HKTDC to build a swimming pool in the sky

I had been wondering how the HKTDC would tiptoe around the PR minefield of needing to demolish a public swimming pool and sports centre (both in very short supply in Hong Kong) in order to build the Phase III of the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre it so dearly wants. Today's new, free Standard newspaper gives a clue.

It reports today that the government is favouring early approval of Phase III and that TDC will hope to overcome likely public opposition to its plans by re-building a public swimming pool on top of the new extension. Let's hope it doesn't leak.

The story shows that the Macau, Venetian 'bogeyman' line is being pushed by proponents of the project. "How can we compete without it?", they plead. Hmmm. Maybe they should propose a casino on top instead of a pool....

Sausages at the Frankfurt Book Fair

Only one blog entry made me laugh out loud today and, not for the first time, it was from Richard Charkin, CEO of Macmillan and one of the most engaging writers on publishing. Based on his own consumption, he worries that the caterers may be under-provisioning the sausage stalls at the upcoming Frankfurt Book Fair.

We spoke earlier in the week about publicity stunts. Charkin is not above pulling his own. At the
Book Expo America earlier this year, his "Google heist" was a dramatic way of demonstrating his discontent (along with many other publishers) of the Googleplex's cavalier attitude to copyright.

It would be nice if there were few more CEOs who could make us smile while making money.

Denny vs. Jack...all over again

We commented a few days ago on the news that Jack So is coming back to the HKTDC. We had missed until we were poking around on AsiaWorld-Expo's web site a few minutes ago the news that his old nemesis, Denny Yung is also back with a jewellery fair at the airport. This is due to take place in the 3 days before the HKTDC's own March fair.

Those with long memories will recall that Denny Yung's former company, Headway, was involved in a bitter spat with the TDC over two competing September jewellery fairs. This was finally resolved in 1995 (I think) when Miller Freeman (now CMP Asia) acquired Headway and folded in the TDC event into what is now one of the world's largest jewellery fairs.

The spelling mistake in the logo of the new Neway show at AsiaWorld-Expo doesn't give full confidence that this event will have the capacity to bruise the TDC March show seriously. But, there must be a few old hands standing on the sidelines to watch how this one shapes up with great interest. It's the Hong Kong exhibition industry's version of Rocky IV.

Don't fight on price

Had a good chat at lunchtime today with Eddie Choi, the founder and CEO of Tradedot which also runs Vertical Expo. I'm speaking on a panel he's chairing at next month's ad:tech event in Beijing.

We seemed to share opinions on quite a few things and I certainly agreed with the "Good Show, Bad Show" post on Eddie's new blog where he warns against the dangers of competing on price int the trade fair business. He suggests:

...in my humble opinion, many trade show organizers are now competing in price will end up running a “Bad” show. Because those organizers who involve in price war can only afford to produce no-frill event. Hey, this is show business. Skinny trade show budget will only drag the business into a lose-lose cycle. No frill -> no public eyeball -> no traffic -> no exhibitor -> no business.

Infomedia in play

India's Economic Times has reported that one of the country's leading directory and specialist magazine publishers Infomedia is likely to move into private equity ownership. A 63% stake in the company, formerly part of the Tata empire, has been controlled by Indian bank ICICI since 2003.

The article reports that General Atlantic, Blackstone and Warburg Pincus are all thought to be interested in the business which, if sold, will record a tidy profit for ICICI:

Given the fact that whoever buys the stake will have to make an open offer and also pay a controlling premium, the buyer should sell out upwards of Rs 400 crore. Infomedia’s market capitalisation is Rs 474 crore and its shares closed at Rs 240 at the BSE on Wednesday.

There was no confirmation of any of this from either ICICI or Infomedia boss Prakash Iyer.

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.

The publicity stunts get bigger

Last week, it was Diana Ross in Macau. This week Reed Exhibitions organised an even bigger publicity stunt for the opening of its first Asian Aerospace in Hong Kong (you may recall we covered the uncomfortable exit from Singapore last year). The harbour fly-through by thee A-380 gave Hong Kong's aviation shutterbug's their best photo op since Kai Tak closed in 1998.

As the Standard newspaper has just announced that its going free, I trust they won't mind me linking to their story through the photo here. Their editor was just on the Hong Kong morning news radio talking about how hard they've been hit by the Stock Exchange's decision to loosen the requirement for publicly-listed companies to place all those enormous official announcements in one English and one Chinese newspaper.

Jack's back

There will be a little nervousness among its competitors at the news that Jack So has been appointed as new chairman of the Hong Kong Trade Development Council from 1st October. During his tenure as Executive Director (1985 - 1992), So gave the TDC a much more hard-nosed commercial focus than it had before and has since repeated the act at Hong Kong's MTR (subway) and, more recently, at local telecoms giant PCCW. This latter job, however, Bloomberg reported on March 28th that "So quit as Hong Kong's largest phone company reported an unexpected 22 percent slump in annual profit".

With it's web sites, catalogue magazines and trade fairs, TDC is one of the biggest players in business media in Hong Kong. It is also the owner of the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre.

Half the world's most wired cities in Asia

It seems that the holidays have focused the minds of US editors on the challenges of competing in the wired world. No sooner do we see the Washington Post wringing its well-manicured hands over the superiority of Japanese broadband than we find the endangered species which is editor of Business 2.0 reinforcing the point with a piece on the 12 most wired cities in the world.

The TechnoKimchi blog points out that "6 out of the 12 cities are Asian cities: Bangalore, Hong Kong, Seoul, Shanghai, Singapore, and Tokyo." None is in the USA. The other six are Barcelona, Helsinki, London, Stockholm, Tallin and Tel Aviv.

Back to future with Japan

This Washington Post article, posted on his Facebook page by Hugo E. Martin has a distinctly 1980s feel to it. It is full of angst and chest beating about how Japan is racing ahead of the US with better Internet technology. It begins:

Americans invented the Internet, but the Japanese are running away with it. Broadband service here is eight to 30 times as fast as in the United States -- and considerably cheaper. Japan has the world's fastest Internet connections, delivering more data at a lower cost than anywhere else, recent studies show.

Heck, before we know where we are, they'll be buying Hollywood movie studios and Rockefeller Center...

It makes a change from the China hysteria on which so much US newsprint is now wasted.