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发帖数: 4825 | 1 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870340730457615419
Groupon Gears Up to Expand Into China
By LORETTA CHAO
BEIJING—Deals website Groupon Inc. appears to be making preparations to
start operations in China, a move that could shake up the market for group
buying, even though challenges lie ahead for the young U.S. company.
[CGROUPON] Top: Loretta Chao for The Wall Street Journal. Bottom: Getty
Images
Groupon may face a crowded race for Web group discounts. Groupon's Beijing
office, top, and its Chicago headquarters
Chicago-based Groupon, which opened in 2008 selling discounted products and
services from local merchants such as restaurants and nail salons, faces a
huge Internet market that has confounded some of the world's biggest players.
China has more than 450 million Internet users, more than any other country.
In a Beijing office adorned with a large Groupon sign, staff are conducting
job interviews. A person in the office on Saturday said the company operates
Gaopeng.com.
The website, which appears to come from a Chinese phrase meaning "cherished
friend sitting around the table," is listed as registered by someone at
Internet giant Tencent Holdings Ltd., of Shenzhen, China, a 10% stakeholder
in Russian Internet firm Digital Sky Technologies, one of Groupon's backers.
Groupon would be entering a market as hundreds of other domestically run
websites are racing to take advantage of the growing popularity of group
discounts on the Internet.
One China-based group-buying search engine, Tuan800.com, estimates
transactions on such websites will surpass 16 billion yuan ($2.4 billion)
this year.
Though well-established U.S. companies including Google Inc., Yahoo Inc. and
eBay Inc. have opened sites here, Chinese companies such as Alibaba Group
and Baidu Inc., with their limited international reach, dominate the market,
which is fast-growing but tightly regulated.
Meanwhile, job listings for sales, marketing, finance, customer service and
other staff for Groupon have been posted by headhunters on Chinese job and
university sites in recent weeks. "The largest group-buying site is hiring
in Shanghai!" the ads say. "Groupon is the fastest-growing company in
history… and it's now starting its Chinese company."
Ye Hongna, a Groupon spokeswoman based in Beijing, declined to comment.
Tencent couldn't be reached.
Watch Groupon's 'Tibet' ad for Super Bowl XLV.
Groupon raised eyebrows with its controversial Super Bowl commercials this
year, particularly one that poked fun at the political situation in Tibet.
The ad features actor Timothy Hutton narrating a mock public-service
announcement about Tibetans being "in trouble, their very culture in
jeopardy," that becomes an ad for a Groupon deal on Tibetan food. Copies of
the commercial quickly appeared on Chinese websites with subtitles, drawing
criticism from Internet users who said it was offensive and showed the
company's ignorance about China.
Meanwhile, references to the social situation in Tibet are considered taboo
in China, where regulators often require discussions of Tibetan independence
to be removed from domestically operated websites. If Groupon opens a
Chinese site, it will need regulator approval.
—Juliet Ye in Shanghai contributed to this article. | u***r
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