tencent

Report: Groupon looks to launch operations in China

The daily-deals broker Groupon is reportedly getting ready to launch operations in China, which would help expand its reach in Asia.

In Beijing recently, a company that operates the site Gaopeng.com was conducting interviews in an office with a Groupon sign on display, according to a Wall Street Journal story today. Gaopeng.com is "listed as registered by someone at Internet giant Tencent Holdings of Shenzen, China. " Tencent is one of the stakeholders in Digital Sky Technologies, an investor in Groupon.

The Journal report also said openings for Groupon staff positions have been posted recently on Chinese … Read more

Steve Jobs takes health leave

Links from Tuesday's episode of Loaded:

Apple announces that Steve Jobs will take a medical leave of absence

Nokia ends its Comes With Music service in 27 countries

GoDaddy is ready to sex up its Superbowl Ads with a campaign to promote .co addresses

Groupon is in talks to partner with Chinese Internet giant Tencent

BlackBerry users in Indonesia can no longer access porn sites from the browser

Netflix upsets customers with a change to its service

Groupon in deal talks with Chinese Net giant

Groupon is in talks with Chinese Internet giant Tencent to form a partnership to accelerate its effort in the critical Asian arena, said several sources with knowledge of the situation.

Terms of the deal are unclear, but sources said that it is likely to involve some sort of co-branded joint venture effort between the two--a key strategic move for Groupon, given the hard-to-penetrate-if-you're-not-Chinese Chinese market.

More typical for Groupon has been to buy a top local player abroad and rebrand it, such as its launch of Groupon Hong Kong, Groupon Singapore, Groupon Philippines, and Groupon Taiwan through the early … Read more

Apple, overseas firms lead in value creation

Tech, media, and telecom companies in emerging markets and those considered "digital innovators" are among the world's tops in providing value to their investors, according to a new study from the Boston Consulting Group.

Out today, the report "Swimming Against the Tide: How Technology, Media, and Telecommunications Companies Can Prosper in the New Economic Reality" found that seven of the top 10 telecom performers, five of the top 10 media performers, and four of the top 10 technology performers are in India, Taiwan, Mexico, China, and other emerging markets. But global companies tuned into the … Read more

Biggest sellers in the virtual world

Virtual goods are providing very high-margin sales for many internet companies. According to PaidContent.org, Chinese portal Tencent pulled in nearly $1 billion last year from the sale of virtual goods, while Facebook earns between $50 million and $100 million (your mileage may vary on these estimates). Recently Hi5 Networks made the move to include far more virtual goods as part of its social-networking site.

Obviously every site is a bit different, but there are two common threads of items that people seem ready to pay for:

Customization of the environment -- page decorations and other things that provide some kind of status in the game Enhancements to games -- if you can't beat them, you can just pay for items

Of course, there are many other possibilities--virtual gifts play a big role in Facebooks' revenue and I believe there is a huge market for goods such as baseball cards and other tradeable real-world/virtual world crossovers.

Looking at three of the top virtual goods companies, Rory Maher outlined how they make money. … Read more