has been made relevant to the Msft-Yhoo deal.
Many people including the bloggers of techcrunch.com are quite curious about the China Internet market. Although I have left China for a couple of years, I can still feel that some articles and their comments regarding China do not make much sense. Sometimes some views are even ridiculous and you can immediately know those people have never been to China or have never had a good study of China.
Sorry if you are offended but I just want to tell my honest observation. If you agree with me, I assume the founder of techcrunch.com, Michael Arrington, may consider hiring a China team who knows the inside out of China Internet market but at the same time be good at English writing. Then instruct this team to write China articles in English. I think these articles will be greatly satisfying all the western people who are keen to understand the China Internet market. Then based on that they can make informed decisions if they happen to be investors who are interested in investing in China or businessmen who want to explore the biggest Internet market.
Why not support an American Alibaba? Factories In China Inc. is celebrating the launch of http://www.FactoriesInChina.com with free shares giveaway. There’s details in a press release http://www.fastpitchpress.com/.....PRID=22618
They placed banner ads for sale on eBay. Buyers of the banner ads will get discounted prices as well as matching number of shares in the private company.
Search on eBay’s website under “next aliaba” or go to: http://stores.ebay.com/Factories-In-China-Website