Microsoft is back and offering a new deal to Yahoo!.
Microsoft Corp has proposed to buy Yahoo Inc’s search business and take a minority stake in the Web pioneer, stopping short of a full-out merger, a person familiar with the discussions said on Monday.
As part of the deal, Yahoo would sell its Asian assets including significant [...]

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It has been a busy week for Alibaba.com with a flurry of news releases. TradeMediaBlog is happy to bring them to you below with comments.
Alibaba.com formerly announced the often referred to Joint Venture with Softbank. This US$20 million deal (Softbank 65%; Alibaba.com 35%) will hopefully put some marketing/sales muscle behind a site that has been [...]

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China’s National Statistics Bureau released data this week showing that inflation grew by 8.5% in April which is its highest level in nearly 10 years.
As a reminder, February’s inflation rate was 8.7%, the highest in 12 years, and March was 8.3%.
The government is doing its best to cool this trend by:
1. Requiring banks to set [...]

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Lots of online media news in the last week that I will try to capture below along with a some comments. Forgive me for this long posting but worth a read!
On May 6th, Alibaba.com reported great Q1-08 numbers that beat all analysts’ expectations. The company saw net income double Y-O-Y (US$43 million) and sales increased [...]

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In January, I reported on TradeMediaBlog that Global Sources was offering for the very first time a low cost entry package for their export marketing services which was a concern for Alibaba.com.
It now seems that these new packages are starting to gain traction.
South China Morning Post reported today that Global Sources’ new pricing plan is [...]

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For those of you deeply involved in Search Engine Marketing (SEM), you are aware of the costly issues dealing with Click Fraud.
For newbies, Click Fraud is when someone or something (a ’spider’) ‘clicks’ on a paid ad listing without any interest in the ad or intent on buying from the advertiser.
What’s the big deal? [...]

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As stated in my April 21st post on TradeMediaBlog, the world was watching for Yahoo!’s results on April 24th and they just weren’t that great.
Mass media reported solid revenue and profit growth but if you looked a bit closer you soon realized that most of this lift was provided by a one-time gain from the [...]

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All eyes on Yahoo! this week as they release their most important earnings data in the company’s history April 22nd. Google, Microsoft and Alibaba Group will be watching closely to see if they can deliver the numbers they reaffirmed with analysts. We will also be looking for signs of traction from tweaks to its advertising [...]

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My April 1st posting, Google Slowing?, detailed interpretations of recent Comscore data that showed that the almighty Google may actually be losing strength.
However, Google just released their Q1-08 earnings and hit the ball out of the park! Check out these numbers:
- Q1-08 earnings of US$1.31 billion or $4.12 per share versus US$1 billion or $3.18 [...]

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The Canton Fair, one of the world’s largest and most comprehensive trade shows, opened its 103rd session April 14th in Guangzhou, China.
This year’s event (and almost every year) is said to be the ‘biggest and best’ with ever increasing numbers of exhibitors and expected attendees.
However, SCMP.com and our good friend, Paul Woodward, have reported that [...]

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