China may see 9 in 10 dotcoms going bankrupt this year: report

　

September 4, 2000 Monday

　

SECTION: COMPANY NEWS

LENGTH: 211 words

HEADLINE: China may see 9 in 10 dotcoms going bankrupt this year: report

DATELINE: BEIJING

BODY:

Nine out of 10 Chinese Internet start-ups may fail慯his year as funding for such ventures declines worldwide, the China Daily泎usiness Weekly reported.

"It's not exaggerating to say 90 pct of Chinese dotcoms will go bankrupt by慯he end of this year," Zhi Tan, chief executive of 8848.net, a company that㗖elps small enterprises get online, was quoted as saying.

According to official data, however, China's online population almost賷oubled in the first six months of the year to 16.9 mln.

At the same time, the Ministry of Information Industry expects e-commerce戹olume to reach 10 bln yuan in 2002, up from a forecast 800 mln this year.

The problem is that enteprises trying to make money on online transactions霡ace a range of obstacles specific to China, the paper said.

The lack of a standard credit system or an effective express network is a麖roblem for companies, whether they want to perform business with other猬nterprises or with consumers, it said.

"Whatever e-commerce mode is adopted by Chinese dotcoms... they will猬xperience a hard time cultivating the market," Liu Zheng, an economist with慯he Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said.

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LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

LOAD-DATE: September 4, 2000