Chinese Facebook Clone Xiaonei Raises $430 Million

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1. bob cobb
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 6:52 pm

   That sure is a clone, I’d be pretty pissed about that if I was zuckerberg

2. ceejayoz
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 6:52 pm

   Nearly half a billion dollars? Maybe they can a little of that on a decent translator and a web designer with a half an original thought. Looks like it’d be an improvement.

3. lyy9981
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 6:56 pm

   Good for them. That’s what you get when you ignore the Chinese market.

4. Duncan Riley
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 6:57 pm

   ceejayoz
   in their defense, they don’t offer an English version, the screenshot above is in Google translator English, I ran that version because it made more sense that the Chinese one to most readers

5. Scott Y.
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 6:58 pm

   Server is in Tianjin so it’s pretty slow from rest of the world, and looks like it is implemented in Java with Structs framework (as opposed to PHP in Facebook). But that screenshot — I wonder what would FB do to protect their branding.

6. Juan Saldivar
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 6:58 pm

   What a lack of creativity, what can I say, they raised half a billion dollars just for that, it may actually work, but at least change the design. That’s funny thats why I wouldn’t trust a chinese manufacturer, they just love to copy and paste with there own labels ha!

7. Bobby
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 7:06 pm

   Thank goodness for Israel and some parts of Europe…otherwise there would be no innovation on the internet outside the United States.

8. sd
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 7:08 pm

   Mark “got” the idea from someone else, now someone “borrow” the idea. fair world.

9. 113.com
   

   April 30th, 2008 at 7:09 pm

   Congratulations!!

10. sd
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:10 pm

    @6, fb can’t do nothing. that just color and pixel. otherwise coke is suing all the “cola” brands. they look and feel the same.

11. Andy Wong
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:10 pm

    With one quarter of the world population, they don’t need to care about the other markets. There were plenty of successful stories since mid 90s, which basically clone the US counterparts, like QQ vs ICQ, Taobao and many other vs eBay etc. VCs loved them.

    Don’t blame cloning. Such cloning exists in UK, Germany and French. Simply because the China market has high population, they get bigger funding, however, dollar/head is still much lower than what FaceBook got, this is why VCs love such startup.

12. lawrence
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:13 pm

    lol - the Chinese are notoriously known for copying all kinds of US items, in regards to cheapo knockoffs of well-known brands

    but a copy of this magnitude - is amazing, at least of the success of it.

13. Zedomax
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:18 pm

    This is really cool! The Chinese can pretty much copy everything including Rolexes…

14. Xi
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:20 pm

    Duncan, I think the title is misleading coz it is xiaonei’s parent company (Oak Pacific Interactive) that has raised $430M, not xiaonei. Oak Pacific Interactive has owned other leading social networking sites besides xiaonei in China, like http://www.mop.com, http://www.donews.com, etc..

15. BainFu
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:23 pm

    Believe it or not, this… has already been done.

    Check out http://www.yeejee.com

16. Nat
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:33 pm

    Pretty much great startup and idea they try to copy it, mostly U.S., that too bad, no chinese originality.

    Nat
    http://www.workersinc.com

17. Jose Fajardo
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:44 pm

    $430m, that’s gotta be fake! No one let’s go of that much cash without a way to take there assets internationally! Then again i guess all they really need to do is change the look and feel of the site and then there fine to go!

    Personally I think the whole IP and Copyright world is screwed so a big part of me wants to pat these guys on the back!

18. Andy Wong
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:56 pm

    If it is an American guy clone Facebook, as there already exist many in US, or a French /UK guy clone facebook, as there also exist many in respective local national markets, will they get so many negative feedback? Do American clone other’s idea and earn big load of cash? Yes, see Dodgeball which was acquired by Google. Dodgeball was a clone of a long well established Japanese service.

    Poor Chinese, they got really bad publicity these days. It have been becoming so fashionable to blame China for anything. Chinese got blamed for imported cheap goods destroying manufacture jobs in US, now, the imported goods become more expensive, American blame China for inflation.

    Sorry, a bit off topic. But just want to tell you the background.

19. Utkarsh Sinha
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 7:56 pm

    This is another of many shockers I’ve seen. I think the FB design and approach is well connected to some powerful force beyond us. Whoever tends to use, end up selling or raising in millions.WOW!
    Another S/N with the same feel and design aesthetics in India sold for about $10M. Even though they had nothing to offer.
    I think a book on FB’s design psychology is about to come.

    ‘How to be a millionaire by copying FB?’ etc…….

20. GettyCash
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:07 pm

    $430 millions ? That’s a lot. I wonder how many users do they have.

21. matt
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:07 pm

    All your facebook belong to us

22. Adam
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:08 pm

    First off: I am an American school teacher in China. I love China and support wholeheartedly the Beijing Olympics.

    However, let’s be honest with ourselves: China thrives on ripping other people off. Piracy of software, DVDs, and anything that can be copied is off the wall. There are brand names such as “American Apple” (which makes MP3 players) which impersonates Apple with a slightly different logo. Everywhere I go, there are markets selling counterfeit merchandise with designer brand names on it.

    And now this bright young student so blatantly ripped off the Facebook page he stole their icons! That’s dirty. If you want to make a competing social networking site, be my guest. If you want to rip off someone’s intellectual property because you were too lazy to make your own icons, that’s dirty. I think that young man owes a portion of that money to Facebook.

    China needs to stop making an easy buck (or yuan) off of Western brand’s popularity and do something original.

23. Robert
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:10 pm

    I think i’m going to join and start a Free Tibet group…

24. YouYap.com
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:17 pm

    $430 millions? I think I’m moving to china.

25. Bobby
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:18 pm

    Wong - you just gave one example. For every one example you give I think I could give one hundred examples that go the other way. I personally don’t care - in fact, good luck to the site and owners. But I would love to see other countries (other than a select few) actually try to do things on their own…without innovation we get stuck.

26. alan
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:21 pm

    Seems some Chinese folks have learned something from the Olympic torch protests: Get out with the counter-punches fast. I wonder what the world would be like today if John Kerry had been as proactive with regard to the swiftboaters…

27. Sumanth
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:22 pm

    Yeah rt, when AOL can ripoff the front page from Yahoo! ..

    anyone can do anything !!

28. Zanom
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:30 pm

    Some other clones might get lucky…

    vkontakte.ru
    odnoklassniki.ru
    sonico.com
    studivz.net
    and soo many others

    good for them… facebook did not invent social networking. wow, they have IM now.. yarn

29. Real world
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:33 pm

    #8 TOTALLY TRUE!

    Mark “got” the idea from someone else, now someone “borrow” the idea. fair world.

30. Go2.0TOP
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 8:53 pm

    Wow!!!! 430 m for clone?

31. Biznews
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 9:17 pm

    Copying is not that easy . It still requires a certain level of competence .
    Afterall you can buy a myspace or youtube script for about $200 and many people do but how many actually make it big ????

32. snyggast
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 9:42 pm

    it’s no surprise they lack creativity and originality because they grew up not being allowed to think.. no music no art just, but i’m sure they can hack like a mother.

33. Nabil
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 9:46 pm

    Yet another Chinese knockoff? Yuan….

34. logon2
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 9:54 pm

    @18

    We are all aware of clones that perform the same tasks / offer the same services, but this is a blatant ripoff. The icons are even exactly the same. The look and feel, flow and design are almost copied directly… China doesn’t care about IP though so BL.

35. sean
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 9:54 pm

    i don’t like the site very much….

36. Dary
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 10:08 pm

    #7: Bobby, what a silly statement. For example, what about Japan? I could’ve sworn some scripting language came out of Japan that is powering some of the most popular sites on the web. What’s it called? Opal? Limestone? Ohhhhh Ruby. That’s right. Thanks Matz. Japan RULES!!!

37. Wes
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 10:53 pm

    Clone or no clone, I think they got some decent money. I think they must be doing something right.

38. Real world
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 11:11 pm

    #7 no innovation? china has a 5000 year old history/culture.. they pretty much invented civilization.. the USA appeared just a couple of hundred centuries ago… if you put things into a historical perspective you will realize how dumb the majority of the posts are…

    welcome to the new world… Silicon valley is no longer the only tech hub of the future… you are seeing such clusters emerge in israel, ireland, china, argentina, etc.

    the US has only 19% of the worlds GDP… and facebooks 2008 strategy is to conquer the international market… they will have an uphill battle… like #28 said… many SN similar to facebook are already established and are concentrating in specific countries/regions.

    let the battle begin.. with a 430 million dollar war chest and the favorable purchasing power of the yuan… this will get interesting… the market for sure will heat up.

39. Joe T
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 11:20 pm

    I would imagine the university experience in China is a lot different than in the US. The kids don’t have enough money and what they do have is goverment-subsiduzed so they live within tight budgets. Plus they spend a lot more time studying and a lot less socializing.

    Not sure if this kind of thing can be leveraged into a huge moneymaker those valuations and amounts would suggest.

    Also, won’t a Chinese social network for students be used by the Chinese government to monitor dissident tendencies and arouse nationalistic sentiment, as they did over the Tibet affair?

    In China NO social network can be kept independent of government infiltration and tampering, which is done at all levels including the ISP.

    Before long the Chinese Communist party will be rallying “patriotic students organizations” on this network to turn out for the latest anti Dalai Lama rallies at the Olympics.

    But if anyone utters one word in support of Tibet… Well, you connect the dots.

40. Lelia Katherine Thomas
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 11:36 pm

    It’s amusing that a Facebook clone can fuel nationalistic pride for both sides. Can’t we just all get along? There are heros and assholes everywhere.

41. grah!
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 11:42 pm

    @14 Xi

    You are correct. This post is misleading..

    To clarify again, OPI raised the $430m and owns more than just Xiaonei. Also has raised some $60m since 02.

42. True American
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 11:47 pm

    Just shows that China doesn’t have any original ideas. All Chinese economic growth over the past decades is built on American ideas. Their current anti-American policies are destroying the head which feeds them. Once America turns into a third world country and it’s output of innovation is gone, Chinese will realize that copying is not the same as inventing.

43. big man
    

    April 30th, 2008 at 11:47 pm

    i like the ladies

44. Real world
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 12:16 am

    #42 “Chinese will realize that copying is not the same as inventing.” .. old argument… they said the same about japan in the 80s… i bet you like your playstation, HDTV (where did that come from?) .. hey at Samsung (south korea) they have more patents per year than probably any US company (probably close to IBM)…

    cloning facebook? zucky has his owns legal problems for having copied the model himself.

    Stay objetive, this is great for competition.. we would not want a global monoploy would we?

    40# amen

45. Mogilny
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 1:02 am

    @Real world - Zucky might have “stolen” an idea, but these people CLONED an existing website. Is this “great for competition”? I don’t think so. Ideally, companies that compete with each other do their independent development and have their own ideas. Clones are almost always a few steps behind. They only eat up market share of genuine companies.

    Facebook –> $15 billion
    Facebook Chinese Clone –> $1 billion
    Rockyou -> $0.5 billion
    Rockyou Chinese Clone -> around $30 million? Who wants to start a startup if they are going to support 3rd party apps?

    An aside, 2007 detriot auto show.

    http://ca.autos.yahoo.com/p/568/chinese-car-clones

    Pathetic.

46. Shame
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 1:03 am

    Being a Chinese I feel horrible when I see such a site. With the icons being the same, I bet they’re copying the scripts too. I thought view source is a way to protect people like us from malicious scripts, but I can’t believe people exploit it to this level.

47. snyggast
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 1:22 am

    @ 38

    you need to check out patent filings for china and compare it to the U.S. or Germany.

    http://www.wipo.int/export/sit.....2007_6.gif

48. Rendell
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 1:25 am

    This is what you get with no real unique selling points (FB). The idea is easy to copy to the tee.

    The same thing would not work with Google, because the real competitive advantage is under the hood, so to speak. FB needs to go that way, too.

49. Mogilny
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 1:28 am

    @Shame Don’t be a shame. I think most of these Chinese identities are not doing this because they are lazy, they do it because they are smart. Why not copy a business that is successful and apply it to some place new? Also, people forget that it was only 20 years ago when China really opened up to the world. It will take time before they can have real innovation.

50. christiney35
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 1:31 am

    Can we say that the investment also encourages people to make a clone? I feel disgust at the site, but I also feel very bad at those who invest in Oak Pacific Interactive.

51. Igor The Troll
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 1:36 am

    Ha, Ha! You better be nice to China because it will start cloning humans soon!
    Then all of you will be obsolete!

    Today one billion people tomorrow 2 billion people!

52. 9ice
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 2:15 am

    when do we get to see a chinese version of Obama?

53. Peter
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 4:32 am

    Maybe they needed the $430m for a redesign =0)

54. Sachin
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 5:02 am

    @Bobby (7, 25)

    on a lighter note…actually the whole ‘ripping off saga’ began in america…does the name microsoft ring a bell?:P
    now given their success…can u blame anyone for ripping off ideas:D

    one a more serious note: yes copying ideas sucks…but the bit about there being no innovation on the web outside america? lets talk in 5 years:)

55. Wongmaster
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 5:53 am

    Funny how all these brain dead PRC supporters come out of the wood work when china is mentioned. It’s pretty pathetic when these guys always defend anything chinese even when what they do is wrong or dirty. Congratulations for being proud of copying, theft, poison food, unsafe baby toys, etc - you make your country proud.

56. Ivan
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 6:31 am

    Can you say “Chin Chin”.

    Take that Zuckerberg. LOL

57. law
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 9:26 am

    While I think that it is a blatant copy, does it really matter? There are tons of people that copy others all over the world, including in the us. The difference with the US is in general, the markets are saturated, so you HAVE to usually to something innovative in order to stay ahead of the game. In China (and India), there are many products and services that do not exist or do not work for whatever reason, so someone copies it.

    At some point, when there’s saturation in their markets, you’ll see more innovation. Until then, it’s so much safer and economical to just see what works here and to try it out there.

58. Et
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 9:28 am

    Honestly a Chinese Facebook clone is worst for the Chinese, than for Facebook. A central place where people seems to write way too much about themselves than they should, under a repressive regime…
    How many will be identified or locked up because of what they wrote on Xiaonei?
    This is China were talking about, not America where privacy laws and freedom of speech pretty much protects us from a lot of things.
    Anyone else sees this as a disaster waiting to happen?

59. dolla
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 9:37 am

    Is that USD???

60. Pandrogas
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 10:38 am

    More proof that the Chinese will do whatever the Chinese want to do economically. Sure it’s a copy of the FaceBook design, but seriously, what FaceBook really do about it? (Hey look! A sit-and-spin!)

    @58: Eventually the country will open up bit by bit. Blogging and various other sites on the internet have begun to demonstrate that. The problem is that change is hard to force and I have no doubt that some people will be black bagged for stuff they write or say. But saying no to every opportunity to voice your opinions and criticisms is even worse than being black bagged because you play right into the hands of the regime. Slightly counter-intuitive to survival instincts, but nobody ever made an omelet without breaking a few eggs.

61. a fair person
    

    May 1st, 2008 at 11:04 pm

    to those who are saying china is copying off of the rest of the world:

    hey man, the world is at where it is today because of globalization.

    right now american goods are popular, so china copys off of US. american ipods, gangster rap, facebook, etc..
    a thousand years ago, when the chinese first invented printing, gunpowder, compass, the westerners copied off of china. im sure we’ve all learned in school that westerns used to go to china to buy silks and porcelains.

    so, after all, no big deal.

62. Paul
    

    May 2nd, 2008 at 12:38 am

    Can Facebook not make anything for this copy? Clearly, it`s a copy. Where do the copiers get the source code? There are criminal collaborator of Facebook?