Is Blizzard Considering Switching to Tencent for WoW in China

Blizzard’s World of Warcraft may be seeing a downswing in its user base, but it’s still got more players — and rakes in more money — than you probably care to imagine. And, nearly alone among Western-developed games, it’s super popular in China, where profits are actually rising even as they fall in other regions.

So, being Blizzard’s WoW operating partner in China has always been a coveted position, and it’s a partnership Blizzard has already shown it is willing to reevaluate. In 2009, for example, they ditched local partners The9 and took up with Netease. Now, rumors are swirling on Weibo that Blizzard is in talks with Tencent, and considering dropping Netease and going with Tencent as the new China WoW operator.

But you might want to take these rumors with a few grains of salt. Blizzard has already responded to the rumors, saying it hopes to continue working with Netease. Netease hasn’t said anything, but industry experts and insiders seem to agree that a Blizzard-Tencent deal is pretty unlikely.

Why? There are a number of reasons, but two of the most compelling are that Tencent is already partnered with Blizzard rival NCsoft and that Tencent already has many games competing with WoW that would profit if Tencent were able to get control of WoW and, er, run it into the ground. Moreover, Tencent has been showing signs it is seriously eyeing the international gaming market, and might be looking to become a Blizzard competitor in its own right.

So is Blizzard thinking of switching to Tencent? Probably not. But hey, you never know. Plus, we need something to talk about while we’re waiting around for that panda expansion pack, right?

(Just kidding, you should all be playing Skyrim instead).

[DoNews via Sina Tech]

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ShadiMagic wants to be the marketplace for Wedding Related Services

In the early days of web2.0, quite a few wedsites popped up but very few of them survived. Most of these wedsites were competing with Facebook(s ) of the world , though none of them were trying to solve basic pain points in the wedding market.

Shaadimagic, a NCR based startup takes wedding planning to a more actionable dimension by providing wedding planning information and importantly, vendors listing service.

Features offered by Shaadimagic:

- Online Wedding Planning magazine
- Listing for the vendors and agencies
- Offers a shopping portal, planning tools for bride and grooms
- In future, will offer personalized wedding website and an Expert Guidance section

Though the site starts off with a good concept, they should really look at bringing more technology focus to the wedding planning approach (right now, they are mostly using free plugins from Joomla) as these plugins would eventually require custom development in order to evolve the product. In fact, if the team needs to decide whether it’s a content portal or a local search engine (for wedding market), as that will also help them in create a crisp features and positioning for end users.

Here is a quick QnA with Shaadimagic team:

Pluggd.in: How are you adding vendors? Are these from yellow pages or are vendor approaching you?
Shaadimagic: Either vendors themselves or our sales team approach them, we are not providing any free listing …Its a paid service to maintain the quality of vendors and all the services are free for end consumers i.e to-be weds.

Pluggd.in: How much of business have vendors received? Do you track these numbers (CTR etc)?
Shaadimagic: Currently, we are not tracking the conversions, though we got queries form to-be weds and we forward those to our vendors and have also received reviews from brides, grooms & their family that the portal is very informative and they had approached listed vendors for their wedding needs.

Pluggd.in: What’s the future roadmap?

Shaadimagic: The current vendor listing is primarily in NCR region only. We are planning to expand it to all the metropolitan cities of India in next 12 months and also increasing the services such as personalized wedding websites, more planning tools, expert sections etc..

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If you are getting married, do check out Shaadimagic and share your feedback.

Related posts:

1. Canvera – A Digital Services Company targeting Wedding Market Needs[Business Model Overview]
2. P2W2 – Online Marketplace for Services Industry
3. Bangalore based BookMyTrainings Launches Marketplace for Training Programs
4. PerSquareFeet wants you to review builders (all things related real estate)
5. DealsForStartups: 45% Discount in Company Incorporation (+ Related Formalities)

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Haiku Meets Twitter on a Nanoblogging Service, Hycku

Bored with just plain vanilla status updates in microblogging sites? Are you looking to express yourself in more poetic way to the world?  Do you think 140 character is too short for you?

If you say yay, well check out Hycku, new service launched by Indian developer Vasanth. Hycku’s nano-blogging platform is inspired by Japanese haiku, a poetical form that has people expressing the way they feel in just 7 words. On Hycku, you have maximum limit of 7 word to express yourself or answer “Whatz up?”

Hycku - Twitter meets Haiku

Though Hycku updates allow 255 characters, you can only use 7 words! In terms of product features, it follows the same model as Twitter – i.e. you can follow other users and send them public/private messages. If you are sharing link, you can use maximum 6 word, however sharing image doesn’t penalizes you on using the seven words.

An interesting idea – the key for such hacks to go viral is to bring in either a few celebrity users or ensure that the hyckus are shared across one’s social network as well. Most importantly, targeting a few niche communities like poets etc. would be more useful than a large chunk of userbase, who are already on Twitter/Facebook.

Here is a quick QnA with Hycku developer, Vasanth V:

Pluggd.in: What platform have you used to build this? Is it developed from scratch or ..?

Vasanth: It is built using LAMP (Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP). Yes off-course it is 100% custom built from scratch.

Pluggd.in: Future plans?

Vasanth: Currently we are concentrating on attracting more users. In future it is gonna be a quick communication platform. Twitter has now become a news sharing site, we are planning to be as a communication platform where users can have chat with one on one, one on group or one on globe.

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Do give Hycku a spin and share your haikus!

Related posts:

1. Osutra – Twitter Meets The Hyperlocal Market
2. Twitter meets Instant Messenger | How to Chat with your Twitter Friends
3. chittr: India’s twitter (the microblogging platform for India)
4. Microblogging meets Real Time QnA – Announcing Answers Service for Startups
5. Twitter in India – People Use it as a News Service [Survey Report]

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Zomato Goes for a Kill..Launches Online Ticketing Solution

Zomato, the NCR based lifestyle site has forayed into ticketing solution with the launch of its New Year Event section (http://zomato.com/newyear). The company added Events a few months back and has timed the launch of its online ticketing solution with New Year’s eve, ensuring enough buzz around the launch (they have also launched print ad campaigns).

Zomato’s Events section, which lists over 500 upcoming events across Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Pune, has gone live with over 175,000 tickets for New Year’s Eve parties (translating to INR 40 Cr of ticket inventory online). Tickets will be available for more than 30 venues in each of the four cities – Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Pune.

Competition for Ayojak/Buzzintown?
This is, I’d say is the most credible competition for online ticketing providers like Ayojak/DoAttend and importantly, the event listing guide, Buzzintown. Zomato has taken an underdog approach towards monetization and I won’t be exaggerating to say that Zomato’s real game starts where most of lifestyle guide’s focus stops. That is, monetization via transactions instead of purely relying on banner ads/eCPM model.

Zomato’s biggest differentiator in this game is existing relationship with lifestyle venues, which other ticketing providers will find difficult to crack (to start off, Zomato is not charging any convenience fee unlike other portals).
Though the key here is to see whether Zomato does a good job in building the backend for event organizers (read our Comparison of Online Ticketing Services) and provides relevant solution to them or not.
Also, what happens after new year? Do they plan to get into the turf of Bookmyshow? Surely an interesting initiative to watch out for.

- Zomato recently raised $3 million funding from InfoEdge and claims 2 million monthly visitors to the site.

- Recommended Read: Guest article by Zomato cofounder: 9 Entrepreneurial Lessons [Money solves only a single problem..and that’s Money!]

Related posts:

1. Eventzilla – Online Ticketing Solution for Events
2. InfoEdge To Invest $3 Million in Zomato
3. Ayojak Launches CoD Solution To Sell Event Tickets
4. Introducing Zomato, Our Hackathon Partner [+ Your Chance to Win An iPad]
5. Compared: DoAttend Vs. Ayojak [Online Ticketing Services]

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Privy.net Launches iPhone App, To Let You Know What’s Hot in Town

Privy.net is an exclusive membership only community that is built on the philosophy of ‘it’s who you know’. The first thing I noticed about the site, is that it is made up of successful, rich, good looking,  Asian American’s such as Lisa Ling of , Kelly Hu and Steve Chen of Youtube, an interesting niche sub-culture. The network aims to help members find out what’s hot from who’s hot, like what to eat, wear, travel, party and buy. Of course everything is of class and only available to people privy to such information and connections.

Like other exclusive networks like P1, in China for ‘wealthy’ Chinese people or A Small World for celebrities, Privy.net only gives access to approved members.

Some of the things they cover are events like the Miss Universe China crowning, Hennessy Tasting events in New York, interviews of cardiologist turned fashion designer or covering a story about rich Chinese women buying Maserati sports cars. To some it may seem pretentious but it’s rather natural for humans to want to feel a part of a group, this group just tends to be a class of confident, successful Asian Americans.

Now Privy.net has released an iPhone app for members to connect with each other when they travel and share what they are doing. Stephen Liu, Founder of Privy.net said “One of the original inspirations that led to the creation of Privy was to solve the logistics challenge of coordinating roving itineraries among trusted friends and people you actually do want to meet. Rather than telling the whole world you are in Taipei and hoping they respond back to you — with the Privy iOS application — you can now discretely share your itinerary with the people you want to know as well as find out who will be in town on precisely the same days you are, and then connect with them.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In future developments they will create a “curated social dashboard” that answers what we feel to be three very basic but important questions when arriving in a city that’s not your own:

1. Who’s in town? (not only who’s based here, but traveling to the city at the same time)

2. Where to go? (trusted recommendations and perks on the latest and greatest to eat, drink and stay)

3. What to do? (invites to events hosted by Privy or our members)

Privy is planning to launch a Beijing network, soon and you can register your interest here.

For members, you can download the app here: http://bit.ly/privyapp

 

 

Related posts:

1. Truth Soft – iPhone App for Travel
2. P1- a social network for China’s affluent
3. Tencent Launches Q+ (Not Like G+)

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Has Google Dropped to Third Place in China? [STATS]

New data from web analytics company CNZZ suggests that Google (NASQAQ:GOOG) is now in third place in China in terms of search engine traffic – pushed down by the rise of Sohu’s (NASDAQ:SOHU) Sogou.com.

But a note of caution: analytical methods can vary greatly, and CNZZ’s numbers have always been greater for the smaller search engine rivals than the stats from, say, Enfodesk, that we’ve used in the past. Here’s the most recent data for November, in terms of traffic:

Nonetheless, if anyone was going to steal Google’s tenuous second position in China, it was clearly going to be Sohu’s Sogou, which has long been the strongest of the also-rans who are ultimately aiming at taking market share – and ad revenue – from Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU). It is perhaps helped by its popular web browser, Sogou Browser, which of course defaults to using its own search engine. Indeed, earlier this summer Sohu’s chief executive, Wang Xiaochuan, said in a speech that “Our real aim is to overtake Google in China within a year.” Mission accomplished, if CNZZ’s data can be backed up by some other sources too.

Looking at the data for last month compared with November 2010, we see the same eight competitors in action, with Tencent’s (HKG:0700) Soso search and Netease’s (NASDAQ:NTES) Youdao perennially stuck in fourth and fifth places, respectively:

The only major changes we see are Bing going up to sixth, and Sogou’s step up to second.

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Holding On to Revenue

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Google declined to comment on the latest stats when contacted by the China Daily. But the American search giant can take solace in still being a strong second in terms of revenue. Analysis International says that Google still brings in 17.2 percent of revenue in this industry in China, largely due to its advertising network. Forbes’ Eric Jackson pointed out last week that Google’s China business still rakes in US$640 million per year. Though in the broader Chinese market, that’s actually in third place behind e-commerce company Alibaba Group.

Sohu’s Sogou, in contrast, takes only a 2.2 percent-sized slice of the ad revenue pie in the search market.

On a final note, the playing field is far from level here, with ongoing Great Firewall interference on all Google’s search sites – not just Google.com.hk, which it runs out of Hong Kong – causing the search homepages to be slow or inaccessible about half the time I try to use them from within mainland China.

[Sources: CNZZ, via China Daily]

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LG Introduces Optimus LTE in Japan

We had a preview of LG’s Optimus LTE phone back in October at the unveiling of Docomo’s (NYSE:DCM) winter lineup. And today LG (003550:KS) is officially launching it in Japan, as we’ve received a short announcement from the company this morning.

With a 4.5-inch HD IPS display, and mobile wallet and one-seg functions, the handset is one of Docomo’s top Android offerings. And while the front view looks like most other high-end smartphones (iPhone and Galaxy S/SII), the bright red on the rear is a nice differentiator, though a cosmetic one. LG Mobile’s president and CEO Dr. Jong-seok Park noted:

The Optimus LTE is one of LG’s most promising devices and has already been received well in Korea, Canada and the United States… As a worldwide innovator in mobile LTE technology, we are committed to developing high-quality devices that showcase our technical experience and True HD IPS display.

For a closer look, you can check out some of LG’s kimono-tastic promotional images for the Optimus LTE below.

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