...talking of auctions

And talking of auctions and B2B, as we were, we were interested to see a little more news of the Global Sources Direct service. We commented on this last June when the tie-up with eBay to service small B2B buyers and sellers was first announced. At the time, we suggested it represented an outflanking of Alibaba.com which doesn't appear yet to have made any serious effort to link its taobao.com auction site with either the English alibaba.com or Chinese alibaba.com.cn.

The announcement that made me think of this is pretty small stuff and talks of Global Sources adding new product categories in response to buyer feedback at the recent eBay Live! event in Las Vegas. Readers may recall that Alibaba staged an opportunistic reception in Vegas during that event which garnered not a little attention.

The Yahoolibaba! deal and Global Sources investment in HC International may be the big deals that grab the headlines and have the investment bankers salivating (there's a nasty thought before breakfast). The daily battles in the trenches, though, are where the China B2B media war is being fought - grinding out small gains and taking opportunistic shots whenever possible.