Nov 22, 2011 ~ Web 2.0 Asia Blog

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Xiaomi M1 Phones Available to Everyone Starting December 18

11:55 PM Tech News No comments

the Xiaomi M1

We’ve been interested in Xiaomi’s low-cost high-power M1 smartphone since the first time we saw it, and we’re not the only ones. The company sold 300,000 preorders in less than two days, and since then customers’ biggest complaints seem to be that those preorder units are shipping slowly and that people who didn’t preorder can’t get their hands on the phone.

Well, no longer! In accordance with their original shipping plan, the company is ramping up the shipment of units over the next month from 5,000 units per day (right now) to 15,000 units per day starting December 5. Those go to people who preordered the phone, of course, but on December 18, the company will begin regular sales of the phone via its website. That means people without preorder numbers will finally be able to order the phone.

That’s good news for Xiaomi fans, and here’s the better news: orders placed on the site starting on December 18 will be shipping either the same day they’re placed, or the day after the order is placed, according to Xiaomi President and co-founder Bin Lin.

Mr. Lin gave us a great demo of the phone last month, so if the thought of being able to buy a powerful smartphone with some cool China-specific features for a pretty low price (1,999 RMB, i.e. $310) appeals to you, you might want to learn a bit more about the M1:

Link to full article

360buy Charges Shipping Fee on Orders under $6

11:01 PM Tech News No comments

360buy, one of the largest general online retailer announced yesterday charging US$ 79 cents (about RMB 5 yuan) of shipping fee on orders under $6 (about RMB 39 yuan), a move signaling the Beijing-based company which raised $1.5 billion in Series C from various venture capitals including Tiger Fund and DST with a valuation of over $10 billion also felt the winter chill and is trying to reduce its expenses, a reflection of what Chinese ecommerce sites are facing now under rising logistics costs.

The company’s move echoed by a public speech given by Letao CEO Bi Shen. According to Bi, rapid growth in delivering goods and campaigns resulted in Chinese ecommerce industry’s shabby revenue stream.

360buy which uses large chunk of its funding to beef up its own logistics service currently deliveries to 183 Chinese cities through its logistics arm while the number will reach 300 in next year.

Link to full article

43 percent of Singaporeans don’t want to engage brands on social media

10:33 PM Tech News No comments

A global study by market research company TNS Global has found that 43 percent of Singaporeans don’t wish to engage with brands on social media networks, against an average of 57 percent in developed markets.

This signals a need for brands to adopt a more targeted approach in their social media outreach, or otherwise risk wasting their efforts and contributing to digital media waste.

The findings were announced on 11th November following a study which involved 72,000 consumers in 60 studies. More results can be found on the TNS Digital Life website.

“Winning and retaining customers is harder than ever,” said Arnaud Frade, Regional Director Digital Strategy, TNS APAC.

“Whilst there are obvious and very significant opportunities for brands online, success will only come from a deliberate strategy, considered tactics and careful tailoring aligned to a market, a channel, a category or even a group of individuals. Getting this wrong and adding to the cacophony of noise in the online world risks alienating potential customers and impacting business growth.”

He adds that the goal of companies should be to connect in an authentic manner with their target audience by understanding them intimately. “Selecting the right online approach and focusing on efficient messaging are critical,” he said.

Other findings from the survey:

Fast growth markets are more open to brands on social networks. 73 percent of Vietnamese and 69 percent of Indonesians think social networks are good places to learn about brands, compared to 50 percent in South Korea and 62 percent in Singapore.
Across the board, 40 percent of Asian Internet users don’t want to be bothered by brands on social networks, “revealing that Asians would rather initiate contact with brands than have brands approach them.”
Although 45 percent of Singaporeans post comments on company pages to impart advice, 76 percent do so for the more self-serving purpose of engaging a promotion or special offer.
While common wisdom dictates that people tend to complain about bad service more than they praise good ones, this survey challenges that assumption. Globally, 13 percent have written praise, while 11 percent have written complaints. These figures hold true for Singapore. Thais are also found to be the most likely to praise (22 percent), while the Japanese complain the least (7 percent).
Consumers in fast growth markets are eager to spend more time and money online than they do now, although infrastructure challenges remain a problem for online brand engagement. Internet costs remain a major obstacle for Malaysians, Indonesians, and Thai users.
48 percent of consumers in fast growth markets are open to buying products from within social networks, compared to a quarter in developed countries. Singaporeans comes in at 41 percent, making them the most eager among developed markets in Asia Pacific.
Asian consumers are the early adopters of group buying and m-commerce (also see this study on smartphone usage). 46 percent of people in China and 33 percent of Singaporeans have adopted group buying, while the adoption rate in Sweden and Finland is only 6 percent.

Image: Full interactive version at TNS Digital Life

Link to full article

Prolific Hong Kong Game Studio Closes Funding Round

10:06 PM Tech News No comments

The prolific Hong Kong game development company Animoca, which has produced over 150 social gaming titles for iOS and Android since it started in January of this year, has closed a round of series-A funding. The final sum was not revealed, but it’s believed to be well over ten million US dollars; investment came from Intel Capital and IDG-Accel.

Animoca makes a lot of cutesy casual games such as Pretty Pet Salon (pictured above), Pretty Pet Tycoon, and Cinderella Café, which all come under its ‘Dream Cortex’ mobile gaming brand. It also has a ‘Baby Cortex’ division, producing “edutainment” apps for children such as Baby Flash Cards, and Alphabet Car. Most of the games are free, and use in-app purchases and advertising to generate revenue.

The firms’s communications manager, Mark Leeper, explained to PO that the parent company, Outblaze Ventures, has been in the tech arena for 12 years already, and recently changed focus to try lead the next wave of what’s happening in mobile. He describes Animoca as so far being “a ‘sleeper’ success story” that has not had the same level of coverage as, say, Rovio Mobile, and which is now boosted with this first round of funding.

In a press release, the CEO and co-founder, David Kim, added:

“With dozens of top-ranked apps and more than 40 million downloads worldwide, in just ten months we have built Animoca into one of the – if not the – largest app game companies in this part of the world […] Our goal is to establish the Animoca brand as a major international leader in smartphone games; the investments from Intel Capital and IDG-Accel will be critical to our efforts.

The last time we saw Intel Capital putting its money where its mouth is, was with the Indian group-buy site Deals And You.

Link to full article

A Vision of the Future, How Microsoft Sees It

9:39 PM Tech News No comments

Back in May, I attended a Mobile Monday Beijing event in conjunction with Beijing Design Week. The organizer of Mobile Monday, Orange Labs, presented their vision of the future, where technology would evolve to become seamlessly integrated into everyday life. From waking up and checking the weather and traffic conditions to walking into a clothing shop and seeing what you would look like in different outfits, projected onto screens as you browse. With the pace of technological innovation and with society increasingly using digital devices as an extension of themselves, this vision of the future is not unlikely.

Yesterday I stumbled across another vision of the future, through the eyes of researches at Microsoft. Titled, “Microsoft Productivity Future Vision” it also shows the endless possibilities of technology that can be applied to life and make it easier and more efficient. Much of the trend centers around mobility and connectivity, meaning being able to do everything without needing to be stationary. Smart-phones like the iPhone is the beginning of what will happen. Check out the video:

One of the most interesting ideas I found, was when the man in a Hong Kong subway points his glass device to a screen showing a busker in another country and being able to point and click to donate money virtually. Who knows how that works practically, but this is a vision of the future where anything can happen. Another cool idea was being able to see what’s inside the fridge through an invisible door, without having to open it first, hence saving energy.

One argument against such trends, even from an interactive designer is that, is such technology that limits movements mainly to a finger swiping a good thing? As human, we have incredibly powerful senses and muscles. The question raised, suggests that such a future depicted in the video, will devalue our ability to really feel, respond and react to things if everything is simply a projection. Does this mean we will evolve into just a brain, legs and a finger?

On the contrary, supporters and pioneers of things like augmented reality believe that such technology can only help us interact more with the real world. Instead of peeling away the physical world, augmented reality will layer on top of the real world and enhance our ability to work smarter with it. I agree more with this point and am truly excited to see the visions of Microsoft and Orange Labs become reality.

Link to full article

News Roundup: Only 2% Telecom Subscribers Opted For Mobile Number Portability

9:39 PM Tech News No comments

A year since the Mobile Number Portability (MNP) service was introduced in November last year, only 15.4 million subscribers, i.e. less than 2 % of the total mobile user base, have changed their operators [source]. While this doesn’t translate to happy customers (98% do not want to change operators?), the lower success rate is attributed to roadblocks faced by consumer while applying for MNP.

“Out of a total 20 million requests for porting by users, nearly 5 million have not been carried out. BlackBerry services, a caller ring-back tune, lifetime validity cards, promotional STD or SMS packs are often cited as reasons for rejection of MNP requests.”

Yahoo India Expands video section

Yahoo India earlier launched MoviePlex, a premium video destination allowing users to enjoy licensed, full-length movies for free through the Internet on demand and has now announced new partners for its Video section.

Yahoo! Video will provide original content across multiple genres such as news, entertainment, lifestyle and movies from 35 content producers which include NDTV, Star TV, Shemaroo, Headlines Today, PVR Pictures and Ultra.

“Online video consumption is growing at a rapid pace. However, a large portion of this is user generated content, which is often a rip-off of content. So, a lot of the content available is illegal and pirated” [PR]

Also see: Google Brings Youtube Partner Program to India

7.12m GSM users added in October 2011

GSM operators added 7.12 million new subscribers in October, taking the total GSM subscriber base to 625.41 million. In October, the growth was led by Uninor which added 2.66 million new users, taking its total user-base to 32.31 million at the end of October, 2011 [COAI]

Bharti, Vodafone, Idea seek PM’s intervention

To increase pressure on the government regarding 3G intra-circle roaming (3G ICR) agreements, the promoters of Bharti Airtel Ltd and Idea Cellular Ltd, Sunil Mittal and Kumar Mangalam Birla, as well as the global chief executive officer of Vodafone Group Plc, Vittorio Colao, have jointly written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, seeking his urgent intervention in the matter.

They have also said that if the roaming agreements are declared illegal, the government would have to return the money paid by the telcos for the spectrum as well as the money invested in building 3G networks [source].

Link to full article

Sribu.com: Crowdsourced Designs for Just About Anything

9:11 PM Tech News No comments

sribu

Sribu.com was founded back in June by Ryan Gondokusumo and has quickly become one of the hottest startups around in Indonesia.

It crowdsources designs almost for anything you can think of, from logos to t-shirt designs, brochures to calendars. We talked to its founder to learn more about Sribu.

1. What is Sribu.com? How does it differ from a service like 99designs.com?

Sribu.com is a crowdsourced design website between customers and the creative community. Crowd-sourcing is a concept of using a community of people to accomplish tasks traditionally performed by an employer or contractor. Aside from designs, we also do writing-based contests (brands, taglines) which is different from 99designs.com that solely focuses on designs. We are currently in the second stage of our web development and once it is done, the difference will be even more apparent.

2. How big is your team right now?

Currently we have five people on our team, and we keep trying to be as efficient as possible. Our business model relies heavily on automation.

3. Can you give us some of your key statistics or milestones so far?

So far we have around 30 contests on our site with logo contest as the favorites. Aside from logos, we have portfolios on calendar design, T-shirts, Business cards, naming, flyers, and brochures. In total,we have 13 categories of creative jobs to offer and which can be fulfilled by our creatives. Our customer satisfaction is close to 100 percent with most users loving the designs and using our service again. Our pool of 5000 talented creatives are happy with the current development and so far we have awarded around 70 million rupiah to them.

4. You’ve won a couple of awards already. Can you tell us a little about that?

It was an honor to win the SparxUp competition as the best user-generated content site. We gained tremendous exposure from the event which is very important in increasing our brand awareness. We are keen to participate in upcoming events similar to SparxUp.

5. What is your plan for next year?

Next year will be a busy year. We will focus heavily on monetizing the website while strengthening our customer service team to support it. In addition, we hope to launch our second stage of web development by early of next year which will improve our user experience greatly.

6. What is your opinion about the startups scene in Indonesia? How can it improve?

I have met with many entrepreneurs with amazing ideas or startups, and I believe if they are executed well they have the potential to be big. Attend events, get to know more people, talk to them, share your ideas and business models. It is always the best to get second opinions and advice especially from experienced mentors before you start making major decisions.

7. There is widespread belief that most of Indonesian startups are just clones of Silicon Valley’s successes, what do you think?

People are always excited to see a new idea, but in my opinion being a clone is fine. Regardless whether the startups are clones or new, the most important aspect to make it succeed depends on the team who executes it. The advantage of being a clone is that the business model has been proven to work.

Link to full article

MIIT Says No Need to Package Chargers with Phones, Consumers Rejoice?

8:16 PM Tech News No comments

cord-tangle

MIIT, the Chinese government body that inspects all your favorite mobile gadgets and toys, has announced that starting December 1st, mobile phone makers do not need to provide a charging cord to them along with the phones they submit for testing. What does that mean for consumers? It means that mobile phone vendors are now free to sell their devices without packaged power cords.

Sina Tech is trumpeting this is a victory for the consumer, since third-party chargers are often significantly cheaper than the ones that come bundled with your phone. Think about, for example, the difference between Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhone chargers and third-party chargers. That USB connector cord will cost you $20 if you buy it from Apple, and $0.89 if you buy a generic brand. So that means big savings, right?

Well, yes and no. From what we can tell, although phone makers are no longer required to package power cables with their phones, MIIT’s new regulations don’t stipulate that they’re not allowed to, and since that’s often a way for phone manufacturers to make some extra money, we’d guess that especially in terms of higher-end phones, you may still have to buy them with the power cord packaged.

That said, many vendors will likely offer phones without packaged cords regardless of what manufacturers plan, allowing customers to save money and also potentially reduce waste if they already have a charger or two for the phone at home. It’s not an earth-shaking market change, but it does seem like it can only be good for consumers, so…hooray!

[Via Sina Tech]

Link to full article

Geeks + iTwin = :D

7:22 PM Tech News No comments

I’m excited to announce that we have iTwin coming on board as a sponsor for Startup Asia Singapore. We had announced that the first 50 registrants would receive a somewhat geeky gift (in fact, we’re also offering it to the next fifty registrants as well) and here it is, as promised.

iTwin is a reinvented form of thumbdrive that allows secure and wireless file-sharing between two computers anywhere in the world. With an iTwin you do not need to hand your files over to a third-party server. They stay with you and are shared PC to PC.

For its innovative design and engineering, iTwin was recently feted by CES and Popular Science. Some benefits and features:

Easy to use (plug and play)
No limits to amount of files you can share
Remotely edit shared files
No subscription pricing
Compatible with Windows and Mac OS X

iTwin sponsors Startup Asia Singapore

Ok, I love iTwin already. How may I get one?

Remember what we said about showing some love to the first 100 early birds? All you really need to do is to sign up as soon as possible.

For the 50+ awesome people who have already signed up on the first day, you will be receiving your iTwin along with after-party tickets for ZOUK.

If you want to know what you’ll be in for at Startup Asia Singapore, read the detailed agenda here or our initial announcement here. Expect us to ask tough questions live on stage. And that includes iTwin’s co-founder, Lux Anantharaman, who will have a coffee chat with us on day one, February 2, 2012.

Feed your curiosity. Register here now. For startups who want a booth, use discount code ‘booth40′ to enjoy a 40 percent discount. This discount code will expire at the end of this month (hurry).