Rise & Rise of China’s Internet Billionaires

Chinese group Alibaba’s moves this week to take its flagship e-commerce site alibaba.com private by offering minority investors an eyepopping premium put the spotlight on an interesting fact: our neighbour is almost neck and neck with the US in having the most number of Internet companies with billiondollar-plus valuations.

And it also has the most number of pure dotcom billionaires after the US. ( India, by contrast, does not figure in either of these categories). China’s swift rise in cyberspace has been helped by its ability to block out most Western firms from its market (while copying their business models) and rising internet penetration*, not to speak of its language advantage.

505 million: Chinese Internet user base. This amounts to 37.7% internet penetration

Renren Better known as China’s Facebook, this social networking site was founded by Wang Xing, Wang Huiwen and Lai Binqiang in 2005 Market Cap: $2.11billion

Baidu A Google clone. Established in 2000 by Robin Li and Eric Xu, it’s China’s No. 1 search engine. Founder Robin Li is said to be the richest man in China Market Cap: $48billion

Sina Weibo, China’s answer to Twitter set up by Charles Chao, who sensed an opportunity after Beijing shut down non-China based microblogging sites in 2009 Market Cap: $4.2billion

Alibaba Founded by Jack Ma, Alibaba is one of China’s largest Internet groups. Its businesses: alibaba. com, etao, Tmall, TaoBao, Alipay and China Yahoo! Market Cap:$40billion

Youku Translated into ‘excellent’ or ‘cool’, this Youtube clone founded by Victor Koo in 2006. It is China’s No. 1 Internet video company Market Cap: $2.41billion

Tencent Founded by Ma Huateng and Zhang Zhidong in 1998, it owns China’s biggest portal. Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu together constitute the TAB triumvirate Market Cap: $44billion



Data compiled by: Srividya Iyer, Graphic: JAI