Shanghai Surprise

Beneath is a blog post from my friend Eduardo, he's the founder of a mobile SNS startup Fidgt.com, he's got more than 12 year of work experiences at Sony and Apple, and has close connection with Nokia, Moto and lots of other US mobile industry giants and startups.

He spent half a month here in China, and we shared lots of ideas about mobile internet and SNS, as well as valuable friends.

Here's his latest post after he went back to L.A. He mentioned me and my startup Changyou, thank Edu for that part, that'll help Changyou to improve my the PR image, thanks :-)

Shanghai Surprise

Author: Eduardo Sciammarella the Founder of Fidgt.com

I just returned from a trip to Shanghai. I was there doing some networking and meeting local entrepreneurs. One of the more interesting people I met was Leo Wang. Leo has a mobile start-up that's focused on combining the phone's address book with social networking.

Leo calls it Personal Relationship Matching or PRM, as opposed to the familiar PIM. This reminds me of talk about the SDA or social digital assistant replacing the PDA. Leo's company is called Changyou.

I was very surprised to find a very vibrant start-up scene in Shanghai. There are many local Chinese entrepreneurs as well as foreigners. Another company I met with is called Wealink. Their CEO, Ian Chin, is a very dynamic and forward-thinking person. Wealink is the Chinese version of Linkedin, but with many more features all for free.

Throughout China there are a number of incubators that are set-up for direct foreign investment. They are very interested in attracting companies in the software and interactive media space. One of the incubators I met with is called MPVC. They can assist in setting up your presence in China, as well as handle accounting, HR, and provide office space. Depending on whether your in a city like Shanghai our further out you can receive all sorts of incentives.

I did take some time to check out the local fashion scene. Fashion in Shanghai is exploding with little designer shops everywhere. One stroll down Changle Lu and you'll get it straight away. One of the brands that impressed me the most was ENO. Apparently they are venture backed and have their pulse on the street scene.

LBS vs. SBS (Status Based Service)

First, I'd like to claim that I think SBS would make an earlier success than LBS... Here's what makes me think so:

Last mobile2.0 salon was great, everybody's talking about LBS (Location Based Service), it's really a hot topic, but seems like nobody knows how to make money with LBS, that's a big problem - a hot concept without mature buniness model, just like SNS...

When people are talking about LBS, what I'm thinking mostly are Mobile SBS (Status Based Service), which was inspired by my Adviser - CEO of Wealink (Biggest SNS on Chinese Speaking World, Chinese Linkedin), I think status based services, applications, advertisements make more sense!

Basic idea:

Defining users by business and entertainment are not so precise, because business man also need to relax, to have fun and entertainment users also need to do business, to be serious, even teenagers are not playing game all the time, they need time to date, to read, to sleep, to talk, to shopping...

The better way to define users are their "status / presence" on diffenent time, at different location, in different environment, with different people, under different situation...

With different "status / presence" users need different applications and services, and that's where profitable business should be triggered.

Jobs need to be done:

To collect users "status / presence", we need to:

1. Offer mobile users an easier (or automatic) way to change / mark / select their "status / presence".
   
2. Upload users' "status / presence" to the server and get ready to be noticed by users' "buddies"
3. Offer mobile users an easier (or automatic) way to "add / find / get connected" with their "buddies" who would be allowed to check their "status / presence".

Profitable business:

With the presence of status of users, we can trigger lots of diffenent kind of "business" such as:

1. Advertisements: When users change / mark / select their "status / presence" as Super Boring", then you could push proper advertisements to him somehow - with hot news, via SMS/MMS/WAP PUSH; Marker will pay for the precise advertisements;
   into "
2. Friend Finding: When users change / mark / select their "status / presence" as "Feel lonly", then you could trigger a friend finding application and get two matched "lonly heart" connected anonymous via SMS / embedded IM client; Find a friend is free, but chat with him/her would charge a bit;
   
3. Ringtone: When users change / mark / select their "status / presence" as "Middle of Meeting", then you could automaticly change this users ring-back ringtone into a voice like "Sorry I'm in the middle of a meeting, if it's not an emergency, please wait and I'll call you back after the meeting", but the phone is still "ringing / vibranting / Flashing" (means callee can still pick up the phone); Unique ring-back ringtone is actually a juicy application already;
   
4. Mobile e-Commercial: When users change / mark / select their "status / presence" as "Want to Shopping", then you could open some mobile-online-shopping WAP site; When users find anything they want to buy, they could click-to-call and make the vender deliver goods to their door; We can get the commission fee at least;
   
5. Mobile Coupon: When users change / mark / select their "status / presence" as Hungry / feel like eating", then you could push some restaurant coupon for them to use; We can get the commission fee after they used the coupon;
6. ......
   

Maybe you want to say: LBS + SBS would be better!

Sure, I totally agree, Location based SBS would make more sense, but Location information has a inherent weakness: privacy...And Status information is not so sensitive. That's why I think SBS will make an earlier success than LBS...

That's what I'm thinking mostly lately, TELL ME what do you think?

About this Blogsite

This blog will be a professional information sharing and industry analysis site focusing on fast moving Mobile Internet Market in China.

I'm the author, Leo Wang, here's a brief about me:

Leo is an ambitious and passionate guy with 8+ years of working experience in Telecom, Mobile, and Internet field.

He founded Mobil2.0 private salon in August 2007 which is a high level industry communication platform, and based on Mobile2.0 salon, he started the incubator project for Mobile Internet startups - MOBILE2VENTURE, and now he's working for lots of startups in wireless industry as an independent adviser: Vogins, Shangmail, City600, 0wire, 10Live, Pai56, Doubao, Baiyong...

Before that, he used to work for big companies in Telecom, Chipset, and Internet industry such as HUAWEI, LANTOP, MDC, CHIPNUTS, WEALINK.

By the way, He's also a famous Chinese blogger covering mobile internet field, he's Chinese blog name is BETASHOW.

By Leo Wang
2008-07-13

http://www.linkedin.com/in/touchsky2003