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WirelessDevNet.com Press Release
PacificNet Acquires Interest in Leading Mobile Internet Portal in China
BEIJING, -- PacificNet Inc. (Nasdaq: PACT - News), a leading provider of CRM, ecommerce and gaming technology in China announced today that it has entered into an agreement with MOABC (www.MOABC.com), a leading mobile internet portal in China, to purchase a 20% ownership equity interest in MOABC to strengthen PacificNet's wireless internet, mobile games, and mobile e-commerce unit.
MOABC.com is a leading mobile internet portal in China with 11 million registered users and boasts one of the top-ranked mobile internet sites, featuring mobile social networking, mobile games, and entertainment. This free WAP portal provides a variety of mobile internet services such as news, mobile gaming and entertainment services, mobile blogs, mobile email (Mo- Mail), Avatar and virtual pets, mobile online dating, mobile instant messaging, virtual communities, mobile social community and virtual showrooms to China's increasing mobile phone and internet user base.
Registered users of the portal are allowed to create their own personal profiles, share photos and videos and post blogs to "Mo-Space", a mobile personal web space for personal content, photo and video sharing similar to services offered by "MySpace" and "YouTube" in the US. MOABC is also a leading provider of mobile games and mobile pastimes, providing a wide variety of on-demand game downloads including SMS games, WAP games, and JAVA/BREW games. It is expected that the popularity of mobile JAVA/BREW games will continue to grow rapidly in China.
MOABC is also one of the largest mobile social networking portals with over 8 million registered users using its "Mo-Space" and Mobile-Blog services. MOABC is the first to roll-out the Avatar virtual showroom service, enabling mobile phone users who utilize these virtual communities to purchase virtual furniture and accessories to decorate their own personal space and virtual properties. All the services provided are free except for the VIP functions and virtual items that extend the experience in this fun-filled personalized world. PacificNet believes there is a market for further paid add-ons in the future.
As a mobile game portal, MOABC recently entered into a profit-sharing cooperation agreement with NetEase.com, Inc. (Nasdaq: NTES - News; www.163.com) on a newly launched mobile game titled "The World (http://mbox.163.com/rj )". "The World" is a Mobile Mass Multi-user Online Role Playing Game, or Mobile MMORPG Game, developed in JAVA that can be played by a large number of concurrent users online or offline using mobile phones, including various JAVA-enabled phones by Nokia, Motorola, Sony-Ericsson, Samsung, Siemens, and Lenovo. MOABC is an operation and promotion partner for "The World" and will actively promote the mobile game on its WAP.MOABC.COM site on a profit sharing basis with NetEase.com, Inc.
Casino, Nokia, Sony-Ericsson, Samsung, and other well-known consumer electronics brands have agreements in place to advertise on MOABC's mobile internet portal. These advertising revenue streams are also expected to grow in the near future as more advertisers see the potential of advertising to China's large mobile internet portal user base.
"With over 11 million registered users, MOABC is an impressive brand and top-ranked mobile internet site in China providing fun and entertaining mobile social networking services to the all-important demographic of young and trendy mobile users in China," said Victor Tong, President of PacificNet. "We believe that China's mobile gaming and entertainment market will surge in the coming years as a result of the expected launch of 3G services. We expect strong synergies between MOABC and PacificNet's group of companies in the mobile e-commerce and gaming areas. We are confident that our mobile internet, mobile gaming and e-commerce services will be stronger as a result of this investment in MOABC, resulting in a rapid increase in PacificNet's overall mobile user base and market share in China."
"With the early success of our mobile WAP portal services in China, we believe the market potential is strong for our WAP.MOABC.COM mobile portal and community, especially in light of the impending launch of 3G services in China," said Marco Lai, President of MOABC. "With over 11 million registered users, we believe our fun and entertaining mobile portal and sizable user-base will contribute positively to PacificNet's overall strategy in mobile gaming and e-commerce. This investment by PacificNet should create great synergies in management, sales/marketing and mobile internet technology. With China being the largest and fastest growing telecom market in the world, with over 400 million mobile subscribers, we believe our strong experience in mobile social networking services will contribute positively to PacificNet's growing CRM and gaming service network in China."
According to industry forecasts, mobile online games will become vastly more popular with the advent of 3G networks in China. Forecasts frequently note that online and offline mobile gaming differs greatly in terms of their service models. Online gaming uses a telecom service model earning revenues from traffic fees during play, while offline mobile gaming is simply a game application downloaded onto a handset for a small fee. The forecasts predict strong growth for WAP, JAVA and BREW, while the proportion of SMS-enabled games will drop. With over 400 million mobile phone users, China has already become the largest mobile population in the world. Moreover, the number of mobile users is still growing rapidly and has far exceeded the number of pc- based internet users, which is about 120 million, in China.
The acquisition is also expected to complement the company's Macao gaming technology services by PacificNet Games Limited (PacGames). PacGames is a leading provider of Asian multi-player electronic gaming machines, gaming technology solutions and gaming related maintenance, IT and distribution services for the leading hotel, casino and slot hall operators based in Macau, China and other Asian gaming markets. Macau is expected to surpass Las Vegas in total revenues by 2007. Currently, table games make up the bulk of Macau casino revenues, as opposed to Las Vegas where gaming machines make up the greater proportion. However, PacificNet sees a shift to greater usage of gaming machines in Macau over time. PacGames is a leading developer of electronic versions of these popular table games, which are less expensive to operate.
About MOABC
MOABC (www.moabc.com) is a leading provider of mobile social networking, mobile entertainment and mobile internet portal in China. MOABC initiated Web2.0+ mobile blog services to provide fun and entertaining contents for over 300 million mobile users in China. MOABC's mobile internet site (wap.moabc.com) has grown to over 11 million users, with 120 million daily page views and 1000GB daily data traffic.
MOABC's core products include "Mo-Space" (the first mobile personal space) and "Mo-Mail" (mobile mailbox), as well as online social networking, dating, avatar and virtual community mobile communication services. MOABC was awarded one of the "2005 Most Promising Internet Investment Program" and the "2005 Top 50 Internet Innovation" by the Internet Society of China (http://www.isc.org.cn/). MOABC was also selected as the "Top 100 China Internet WEB2.0" in March this year.
About PacificNet
PacificNet Inc. (http://www.PacificNet.com) is a leading provider of Customer Relationship Management (CRM), e-commerce and gaming technology in China. PacificNet's clients include the leading telecom companies, banks, insurance, travel, marketing, and business services companies, and telecom consumers, in Greater China. PacificNet's corporate clients include China Telecom, China Mobile, Unicom, PCCW, Hutchison Telecom, Bell24, Motorola, Nokia, SONY, TCL, Huawei, American Express, Citibank, HSBC, Bank of China, Bank of East Asia, DBS, TNT, and Hong Kong Government. PacificNet employs over 2,300 staff in its various subsidiaries throughout China with offices in Hong Kong, Beijing, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Macau, and branch offices in 28 provinces in China and is headquartered in Beijing and Hong Kong.
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