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Rapid growth expected for Chinese e-commerce

There is no doubt that e-commerce will be a larger part of the average Chinese citizen's life in 2007. With the rapid and prosperous development of integrated e-commerce websites such as Amazon.com, EBAY, Alibaba and Taobao, specialized shopping websites selling jewelry, pet care, matrimonial services, intellectual property rights transactions and individual custom services have all sprung up rapidly. Although the specific developments still remain to be seen, it is safe to say that e-commerce will play an even larger role in consumer purchasing in 2007 in a few key areas.

In the US and Europe, consumers have largely accepted, and utilize regularly, comparison shopping websites. In China, however, comparison shopping is still in its burgeoning stages and is still developing very slowly. Comparison shopping is a key aspect of online commerce that is expected to gain momentum in China in 2007.

Another area which could use improvement in online jewelry retail, which, compared with other areas of e-commerce is still quite backward and poorly structured. Currently, several online specialized jewelry sales websites like 9Diamond.com in Shanghai and 800Buy.com in Beijing state that they will learn from the business model of BlueNile, a US online jewelry website, to offer better online services.

China has become the world's second largest diamond consumption market, second only to the US. Diamonds and jewelry that are sold online offers a price advantage and are thus more attractive to consumers. The reduction in overhead costs and the savings that are passed onto the consumer have led analysts to expect a dramatic increase in the efficiency and development of online jewelry sales websites in China.

As the consumer demand for pets and household companions is ever increasing in China, websites focusing on pets services are becoming increasingly prevalent on the web. Already, the commercial transaction platform of www.timepet.com is a breakthrough in this field and as a whole, in 2007 the Internet market will be increasingly lucrative in China.