China's incubators set entrepreneurial spirit in motion.
Stephen Bell has high hopes for Chinese student entrepreneurs. The American venture capitalist invests in seed-stage start-ups across China, betting that the next Mark Zuckerberg will emerge from the world’s second-largest economy.
Incu-greater?
Papa, the photo-sharing application launched last year that allows users to record voice narrations to accompany their images, also has risen to success without the aid of an incubator. But according to Steven Millward, an Asia tech-industry watcher for the TechinAsia site, Kai-Fu Lee himself is a Papa user. Lee could potentially take Papa onboard if he believes the app has sufficient potential. Papa has already received an angel investment from Xu Zhaojun, whose Diandian startup—known as “the Tumblr clone of China”—has the backing of Innovation Works. While a good incubator “is a win for everybody”, when start-ups join, they do forfeit freedom and equity, says Ong of The Next Web.
[This article has been reproduced with permission from CKGSB Knowledge, the online research journal of the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB), China's leading independent business school. For more articles on China business strategy, please visit CKGSB Knowledge.]