Hipihi Announced Funding and Global Strategy

Written by Tangos on August 20, 2007
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Hipihi, the 3D virtual community in China, announced its funding and global strategy today during the conference “State of Play V: Building the Global Metaverse” in Singapore.

There was market rumor on Hipihi’s funding for quite a long time, Hipihi announced NGI group from Japan becomes one of strategic investors of Hipihi, but the announcement did not disclose the amount of fundings. Besides funding, NGI group would be a strategic partner for Hipihi to develop Asian market, esp. Japan. In June, NGI group established a subsidiary company, 3Di.jp, to focus on the burgeoning virtual world business.

Hipihi also said it aims to boost the ecosystem of the 3D virtual world and establish a world-wide collaboration in this market. (From its announcement)

There are three parts involved in HiPiHi’s global strategy. First, HiPiHi will cooperate with global leaders in the Internet and communication industry to establish a set of relevant hardware and software standards for the development of the 3D platform. Second, HiPiHi will cooperate with other major 3D virtual worlds to finalize these standards, and bring the possibility for users to interact and transact between different virtual worlds. Lastly, HiPiHi will actively build its “Global Market Partnership Project”, “Third Party Developer Project” and “Community Partnership Project”, to establish a HiPiHi virtual world global value chain.

It is rare for a Chinese companies to announce its global strategy when it is still in beta test. I hope Hipihi would really work something out with its technology and product for global virtual community market. But on the other hand, to match with its global strategy, Hipihi should further improve its English website and launch its English version client soon.

Update: NGI Group invested $300$3 million into Hipihi.

4 Responses to “Hipihi Announced Funding and Global Strategy”

  1. Marc on August 21st, 2007 12:27 pm

    Tangos, as you should know from your experience in the Chinese web 2.0 sphere, it is impossible that a start-up like HiPiHi with a product that is still in beta would ever get USD 300 million. Please check your sources (and note them on your blog) and think about what they tell you before putting it on your blog.
    Cheers, Marc

  2. fukumimi on August 21st, 2007 1:21 pm

    The investment was JPY350M, or around $3M according to this Japanese source: http://v.japan.cnet.com/news/article/story/0,2000067548,20354800,00.htm?ref=rss

  3. Tangos on August 21st, 2007 3:49 pm

    Hi, Marc, I’m terribly sorry that I make a typo, it should be $3 million. I was absent-minded when I updated the post.

    You know in Chinese, 3 million is 300 “wan”, ;)

  4. chinamemes.com on August 30th, 2007 3:31 pm

    Hipihi Announced Funding and Global Strategy…

    Hipihi, the 3D virtual community in China, announced its funding and global strategy (while still in beta test!)….

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