Six New Investors for Yam Digital

Yam Digital
Technology this week welcomed six new investors on
the fifth anniversary of the launch of its
Chinese-language search engine.

The investor list is comprised of Bertelsmann AG, Microsoft
Taiwan, Acer, I-Mei Foods
Corp., Eslite Bookstores, and Field Force.

Hans-Jorg Assenbaum, VP for
corporate development and multimedia at Bertelsmann, says
the Greater China area is expected to become the
world’s second-largest Internet market in a few years,
and Yam is likely to be the leading Chinese-language
portal within that market.

The German media conglomerate is the first European
enterprise to invest in a Chinese-language portal.

The new investors injected NT$700 million (US$23 million) into Yam, giving them a 28 percent stake
in the portal. The largest single new investment was
NT$ 49 million (US$1.6 million), from Microsoft Taiwan.

“Taiwan is a major Chinese-language market, and
Microsoft is keen to improve its localized products
and service,” said Microsoft Taiwan president Huang
Tsu-yi.

Yam recently changed its Web address from “www.yam.com.tw” to
“www.yam.com” to better reflect its growing
international profile.

In another alliance unveiled yesterday, Compaq Computer
Taiwan announced it would cooperate in the areas
of e-commerce, administration and marketing with
e-commerce firm Commerce One.

Compaq plans to localize Commerce One’s e-purchasing
systems and work with the e-commerce firm to build
business-to-business structures.

According to Lloyd Oki, Commerce One Asia regional
deputy, the alliance will bring Commerce One’s
North American experience to Taiwan, which will be
used as a base for ventures into mainland China.