Twenty years ago, Zhongguancun was but farming fields and small houses, far from the city center of Beijing. The ‘cun’ at the end of Zhongguancun literally means ‘village’. As with much else in China, the change has come lightening fast.
Today, Zhongguancun is China’s closest equivalent to Silicon Valley. It’s host to electronics super malls, research centers, publicly-listed tech giants, and… → Read More
The runaway growth of Sina’s microblog service Weibo has been one of the hottest tech stories of the year in China, and we found out the power of the platform firsthand during the promotion and planning of TechCrunch Disrupt Beijing. One curious thing about China’s microblog wars is that an older technology company– not a scrappy startup– became the dominant winner. That’s partially a testament… → Read More
Before we kicked off Disrupt Beijing, the TechCrunchTV team had just enough time to venture out into the city to begin exploring the local startup scene. One of our stops: The Garage Café, a coffee shop where startup companies go to work on their projects. For the price of a cup of coffee (a little over 3 US dollars), teams can set up office for the day and have access to a library of reference… → Read More
At the end of this month, China’s capital city will begin rolling out free WiFi service in various hotspots across the city. The “My Beijing” wireless network, as it is to be called, is backed by three of the country’s largest telecom companies, China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, and will provide 2Mbps broadband WiFi to approximately 60 percent of Beijing through some 90,000 access… → Read More
What’s most amazing about TechCrunch Disrupt Beijing is that our Startup Battlefield format has proved applicable internationally; There’s something universal about giving your all in a pitch to people with money I guess. After watching the seventeen companies take the stage yesterday (and blogging all day), TechCrunch’s John Biggs, Greg Kumparak and I went backstage, exhausted and inspired, to… → Read More
What fuels Silicon Valley is a never ending desire to solve problems, make things work and get things done, no matter what the obstacles. If anything is testament to the universality of this spirit, it is the emergence of a fervent strain of entrepreneurship in China — most recently evidenced by the 46 hacker teams that poured their hearts and minds into their computers at the TechCrunch Disrupt… → Read More
We’ve teased you with this news over and over again, but today it becomes official: TechCrunch is coming to China.
In late-October we are hosting our first international Disrupt conference ever, and the obvious location was Beijing, the hub of China’s surging entrepreneurial ecosystem.
And we’re not stopping there. → Read More
Andrew Mason has been visiting Beijing and Groupon HQ has finally realized there are some problems in China.
On the Forbes website, Rebecca Fannin reports:
CEO Andrew Mason just arrived in China and hasn’t wasted time shaking things up. Four expatriate executives at Groupon who were recruited from rival site Ftuan just a few months ago will be leaving Groupon China. → Read More
Just add it to the list. Hotel rooms, offices, residencies and now taxi cabs. Visitors to China will be closely watched, monitored and recorded. As the U.S. State Department has said: All visitors should be aware that they have no reasonable expectation of privacy in public or private locations. Microphones have been installed in most of Beijing’s 70,000 cabs. Integrated with GPS, the system can… → Read More
The Summer Olympics begin tomorrow (time zone permitting), but you’re stuck in the office all day long and can’t watch. Not so! Using some of the same methods we discussed a few months ago, you can watch your favorite sport—I’ll be watching football (soccer) from the many watering holes in and around Barcelona—as it happens, in real time. Note that NBC is showing damn… → Read More
The Beijing Olympics begin August 8, but just remember what happens to the guy in first place. via fusioned.tumblr.com → Read More
With the Olympics coming to Beijing, China next year, electronics manufacturers know it’s time to step up to the plate and to offer something ridiculous and expensive to commemorate the event. Samsung today announced a special version of the P318 Anycall phone in a stunning 18-karat gold paint job.Combined with the black finish, it looks like an alright phone, especially next to the D&G… → Read More
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