There’s no shortage of U.S. Internet companies that have failed to replicate their successes at home in Chinese cyberspace. Despite throwing considerable resources at its Chinese-language operation, for instance, Google (GOOG) is a distant No. 2 in online search [BusinessWeek.com, 8/30/07] behind local champion Baidu.com (BIDU). In online auctions, eBay (EBAY) threw in the towel [BusinessWeek.com, 12/19/06] in December 2006 after failing to dislodge the market leader, Hangzhou-based Taobao, and joined forces with Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing’s TOM Online. In instant messaging, Microsoft (MSFT) lags far behind local rival Tencent. Most recently, News Corp.’s (NWS) MySpace has had a disappointing performance in its attempt to export its social-networking model to China.
Edward Lo, the top China executive for online recruitment company Monster Worldwide (MNST) knows all about this sorry track record, but he says those failures won’t deter him and his colleagues. In a sign of their confidence, Monster on Oct. 8 announced it was taking 100% control of ChinaHR, one of the top online recruiting companies in the country. Monster, which already owned a minority stake in the company, is paying $174 million for the remaining 55% of the Beijing-based ChinaHR.
Why is Lo so confident that Monster can avoid the traps other U.S. e-commerce powerhouses faced in China? Demographics. With some 70 million college graduates a year, China has a strong demand for online recruitment, he argues, and Monster can capitalize on that. “The key thing is, we are in the right space,” says Lo, a former executive at AIG (AIG) who joined Monster in January.
Net-Savvy Job Seekers
Another plus: China’s young people are extremely savvy about using the Net, he says. Chinese college students spend a lot of their time playing online games, sending instant messages, and participating in social networks. So it’s only natural that young Chinese will…