Re: HRCT/Nanking murders. Yes, HRCT's on a tear, but I haven't been able to find enough hard data on 'em, too much of a leap of faith for me. I think you're also long SIFY - good company but I haven't checked their financials/valuations. I have foreign/small cap net plays of my own, will be tossing them out to my mailing list, unless anyone here wants me to stray offtopic.
As for Nanking, yeah. I don't know the exact details, but there's a book out there written by a Chinese-American lady called "The Rape of Nanking", detailing murders of Chinese citizens by Japanese soldiers. To say the least, there's no love lost between many Chinese and Japan. I've had several Taiwanese roommates, the older generation (the younger ones didn't seem to harbor much anger) particularly tends to despise the Japanese to some extent .
Thus, contrary to what most Westerners may think (who often indiscriminately lump all Asians into one homogenous category), I see "Masayoshi, Japanese citizen" as a liability rather than an asset in his quest to extend a global Net empire into Asia. However, that liability disappears if he is viewed as "Son, Korean expatriate", someone who was harassed growing up by some of his Japanese schoolmates. To answer your question Jonas, yes geopolitics will matter...
- Netconductor.com "toonces"
>>Jonas wrote:
Jay: Hartcourt, China, Softbank, Nanking effect
Still waiting anxiously your analysis on Hartcourt. Re Softbank and China, most of my Chinese friends have no kind
words for Japan (the history surrounding Nanking apparently has a lot to do with this).
I wonder if this was not behind the original defection of staff from sina.com to china.com. Won't this hinder
Softbank's entry into the Chinese markets? So they have the china.com CFO. OK. In a free market economy this
might be a great advantage.
For those of you who are not history buffs, tens (hundreds?) of thousands of residents of Nanking were cruelly
murdered by Japanese invasion forces during WWII,
during an attempt by Japan to conquer China.
Of course China has also suffered from the British and other colonial forces. I just wonder whether in a situation of
government control, where geopolitics is paramount, the Chinese government would ever let a Japanese company get
to control a major portion of their communications infrastructure.
Jonas |
