Going vertical

I was having an interesting discussion this morning about who, if anybody, can challenge the Alibaba/Global Sources duopoly at the top of the Asian B2B tree. I look forward to receiving the calls from both of you saying that you can't be compared. The conversation will continue ladies and gentlemen.

EC21 is arguably sailing in the same ocean, although about a continent behind. Others like TradeEasy chug around in a much smaller pond.

No, the ones that catch my eye are those who are building strong positions in verticals. It's no coincidence in my opinion that Zhejiang Netsun had for a while (I haven't checked recently) the highest market cap of any stock on the Shenzhen stock exchange.

So, it caught my eye that those good folk at Ninetowns are pushing into verticals. Their tootoo.com has a cute name and is trying to compete with its quality rating scheme. But, it's interesting to seem them making some tactical purchases such as this Rmb5 million acquisition of 22% in Hangzhou Tophere Info-Tech Inc. The press release notes that:

Through its B2B website (http://www.21food.cn), Tophere has successfully conducted various trade transactions between domestic buyers and suppliers. Currently, Tophere employs approximately 80 full-time employees in China, and has approximately 1,000 paying members. In addition, Tophere has accumulated information of 149,000 food and beverage products available from over 136,000 Chinese suppliers.