It Is Not a Joke, Groupon Wants Group Buying Chinese Market

We broke the news that Groupon’s hiring in China, and it’s also not a secret any more that Groupon and Tencent is setting up a joint-venture company (rumor says the company share will be 50-50 and the CEO will be appointed by Tencent).

So here is the plan for Groupon’s group-buying Chinese market,

1. Recruiting >1000 staff and operating in >200 cities in China. And according to a headhunter, he says the number of staff they are looking for is 4000!
2. Site fully launched in May 2011, which means only 4 months Groupon wants to lead the Chinese market.
3. Rumor says Groupon might us Groupons.com (which is registered under Groupon) for China. But I really doubt it, not many Chinese understand the English words ‘Groupon’ and few of them would remember the ‘s’ in the end;

With Tencent’s dumping its millions users, strong local connection and Groupon’s $$$ support, unlike any other foreign web company, Groupon looks so aggressive and crazy this time.

So how’s Chinese Groupon-clones going to fight back? It says that several leading Group-buying site, including Manzuo, Lashou, FTuan, 58 etc have agreed to form an alliance against Groupon’s intrusion. The wolf is coming!!!

[image via edu.chengdu.cn]

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