SubscribeWhere are the clones in China?
Written by Angus Lau September 13th, 2007 . Tags: China, Office 2.0, SaaS.At the Office 2.0 Conference last week, I got thinking about the Office 2.0 services in China or the lack of. There are tons of really interesting office services in the conference and it’s surprising that none are being cloned in China, whereas just about every Web 2.0 social networks and video/photo community sites are cloned already.
So why are the developers not cloning any office services in China, considering many of the services aren’t localized? What makes SaaS less attractive than consumer services?
Anyone in China care to share some insights of business operations there?
I guess most of the Internet users in China are seeking fund and entertainment online, the demand on online collaborative productivity tools is still limited.
that’s a good question indeed.
maybe it’s gotta do with security, privacy and 24/7 access to broadband internet?
Office 2.0 services do rely heavily on internet/network accessibility.
Those services are relatively cheap and in some cases free to use. Sure beats installing pirated copies (at least for the SME/SMBs, I’m guessing they are more likely to use pirated software).
Is there not the need for collaboration there in businesses? Beyond that, I know CWR profiled a Basecamp clone.
http://www.cwrblog.net/699/basecamp-gets-a-rival.html
It is the natural development like the Internet and Web previously, first for entertainment (even sex and gambling) then education & learning, for work and enterprise is the last.
Agree to Jason, the China internet usages are on the way of evolution, they are now using it purely as an alternative information platform, their everyday life depends too little on the internet, they just treat it as an entertainment platform which burns out some of their leisure times, thats why SaaS are not hot topics in the China market and it would definitely be changing while the internet accessibility in China are improving is a fast pace, and ultimately they will benefit more from the internet, and the needs for SaaS will be more significant.
and Hong Kong has a similar situation actually , just a little bit ahead of China, as we still dont see any widespread usage of Web 2.0 tools here in Hong Kong.
Just my own opinion, corrections are welcome.
Hi!I’m Kawai from Shenzhen,China. why you can’t find office clones in china…I think the ressons should be: 1) to the developer,in a technical view,it will be much more difficult to clone another Google Docs,comparing cloning facebook,youtube,etc. 2) to the users,like me, i think MS Office and google docs are enough. they’re both stable and FREE.(you know, to individuls, pirate versions of MS products are always available in china)