Niko News is a filter of the most important news items and bits of information concerning the games markets of China and Southeast Asia uncovered by Niko each week. Our multilingual analysts review dozens of news sources from several countries, and as a team Niko reduces the long list of articles to 3-4 "must read" items for you. We then provide our Niko analysis to these items, making them relevant and highlighting the importance for the market. This service is one of the many ways we help distill the confusing, conflicting information about the games markets of Asia for our clients and readers. 

E3 in LA felt international but there were only a few Chinese firms exhibiting this year. Only Perfect World, Snail Game and Taomee represented the mainland Chinese publishers. There were a few others from Korea, Japan, and SE Asia too. We met with some new companies, one of which is SEA Gaming, which helps developers distribute online games in SE Asia, but is not a traditional publisher (you do more work but keep more of your profits.) We also met a Chinese company that acts as an agent for the export of Chinese games to international markets. China's Ministry of Culture sent some representatives. Because China and SE Asia are dominated by PC online games and increasingly by mobile and social games, E3 was not entirely relevant for companies from this region because the show has a strong emphasis on console makers and console games for western markets.   

MIIT issued a new policy report that clarified requirements for real-name registration and personal information security. The goal is to prevent unworthy content from being posted on weibo sites and the like. Internet companies that enable user posts must retain the content of all posts for six months and service logs for 12 months in case the government wants to review them. We did not find further clarification of the real-names registration rules in the summary we read in the Marbridge Daily, but if you want to read more in Chinese, locate the MIIT document with the (translated) name of Management Methods for Internet Information Services (Revised Review Draft).

15% of Vietnamese use 3G networks today, and that is expected to rise to 20% by 2015 according to Vietnam's Electronic Trade and Info Technologies Department. The price of 3G access is now lower than that of 2G in Vietnam, and the drastic reduction in the tariff for 3G has encouraged nearly 5 million new subscribtions in the past 10 months. Another driver for the growth in 3G usage is the increase in penetration of tablets. IDC says that in 2011 tablet sales rose by 44% and this year they should rise by 51%.  

Forbes published a second interview with Lisa Hanson last week, during E3. The link is here for your reference. It discusses the Chinese market with some highlights from our May 2012 MMOG report.