
VC from Asia is skyrocketing - thisisit
https://www.wsj.com/articles/silicon-valley-long-dominated-startup-fundingnow-it-has-a-challenger-1523544804
======
abhiminator
I remember The Economist doing a piece on this fairly recently[0] that talked
exclusively about how China's tech VCs and established corporations (referring
to the likes of Alibaba/Tencent) are challenging (and to a certain extent
dethroning) Silicon Valley "monopoly" when it comes to investing in
innovation/R&D in super critical areas like A.I., for example.

One huge advantage Chinese corporations and startups have is China's super lax
(non-existent, in fact) privacy and data protection laws -- enabling their
companies to harvest ENORMOUS amounts of data to hone their A.I. algorithms on
-- making them super attractive for investors.

Add to this China's culture of scientific inquiry, rampant IP theft from
American and European corporations and startups alike, a stable administration
that has made technological advancement it's razer sharp focus -- you have the
perfect recipe for VCs' fund to start flowing on to the next big thing with
relatively fewer barriers.

[0] [https://www.economist.com/news/business/21737075-silicon-
val...](https://www.economist.com/news/business/21737075-silicon-valley-may-
not-hold-its-global-superiority-much-longer-how-does-chinese-tech)

~~~
pascalxus
This may sound naive, but how does IP Theft even work?

I've worked as a software engineer for over 12 years at over half a dozen
companies, with codebases numbering in the millions of lines of code and I
have yet to see any software or code I could imagine anyone would want to
steal. And if you really needed some code, I'm sure it's available somewhere
as open source. And wouldn't the open source code be much more preferable?
rather than ripping out some piece of "stolen" code that was never meant to
serve other purposes.

~~~
yorwba
IP that's worth stealing is not limited to one specific implementation, it's
about using someone else's _idea_. (So "theft" is a misnomer, it's really
about imitation.)

For example, if you buy a competitor's product to take it apart, replicate its
components and assemble lots of knock-offs, you have some validation that the
product is going to work, without having to do any costly planning and design
yourself. All of that works without literally breaking into the competitor's
factory to steal their equipment or their code.

For a lot of really valuable IP you won't find an open source implementation,
or if you do, you won't be able to legally use it, at least as long as
software patents are a thing.

~~~
sumanthvepa
It is utterly ridiculous that to take an =idea= is considered theft. In that
case, pretty much every American corporation can be accused of theft. Google:
Stolen from alta vista, Microsoft: Stolen from CP/M, Apple: Stolen from Xerox,
The american space program: stolen from the Nazis! If that's the basis for
accusing China of stealing IP, it's a pretty weak argument.

------
cwperkins
I think it's always strange that the media frames this as "threatening" to
shift power. On the one hand I agree that I would like to keep America
investing in R&D to create the next great innovation that revolutionizes the
world, on the other hand I do not fear other countries of the world overtaking
us. I frankly think it's awesome to see other countries of the world investing
and leapfrogging off of American innovation and some day I would only hope
that we can do the same.

I think instead of using attacking vocabulary like "threatening" it would be
more worthwhile for the media to say that the US is not keeping up with it's
peers.

~~~
youpassbutter
> I think it's always strange that the media frames this as "threatening" to
> shift power.

Why is it strange? That's the purpose of a nation's propaganda organizations.
The chinese media does the same thing. Every nation's media does it.

~~~
csallen
You're not supposed to call our media propaganda. That's a word that can only
be used for other nations' media.

~~~
magduf
Our media isn't propaganda, because it doesn't fit the definition. Propaganda
is slanted views that are approved or promulgated by the reigning regime in a
country. The news in the US simply isn't like that: just look at how anti-
Trump most of it is (not saying this is a bad thing). Propagandized media is
where the news media is really nothing more than a mouthpiece for the current
regime, as you see in China and Russia, and doesn't air views contradictory to
that regime.

This isn't to say that our media is completely neutral. No media really is.
But it doesn't represent our current government, it represents the interests
of its owners, who have different interests than our current leaders, and are
frequently at odds with them. And of course, we have multiple media outlets,
who frequently disagree with each other, a good example being Fox News.

~~~
2RTZZSro
>slanted views that are approved or promulgated by the reigning regime in a
country

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fHfgU8oMSo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fHfgU8oMSo)

~~~
skrebbel
If you dont want to watch: Parent is posting a video of a bunch of pro-
government news reports by Sinclair, owner of many local tv stations in the
US, which is known to be particularly right-wing (and, if you ask me,
bigoted), much like the current administration.

To my understanding, parent's hidden suggestion is that somehow these buffoons
are representative of the average American media company.

~~~
2RTZZSro
>which is known to be particularly right-wing

This is a baseless claim with zero evidence to support it

------
csomar
Everyone is ignoring the fact that China is a _massive_ closed market. Most
western services do not care about China. China culture is different and it
doesn't seem that the "world" is willing to translate and adapt its services
to it.

This means a huge opportunity for local ventures.

~~~
pcr0
I'd argue China is actually one of the easiest markets to adapt for, given its
size. We're talking 1.3 billion people with the same national language, 92% of
which share the same ethnicity (Han). Most Chinese cities are quite consistent
in terms of culture and regulations. It's a very homogeneous country with a
large middle class

Indian or South-East Asia markets are much more difficult to adapt for. You've
got a smaller population with less buying power divided up into more than
dozens of major languages, cultures, ethnicities, laws, etc.

Protectionism is the real barrier in China, not Western ignorance.

This is what I experienced at a Chinese startup, where a large majority of the
strategy/ops efforts were dedicated to localizing products for SEA, compared
to the domestic market.

~~~
chenster
You need connections in China to do anything as a unfair advantages or you
will never succeed.

------
awat
I think its prudent here to try to separate out innovation vs state backed and
protected interests.

Although I do agree there are some eastern sentiments that are driving some
interesting innovation.

Wired documentary on Shenzens rise:
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SGJ5cZnoodY](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SGJ5cZnoodY)

~~~
thisisit
There's one amazing tidbit in the documentary about how China's systems work.
Starts around here:

[https://youtu.be/SGJ5cZnoodY?t=3585](https://youtu.be/SGJ5cZnoodY?t=3585)

The system seems so controlled which I don't think is feasible for any other
country.

------
gcb0
everyone already forgot the top story here on HN a few weeks ago?

[https://www.marketwatch.com/story/finance-documentary-the-
ch...](https://www.marketwatch.com/story/finance-documentary-the-china-hustle-
revisits-chinese-reverse-mergers-and-activist-short-sellers-2018-03-30)

------
bassman9000
Good if true. Competition is always welcome.

------
neonate
[http://archive.is/94TdJ](http://archive.is/94TdJ)

------
jorblumesea
VC is China is complex, where many VC investment firms are just arms of the
Chinese government. I don't think it's fair to compare our VC system to
theirs. While the US does some VC investment (In-Q-Tel) they are far more
separated.

~~~
contingencies
_many VC investment firms are just arms of the Chinese government_

As a serial entrepreneur in China I am really interested in your source here.
Care to share?

IMHO based on experience to date I would say there is usually a _very_ clear
distinction between government and VC firms.

------
workleg
paywall-less:
[http://badblue.bitnamiapp.com/sources.php?to=https://t.co/2A...](http://badblue.bitnamiapp.com/sources.php?to=https://t.co/2AF5zdtloU?sid=11393785)

~~~
codeisawesome
Hi, thanks! What does this script do?

------
coldtea
> _VC from Asia is skyrocketing, threatening to shift power over innovation_

"Threatening" to whom? Not to Asians.

This is an offending us/euro-centric title in a global age...

~~~
refurb
You're assuming the wrong definition of threatening.

It's meant as "to announce as intended or possible".

That's true whether you're Asian or not.

~~~
coldtea
> _It 's meant as "to announce as intended or possible"._

In a negative way. See my response below, and the lemmas for 3 major
dictionaries...

~~~
refurb
Not necessarily. One could say that a rider in a bike race is threatening to
overtake another.

That's not necessarily bad. One could say it's used to say it's unexpected, as
I assumed for the quote we're discussing.

------
kozikow
I got a random idea: what if sites like HN, Reddit, RSS readers, etc. would
have netflix-like subscription for articles?

I don't care about WSJ or other paywall publishers. Especially not enough to
subscribe. I however do care about occasional story that ends on HN.

~~~
magduf
That's not a bad idea, but it'd mean you'd need to subscribe to HN, Reddit,
etc., because WSJ and other paywall publishers are going to want to get their
money from somewhere. But I guess it's possible that sites like HN could
institute an optional subscription system where you can pay a monthly
subscription fee and then that's used to subscribe to these news sites through
a special deal for linked articles.

------
R3DJOK3R1
"Paywall"

------
taesu
freaking hate this paywall crap content on hacker news.

~~~
dang
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html)

Users usually post workarounds in the threads.

------
kingraoul3
China?? I heard they were bad though?

~~~
dang
Would you please not post unsubstantive comments to Hacker News?

