Private Cloud Market In India–Total Cloud Spend Expected To Reach 8.2%

Every large tech company is now claiming to be a cloud company; Google and Amazon being the front-runners, though the models implemented by the two behemoths are different. While Google has been promoting Google Docs and Google Apps for anyone to use but only through Google’s interface, Amazon has been renting out its Elastic Compute Cloud space for companies to provide infrastructure to host their applications and store their data. After two decades of highly successful desktop-based office suite, Microsoft has finally moved to Office 365 hosted in the cloud. Apple is also poised to launch its iCloud this fall that will seamlessly integrate all your music, photos, documents, and apps, so that you can access your content on all your devices.

The current position of cloud in India

Most large Indian vendors have built private cloud environments for their internal development and test provisioning environments, and have built public cloud services platforms to deliver mainly IaaS and SaaS  solutions. These public cloud services are just beginning to emerge. Large vendors such as Reliance, Tata Communications, Zenith Infotech, L&T Infotech, Mahindra Satyam, Wipro, TCS, MindTree and Infosys Technologies offer a range of cloud offerings. These services include public cloud services in IaaS, SaaS (including vertical-industry-specific solutions), building and providing managed services for the cloud and cloud services brokering and integration. Customers like Fortis Healthcare, KPIT Cummins, J&K Govt, and IIT Delhi are already using private cloud services.

Many mid-tier vendors are also gearing up to position traditional system integrator services to build and manage cloud environments for end-user enterprises. However, the adoption of cloud-based applications and infrastructures is at a very nascent stage in SMBs. Companies are still skeptical about deciding whether to opt for cloud-based solutions. Cloud is still synonymous with software as a service (SaaS) in India, with limited understanding and adoption of infrastructure as a service (IaaS).

The future of cloud in India

India is a fast-growing market, and the strength of the Indian economy is SMBs, which have a significant presence in manufacturing, pharmaceutical, chemical and other related industries. Typically, these are very small companies working out of industrial estates, and they have very small workforces of as few as 10 to 20 people. These companies do not have the resources to have their own data centers or to manage hardware and software. However, larger companies, such as automobile or steel manufacturers, that buy from these SMBs want them to be IT-enabled to provide increased visibility into and optimize their supply chains.

This scenario lends itself to the creation of community clouds typically managed or controlled by the main player in or supply chain owner of the supply chain. Hence, compared with the cloud adoption rate in the US and Europe, the adoption rate of the cloud in India is lower, but is expected to pick up within a couple of years. A recent study by EMC Corporation and Zinnov Management Consulting says the total cloud spend as a percentage of the total IT spend is expected to rise from 1.4% in 2010 to 8.2% in 2015.
As the next-generation IT delivery model, the cloud is a major challenge for IT vendors whose business models are fundamentally based on customization and old operating principles of complexity, integration and high-value-add resources. They will struggle to keep long-standing customers who are all looking at a long-term migration toward some combination of internal and outsourced cloud computing.

Public vs Private Cloud

There is a clear preference for private versus public cloud based on company size. Private clouds are more likely to be used in the large enterprise (500 employees or more), both currently and in the future.Enterprises with fewer than 500 employees are more likely to move to the public cloud, with higher current usage as well as planned deployments as compared with the large enterprise.

Customers are turning to cloud for cost reduction, to more efficiently use IT,and to improve the business environment. Within the price-sensitive Indian market, cost remains the largest driver for cloud services. Private clouds are generally cheaper, but they may have other apprehensions. With VC funding for startups not very difficult to obtain, cost becomes less of a deciding factor.

While private cloud has has issues relating to security, reliability and performance, users of the public cloud are concerned about the loss of control of data. Depending on what bothers an organization the most, the decision could me more inclined in favour of one over another. Cloud vendors are aware of these top concerns and are working to provide adequate solutions and further drive demand for cloud services.
As of now, very large Indian enterprises are not moving their core, mission-critical and latency-sensitive applications and infrastructures to the public cloud. Most current public cloud adoption has been for applications like mail, chat, collaboration and travel. It is easier to have applications with less customization in the public cloud. There have been ERP and CRM offerings in the cloud, especially from companies like salesforce.com and Ramco. Some Indian companies have moved their websites that disseminate information to be publicly hosted in the public cloud. Customers are looking at utilizing the public cloud for extra compute capacity, especially large media houses and customers that have seasonal requirements for extra compute capacity.

Realizing the advantages of public cloud from the experiences of large enterprises, many SMBs in India may move to the public cloud in the next three to four years. Which kinds of applications would move to the cloud depends on the credibility established by the service providers, and on peer behaviors. However, large enterprises like are already creating strategies to build their own private cloud, starting with development and test provisioning services. In the future, they may host a private cloud for themselves and rent out public cloud services for the public. The Indian cloud scenario is still evolving, there is still some time before it can reach maturity.

[Guest article contributed by Ashutosh Saxena.]

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Report: Mobile Phone Shipments Fall 3%, Smartphone Market Grows at 96% Y-o-Y

The mobile phone shipments in the quarter witnessed a growth of 6% Vs. year ago, there was a minor decline of 3% Vs. previous quarter (January-March 2011). In absolute terms, the Indian market clocked a shipment of 42.8 million units in Q2 2011.

“Shipments cooled down a bit in the April-June quarter of 2011, partly due to an inventory build-up from the preceding quarters and partly because vendors apparently paused to take a relook at their product portfolio strategies. The India-based vendors have particularly been busy planning their debuts in the smartphone category, so some of their energies were expectedly absorbed there. A certain degree of gear-shifting for an awaited smartphone play is on the cards and the results will be visible in the next few quarters” [IDC]

Key Stats

• The smartphone segment showed an impressive growth of 68% year-on-year and a marginal growth of 0.4% over the Jan-March 2011 quarter, to garner a share of 5.6% of the overall mobile phone market. In Q2 CY 2010, the share of smartphones was 3.6% of the overall mobile phone market, in unit terms
• Smartphones with average sales values of INR 18,000 and above witnessed a significant growth of 31% over the preceding quarter and a whopping 96% growth over the year-ago quarter, Q2 CY2010.

Market Leader

• Nokia continued to lead the mobile phone market and the smartphone segment in Q2 2011, with 25% and 45.8% shares, respectively.
• Samsung, second to Nokia with shares of 15% and 21% in the mobile phone market and the smartphone segment, respectively, also clocked the strongest smartphone shipment growth during the quarter, fuelled by its Galaxy series of handsets.
• In the smartphone segment, RIM occupied the third place with a share of 15%.
• The top 5 India vendors, including Karbonn, Micromax, Lava, Spice and MAXX, accounting for a share of 19% of the overall shipments.

OS?

The smartphone segment saw a significant traction for Apple’s iOS platform, which captured a share of 2.6% in Q2 2011, as against a negligible share in the previous quarter. In terms of growth momentum, Android led with the highest growth rate of 10%, quarter-on-quarter.

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News Roundup: Railways’ ‘Baby Simran’ to Help People Track Trains

The Indian Railways is about to redefine rail travel by devising a new satellite-based technology to help commuters waiting at stations to track down the exact location of their train. The project will first be launched for the Rajdhani Express trains.

Called Baby Simran, the official name of the project is Satellite Imaging for Rail Navigation (SIMRAN), an ambitious project that the ministry has been working on for the last four years. The project involves digital mapping of stations. [source]

RCom in advanced talks with PE players for stake sale in arm

Reliance Communications is in “advanced stage of negotiations” with a number of private equity backed consortia to divest its stake in tower subsidiary Reliance Infratel.

“When we hopefully conclude the Reliance Infratel transaction, it will be the largest private equity transaction in the history of this country,” Mr Ambani said at the annual general meeting of the company. RCom is expected to sell between 51-95 per cent stake in the tower business [source].

IMImobile acquires UK application firm

Hyderabad-based IMImobile, a provider of technology infrastructure for mobile data, has acquired UK-based digital agency Skinkers for an undisclosed amount.

Skinkers has pioneered the use of desktop applications since early 2000, and recently had developed innovative iPhone/iPad and Android applications for some of the world’s best-known organisations and brands, including American Airlines, BBC, Haymarket, Microsoft, NDS, Spectator and Virgin Atlantic.[source]

Cognizant acquires assets of Zaffera LLC

Nasdaq-listed information technology company Cognizant has acquired the assets of retail consulting and software development firm Zaffera for an “undisclosed amount”.

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English Broadcaster NHK World Starts Launches Free Ustream Channel

We blogged several times about NHK's online efforts in the past few months (NHK is Japan's national TV and radio network). And today, NHK World, the broadcaster's international service that's available worldwide except for Japan, has launched a channel on Ustream.

NHK World, which broadcasts programs on Japan in English, is live-streaming its content for free on their Ustream channel (they should switch off this one though to avoid confusion).

The service has been letting users view some programs directly on its website for quite some time now, but according to The Nikkei, only "several tens of thousands of people" actually used that service (it's not a nice experience for Mac users like me, for example).

NHK itself was streaming programs on the web (via Ustream) back in March for a limited time, following the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami.

NHK World on TV is currently available in 120 different countries. The network has released a decent iPhone app in February 2010. It's also available online via Niconico.com, the English website of wildly popular video sharing site Nico Nico Douga.

English Broadcaster NHK World Starts Launches Free Ustream Channel

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Google to build data center in Singapore

Coming soon: A Google data center in the Western part of Jurong Island in Singapore. Currently, a piece of 2.45 hectare land (about three soccer fields) has been purchased by the Internet giant and blueprints are already being laid out.

The new facility will provide users from the region faster and more reliable access to its services, Google said in a statement released on 28th September. The data center would become operational in one to two years after construction begins, barring major delays.

“More people are coming online every day in Asia than in any part of the world, so locating data centers here is an important next stage of Google’s investment in the region,” the company said.

Asia is seeing tremendous growth in the mobile space. A joint study by Google and Ipsos found that four Asia Pacific markets have a higher smartphone penetration rate than the US (31%). They are: Singapore (62%), Australia (37%), Hong Kong (35%), and urban China (35%).

In terms of absolute numbers, about 518 million Asians are expected to rely solely on their mobile devices to access the Internet by 2015, up from 119 million in 2011, according to an Ovum study released in January this year.

Google will also build data centers in Taiwan and Hong Kong, investing up to US$100 million in each location.

Since construction plans for Singapore are still being finalized, they are unable to provide more details for the time being.

Singapore was chosen by Google because of its proximity to users, solid infrastructure, and friendly business regulations. Other firms like Amazon Web Services and Salesforce.com have also set up data centers in the country.

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Founder Institute’s Female Founder Fellowship

The next semester of the Founder Institute entrepreneur training program is due to begin Oct 25. While most parts of the application and training process remain the same, one big change that affects female founders is the newly launched Female Founder Fellowship (FFF).

This Fellowship will only be given to the “the most extraordinary female applicant” in each of the Founder Institute’s local chapter and who will have her course fees subsidized. In Singapore, Singapore citizens and permanent residents have to pay a course fee of S$600 (US$492) while foreigners have to fork out the full amount of S$2000 (US$1,643).

Any female applying for the program will automatically be eligible for the FFF but only one or two will be given for the upcoming Singapore Fall 2011 semester. Deadline is Oct 9th.

Increasing female mentors

At the same time, the people behind the Institute is also trying to the increase the number of females in their list of mentors:

“Despite active recruitment, only 10% of our 650+ global mentors are female. Founder Institute Mentors provide invaluable insight, feedback and support to our companies in the critical early stages, and we believe more female mentors can positively impact the long-term growth of female graduates in our program.”

For the upcoming Fall 2011 Semester, there are currently 7 mentors lined up for the Singapore leg out of which, only one is female: Cheryl Yeoh, CEO and Co-Founder of New York-based CityPockets. (Cheryl’s originally from our neighbour, Malaysia, by the way.)

If you know of any experienced female technology founder or CEO, you can let them know of this opportunity and to contact mentor [at] founderinstitute [dot] com for more information.

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Lobangclub – Will it work in Singapore?

Lobangclub comes from the Malay term “lobang” which means “tips”, is an app that allows users to scan a barcode and compare its prices with other local merchants.  Lobangclub is currently incubated at the Innovation Centre of Nanyang Technological Univeristy (NTU) and was launched a few weeks ago

How it works:

Choose a product, scan the barcode, compare prices with other local stores around you, decide where you want to purchase your item. As simple as that. The app also allows you to follow your friends and see their activities. The focus of Lobangclub, unlike other deal or bargain sites, is entirely community based and focuses on everyday prices for things that you buy.

What I like about the app:

• Allows me to know what are the prices of items sold around me
• Personally I really like the feedback tab – first one of its kind that I came across on an iOS app. I like the idea of being able to connect to the team directly and this shows that they care what is going on on the ground.

What I don’t like about the app:

• Some of the items that I want to purchase have limited price comparisons
• App crashed when I tried to add a price listing (lobang). Then again, the Facebook app crashes on me sometimes as well.
• Doesn’t allow me to see my friend’s profile or lobang

Perhaps the more important question is that, Can this work?

Of course, in some cases, Lobangclub can really help users enjoy great savings  especially on higher ticket items. An example of high ticket items provided by Guyi, founder for Lobangclub was a camera : “The Canon IXUS 115 was $30 more expensive at the IT Show than at Courts, and it was $5 cheaper still at SLR revolution at Sim Lim Square.”

Recently e27 reader,  Jacob, dropped me a comment on my previous post which goes: “an app is defined by how useful it is to the user”, which is very true. While Lobangclub aims to bring transparency to end consumers by allowing us to check and compare what are the prices of the goods sold in the local supermarket, this depends on whether users will actually share the lobang found on the app with other users in the area. It would be useless for me if say, I am checking for the price of a camera in Clementi area in the West but the app only shows me the price of it in Challenger at say Tampines area in the East.

At the end of the day, it really comes down to the question of opportunity cost. Is the savings of $5 or $30 justified by the time spent to travel to another outlet, not to forget the time already spent at the current outlet. Is the extra time spent worth $5 or $30? In my opinion, if Lobangclub focuses on daily groceries, I feel that the app would not work because generally the local supermarkets already have their own respective reputations of having pricier or cheaper products.

Also, on the note of local culture, I might look suspicious in a supermarket if I am seen scanning the barcode of a product. I might even be kicked out from a supermarket if I am stopped by an employee there, simply because it is not a culture in Singapore to do that. Other than that, I’m not too sure if local supermarkets are willing to share their prices for comparison so openly, thus they might not allow users to “scan their item’s barcode”. If I need to worry about all these, it may discourage me from using Lobangclub.

However, I do like what Guyi and his team are doing to motivate user to introduce new lobangs to the app, which is through gamification and the point system. That said however, personally I feel that it is not as effective and definitely needs a lot of improvement because it doesn’t motivate me enough to introduce more lobangs. Maybe the team can introduce some kind of reward system for users to do this, or even a leaderboard for “most lobangs added”

It would really be useful for end users if lobangclub can revolutionalize the whole local retail sector and one can easily find the price of a product X sold at the various local supermarkets in area Y. Currently, There are 40,000 Singaporean prices already in the app from beta users at stores like NTUC fairprice, Popular, Cold Storage, etc. and the app recognises over 500,000 products that are sold in Singapore. If you are someone who are constantly looking for lobangs, you should definitely check Lobangclub out.

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Social Enterprise Affair – 29 Sep-4 Oct

From this Thursday to next Tuesday, the Rotary Youth Social Entrepreneurship Challenge (RYSEC) is partnering with the International Women’s Federation of Commerce and Industry (IWFCI) to organize the Social Enterprise Affair. It aims to help young social entrepreneurs showcase their business ideas, source for funds, and network with senior entrepreneurs.

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Programme Details

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Booths will be set up by 29th September morning (see email below for the contact). On 1st October, there would be a social entrepreneurship forum, a RYSEC award ceremony and a networking session (between entrepreneurs, RYSEC participants and other young supporters of social enterprises). Events will be planned for the public at Orchard Central shopping mall as well.

 

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Event Details

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When: Thursday to Tuesday, 29th September to 4th October 2011
Where: Orchard Central (Map)
Interested participants can contact Warren by sending an email to warrenstanlee@nus.edu.sg.

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Mojostreet releases Android App – iPhone in the works as well

Mojostreet – a company which we had covered earlier – has released its Android app today. Mojostreet was a popular company in the last UnPluggd where most of the audience had asked them about an Android or an iPhone app (they already had a Nokia app). They had indicated that its in the works – and today is when they are releasing the app to the public.

We had the opportunity to try it out today. Here are a few thoughts about the app -

a) Usability – the look and feel of the app is very cool. It looks pleasing to the eye – and the signup and sign in experiences were very good.

b) Responsiveness – in spite of getting a lot of information from the server back end (like search results etc), the app was surprisingly and pleasantly responsive without much seeming latency.

c) Some of the buttons were a bit small on my Nexus One – hence a bit difficult to click on. This was especially when there was a lot of whitespace around.

d) In some cases, the app was a bit slow – e.g. inviting friends. I have about 4000 entries in my address book – so that is explicable. Also while scrolling down the lsit of friends, there is no jump to or a side scroller. That makes the task of scrolling down very difficult.

e) In terms of core value, they identified my location very well and gave me a few options to check in. Most of them were highly relevant – and I completed a checkin into a mall.

f) One of the major points of feedback is regarding their data. I think they can do well to add some more data points and populate the search results. E.g. I searched for Japanese (food) in Bangalore and got no results – and I am sure there are. I would think tying up with a Zomato or Asklaila for information would help them get this grounds up data.

g) I wasnt sure if it was serving me just local results – so I tried the same search in Chennai and it showed me a couple of places that do serve Japanese – so I think getting some more data in there would be a great value add for every user.

h) Of course in apps like these, the benefit (like Foursquare) comes when the tieups are with a huge number of restaurants, vendors etc. I think that is still some way to go – although they have some deals in there.

i) I also got a few toasts to “Please enable your location settings”. I didnt have my GPS settings on. Although I can do it – it still makes sense to have some kind of a help to help users do it.

j) They have an excellent feature where they track my location and tell me miles and travel type. I still have to try it in depth – but definitely is a good feature to have.

Last, but not the least, I recall the other major question which people asked them at UnPluggd – How is this different from Foursquare. Although there are some feature differences from Foursquare, the fact still remains that the value is pretty much the same for this app as well.

As per Kalyan, founder at Mojostreet -

We will continue to be in Beta and will be working with Users and Merchants to improve the experience further.  Users can provide their feedback using the Feedback option within the app or email us directly at support@mojostreet.com

Some helpful links -

• Website: http: http://mojostreet.com/index.php
• Blackberry – http://mojostreet.com/download_bb
• Nokia – http://mojostreet.com/download_nokia
• Android – http://mojostreet.com/download_a

The app is still in beta – so they are looking for feedback. Why don’t you try out the product as well and send them your thoughts?
Do watch the demo @UnPluggd

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Cloud computing: A primer for SMEs

SMEs have a history of being sold IT systems that are expensive and unscalable. They would buy proprietary solutions, only to discover that their investment trapped them into using inflexible, antiquated systems.

On the other hand, SMEs which did not make the investment in back-office IT and opted to do tasks in a more manual fashion incurred higher labour costs.

Cloud computing is the answer to these issues. Cloud providers give SMEs the ability to change service providers without incurring switching costs.

Simultaneously, cloud platforms allow SMEs like accounting firms, law firms and medical practitioners to focus purely on delivering services and utilise shared cloud platforms to deliver these services reliably and to scale.

What is cloud computing?

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software and information are provided to computers and other devices over the Internet.

In India, cloud computing is growing at a rate of four times the global average. The momentum in India has been fueled by high inflation which is driving business to seek cost savings. In Singapore in 2011, IBM invested US$38 million into cloud facilities and Dell also opened a local cloud computing center.

Benefits of cloud computing

SMEs can expect savings of up to 50% after migrating to the cloud over three years. Cloud  services have no upfront fees so capital outlays are turned into operational expenditure. Cloud provides a perfect relationship between user’s demand and price – it is perfectly elastic. Fees increase incrementally as users enjoy more utility.

But in the long term, cost savings is not a reason to move onto the cloud, as there is likely to be unforeseen teething problems which may equate to loss in business productivity, and result in a zero net saving.

Instead, SMEs should focus on the long-term benefits of cloud computing — a greater focus on core competency. Cloud promises to not only free SMEs from vendors, but also from daily routines which are not part of their core competency. With vastly less knowledge and in-house resources, SMEs can focus on growing their business and outsource back-office roles to service providers.

SMEs best positioned to take advantage of cloud

SMEs which fit one of the following profiles are strongly advised to consider cloud computing in their business planning.

1. Starting a new company or division;
2. Large IT investments in upgrades or new resources;
3. Decision to outsource a greater number of tasks; or
4. Move towards a decentralised workforce.

Cloud is not so beneficial for SMEs which have already made substantial investments in IT in the last 3 years.

A few cloud platforms available in Singapore

Dell

Dell has changed the way we purchase computers. Instead of buying a PC and upgrading with software, they are bundling cloud solutions with their computers.

www.dell.com.sg

Salesforce.com

In the market for well over a decade, salesforce.com has a local office in Singapore. They offer CRM and tools which automate marketing. Starts at S$25 per month.

www.salesforce.com

QuickBooks Online

Intuit, makers of QuickBooks have three packages available, all which are hosted in the cloud. No more problems with different versions of QuickBooks, or licensing for multiple computers. Starts at S$10 per month.

quickbooks.intuit.sg

Google docs

Imagine downloading the entire range of office applications like calendars, contacts and word processors, installing all of them, and upgrading each one as new versions are released. You won’t have to – manage all your contacts, email and documents in the cloud, and let Google upgrade while you get on with being productive. Less than S$10 per month.

www.google.com/apps

Microsoft Office 365

Next time you buy a PC, consider getting the Office package on the cloud. Access Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint virtually anywhere. Less than S$10 per month.

www.microsoft.com/office365

How we manage people will change

The way we manage people and what we expect from our workforce is going to shift. Cloud is causing an outflow of human capital from the back-offices of SMEs to outsourced businesses.

SMEs will have to become comfortable with not doing business face-to-face. Communication styles will need to evolve to deal with people now potentially located in foreign countries, and not contactable by phone. When SMEs do make contact they may find themselves talking to a different person each time.

Setting clear goals from the onset and carefully considering how the service provider fits into the SME’s ecosystem is key.
For example, using a cloud computing solution like QuickBooks Online allows you to break the back-office task of bookkeeping into several roles, and assign each role to a different person.

1. Project managers can raise cost estimates and invoices.
2. A service provider can input office expenses, payroll and compute Goods and Services Tax (GST).
3. Management can read reports

This kind of collaboration is now possible within one application via cloud. Almost all cloud services offer this capability.

Tips for migration to the Cloud

Migrate non-system critical functions. Offsite back-up and bookkeeping are two easy functions to migrate into the cloud. Then migrate other functions like CRM and document management. Consider how different cloud solutions might integrate.

Use 30 day free trials. Test various platforms before fully committing your firm and people. Introduce a new solution to a few staff to try out on a real life situation. Stick with well-known brands that have been around for a few years.

Demand service level agreements. Beware of service providers which ask for commitment without service-level agreements. Service-level agreements set expectations and decide how the service provider is measured and remunerated. Read their terms and conditions carefully and assess any direct or indirect switching costs.

Robust trouble ticket system. Cloud providers will try to push users to ticket using web-based forms and read FAQs to solve problems. If their system is not well augmented to deal with different issues, the ticketing system not well built, or the organisation does not communicate clearly in writing, consider other platforms.

Platform certification. Choose service providers who are certified by a platform. These service providers will have more knowledge about how the cloud platform works, how the company is run and when new software releases are coming.

Anthony Coundouris is the founder of Futurebooks – a business offering affordable bookkeeping,business planning and business brokering to start-up companies. Anthony has a decade of experience in all walks of marketing. Collectively he has helped dozens of corporate firms build subscription models and develop an online positioning, including Caltex, Jaguar, SAS, ING Direct, FoxTel, salesforce.com, Telstra,Proctor and Gamble, Google, salesforce.com, Kraft, Citibank and American Express.

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Creator of Fruit Ninja to Talk about How to Turn Your Game into a Global Sensation

With significant downloads and great popularity amongst global audience, Fruit Ninja has been a longstanding forerunner in the fiercely competitive mobile gaming market.

As we mentioned couple days ago, the blockbuster is teaming up with China Mobile in an aim to dive deeper into China with a Chinese market tailored version featuring localized characteristics to reflect on traditional Chinese culture.

And now,  Shainiel Deo, CEO of Halfbrick Studio the company behind the game is also coming to China to give a keynote titled “How To Turn Your Game Into A Global Sensation” at GWC’s New Speaker Series, mobiTalk.

Doing a game here? Come and check it out.

Register Here.

 

mobiTalk: A Mobile Internet Speaker Series

The mission of mobiTalk is to educate and inspire local Chinese developers and startups through dialogue with today’s most successful entrepreneurs and companies.

Episode #1: The Road to Success for Fruit Ninja

Focus:

Main speaker: Shainiel Deo, CEO of Halfbrick Studios
Dialogue: Shainiel Deo vs ZHANG He, COO of Domob

• Idea: Where did Fruit Ninja’s idea come from?
• Road to success: How to make a mobile game globally successful?
• Future: What are the main trends of mobile game?

Vitals:

Date: September 28th, 2011
Location: Beijing, 北京.创业影院【朝阳区大望路SOHO现代城D座三层创业影院】
Organizer: Great Wall Club
Media Partner: Tencent
Size: 120 people
Entry fee: 100 RMB/person

Schedule for September 28th:

18:30-19:30 Registration
19:30-19:40 Opening Speech: Bo Yiqun, President of GWC-China
19:40-20:40 Keynote and Q&A: Shainiel Deo (CEO of Halfbrick Studios)
20:40-21:20 Dialogue: Shainiel Deo vs ZHANG He,COO of Domob/Moderator: David Song, President of GMIC
21:20-22:00 Networking

Registration Information:

1.  This activity only accepts online application.
2.  The Main Speaker will speak in English.
3.  Great Wall will be free for members (only one per company).
4.  Application Deadline: September 27, 5:00 PM
5. Our venue is limited by 120 seats. First come, first serve! Register here.

Related posts:

1. Fruit Ninja Partners With China Mobile To Offer China Market-Tailored Game;China Telecom To Release Mobile IM YiLiao With Free Voice Messaging
2. Global Mobile Game Awards at GMIC2011 – Submit Your Mobile Game!
3. Event – Global Mobile Internet Conference 2010, Beijing

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Alibaba Spins Off Domain Seller HiChina For IPO

Alibaba, the giant B2B marketplace is planning to spin off HiChina, its domain-name and hosting service subsidiary for a potential IPO in the U.S. The Hangzhou based ecommerce company has submitted its proposal to the Hong Kong stock exchange today.

Back in 2009 Alibaba invested $79 million in HiChina for 85% of the company, a domain name register that is now extending its reaches into cloud-computing arena with site hosting initiative.

 

Jumping From Domain Selling To Cloud-Based Hosting

Founded all the way back in 1995, HiChina started out providing domain-name service with significant performance that more than 2.5 million customers registered over 2 million domain names through HiChina over the last 16 years.

In doing what it’s good at, namely selling domain names to companies as well as individuals, the Beijing-based company came to realize that for most of it’s corporate customers buying a domain name is just the first step towards eventually having a full-fledged website tailored to meet their needs.

After discerning the huge potential behind domain name service as well as receiving olive branches from Alibaba, HiChina kickstarted what it called “the Plan of Dreamworks”, an effort to simplify and streamline website building for small medium-sized businesses and individuals.

With a mission of “simplify website building for everyone” and a long term vision of “ serving businesses with one-stop internet services”, HiChina Dreamworks operates like a website building service trading platform, a Taobao-like marketplace for firms to find site builders or for site builders to list what they can offer.

For small businesses that want to strengthen their online presence but run on tight budget and with inadequate headcount, spending hundreds or thousands of RMB you can equipped yourself with a decent website just by shopping on HiChina Dreamworks website through couple of clicks. It’s cheap, convenient and easy to use.

 

 

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