TWICE is launching a Chinese edition in April called TWICE CHINA and showed sample copies at our booth during International CES.
The new Chinese edition has been developed in response to China’s rise as one of the key players in the international consumer electronics industry.
Reed Business Information, the leading B to B information provider in the world and the parent company of TWICE, and IDG, the largest technology information publisher in the world, are the partners in this joint venture. TWICE CHINA will be published in Beijing.
TWICE’s publisher Marcia Grand said, “We are very pleased to have the opportunity to work with IDG and to jointly extend the TWICE brand to the booming Chinese marketplace.”
Market research firm IDC estimates the size of the consumer electronics market in China at $687 million in 2003 and it will grow 162 percent to $1.8 billion in 2008.
TWICE CHINA — the Chinese language biweekly — will be first publication for the rapidly growing consumer electronics distribution industry with a circulation of 20,000 covering all major manufacturers, distributors and retailers as well as online resellers.
IDG China’s president Hugo Shong said, “We have been providing technology information for China since the early 1980s when we launched COMPUTER WORLD CHINA. We will leverage our resources and experience for this new publication in the consumer electronics industry which is starting to take off.”
Reports indicate that China has been the largest manufacturer of color TV sets in the world for some years. It now also produces 80 percent of DVD players in the world and 186 million mobile phones a year, 35 percent of the total in the world.
Three years now as a member of the World Trade Organization, China is open further for foreign investment in retailing, while more overseas retailers are sourcing directly from the country. Chinese manufacturers are also keen to expand to overseas through acquisitions or joint ventures with the examples of Lenovo buying up IBM’s PC business and TCL partnering with Thomson in Europe.
TWICE CHINA’s publisher Anny Guo said, “We will track down consumer electronics trends in China for both Chinese and overseas readers. Some of our Chinese articles will be translated into English for the TWICE U.S. edition. We will also translate TWICE U.S. articles for Chinese audience.”
