Amazon buys into growing Chinese online retail market
Amazon.com, the world's biggest online retailer, is to buy Chinese rival Joyo.com for about $75m in a deal that will give it a substantial presence in China's growing internet market.
Joyo is one of the biggest corporate presences on the Chinese internet, with a website offering goods ranging from books and cosmetics to DVD box sets featuring late Communist Party patriarch Deng Xiaoping.
With leading local rival Dangdang.com, Joyo dominates online retailing in the Chinese market.
Dangdang claimed last month that Amazon had offered to buy a majority stake in it for more than $150m, but had been rebuffed because its founders wanted to keep control of the venture. Dangdang is planning to apply for a US share listing in 2005.
Buying a local company will give Amazon, the corporate model for both Joyo and Dangdang, a strong base in a market very different from that of developed countries. In China, service to urban customers still relies heavily on payment on delivery to bicycle couriers.
Under the deal announced yesterday, Amazon will buy 100 per cent of Joyo, which was set up four years ago with the backing of Chinese computer group Lenovo and local software company Kingsoft.
Joyo's sales were Rmb130m ($16m) in the first half of this year, compared with Rmb160m for all of 2003, according to Chinese state media.
Amazon said it would pay $72m in cash, with the remaining $3m accounted for by the assumption of employee stock options. The acquisition is the latest in a series of moves into China by international internet companies. US auction site Ebay paid $180m for Chinese counterpart Eachnet in a deal completed in 2003.
Yahoo, the US internet portal, has also been active, paying $120m for Chinese language search developer 3721 Network Software last year and setting up a joint venture online auction website with Sina.com.
Google, the world's most widely used internet search engine, has launched a Chinese language advertising service and taken a stake in Chinese counterpart Baidu.com.
Such moves underline the strong interest in China's fast-developing online market and progress on resolving obstacles to commercial success such as the limited use of credit cards. The official China Internet Network Information Centre says the number of internet users in the country hit 87m by the end of June, up nearly 28 per cent on a year earlier. Reliable estimates of the value of online commerce are difficult to obtain, but the centre, which conducts regular surveys of the behaviour of “netizens”, has forecast that the number of online shoppers will soar by at least 190 per cent in the next year.
However, some industry figures argue that it will be difficult for US rivals to succeed in the Chinese market even by buying local champions. Jack Ma, founder and chief executive of Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba.com, argues that foreign entrants tend to struggle to control costs and adjust to China's rough-and-ready business realities.
亚马逊借并购进军中国互联网
全球最大网络零售商亚马逊（Amazon.com），计划以750万美元收购中国的对手卓越网（Joyo.com），这次的并购将使亚马逊真正跻身中国不断增长的互联网市场。
卓越是中国互联网上最大商家之一，在网站上销售的商品包括从书籍、化妆品到讲述已故中共元老邓小平的盒装全套DVD等。
卓越领先于国内的竞争对手当当网（Dangdang.com），占据中国网络销售市场的主导地位。
上个月当当宣布亚马逊开价1.5亿美元收购其不部分股份，但遭当当拒绝，原因是当当的创始人希望保持控股地位。当当正计划2005年在美国上市。
亚马逊通过收购中国当地公司，可以在一个与发达国家市场截然不同的市场中站稳脚跟，而卓越和当当就是按照亚马逊的模式建立的。在中国，面向城市消费者的服务仍然大量采取这种模式：即骑自行车的快递员配送商品，消费者到门付款。
在昨天宣布的收购行动中，亚马逊将买下卓越100％的股份。卓越是4年前在中国联想计算机集团以及金山软件公司的支持下成立的。
根据中国官方媒体报道，卓越今年上半年的销售额为1.3亿人民币（合1600万美元），而2003年全年销售额为1.6亿人民币。
亚马逊称，它将支付7200万美元的现金，剩余300万美元则采用员工期权的形式。此次收购行动是国际互联网公司进军中国一系列举措中最新的一步棋。2003年，美国拍卖网站“电子港湾”（Ebay）曾以1.8亿美元收购了中国的一家类似网站“易趣”（Eachnet）。
美国门户网站雅虎(Yahoo)在这方面也一直比较积极，去年曾以1.2亿美元收购中文搜索开发企业3721网络软件公司，并和新浪网（Sina.com）合作建立了一家在线拍卖网站。
作为世界上使用最广泛的互联网搜索引擎，Google已经启动了中文广告服务，并收购了中国的竞争对手“百度”（Baidu.com）的股份。
这些行动显示出外界对中国飞速发展的网络市场的强烈兴趣，也说明要获得商业上的成功，就必须采取一系列措施，消除信用卡使用受限等障碍。官方的中国互联网络信息中心（CINIC）表示，6月底中国网络用户已达8700万人，比去年同期增加了近28％。要确切地估算电子商务的价值不太容易，但对“网民”行为进行定期调查的CINIC曾预测，网上消费者的人数明年将至少激增190％。
不过，一些行业人士争论说，即使收购中国当地优秀企业，美国网站要在中国市场获得成功也并非易事。中国电子商务公司阿里巴巴（Alibaba.com）的创始人和首席执行官马云（Jack Ma）则认为，海外加入者在控制成本上会很费力，并要进行调整，以适应中国竞争残酷的商业环境。
