The purchase means that Tencent is now eLong’s second-biggest shareholder, behind Expedia Inc, the world’s biggest online travel agency, which owns 56 percent of eLong.

Chief Executive Office Pony Ma has said that Tencent aims to provide multiple services for “online life” on the basis of its instant-messaging software, QQ. The instant messaging service, is the largest client software in China, had 674 million active user accounts in the first quarter of this year, according to Tencent.

Earlier this month, Tencent said that it had invested 450 million yuan for a 4.6 percent stake in the Shenzhen-listed media group Huayi Brothers Media Corp, in order to explore areas such as movies, television, and new media. This came after Tencent took its initial steps in the group-buying market when it unveiled Gaopeng.com, which came online in late February. The site is jointly funded by Tencent, Groupon Inc and Yunfeng Fund, a venture capital company.

Tencent and eLong will develop online travel products and distribute eLong’s hotel services to Tencent’s users, according to the statement.

The travel website has links with more than 150,000 hotels worldwide through its connection with Expedia’s systems.

Chinadaily has reported that China’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are facing staggering operational challenges as they are hit by increasing production costs and tight monetary policies, said officials and economists

Quoted in the Chinadaily, the Vice-chairman of the Central Committee of the China National Democratic Construction Association, Gu Shengzu has said that “Their[SME] operational situation may be even worse than that during the financial crisis in 2008.”

Gu said he had recently conducted a survey of around 600 SMEs. Their maximum net profit margin was 3 percent, and most were operating at a deficit, he said.

chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, Huang Mengfu has said rising labor and raw-material costs have squeezed the profit margins of China’s SMEs.

“The government’s administrative measures of controlling prices to rein in soaring inflation have also limited the companies’ profit margins, especially for the small and medium-sized operators,” said Huang.

In April, China’s Consumer Price Index, a main gauge of inflation, increased to 5.3 percent from a year earlier, after a 32-month high of 5.4 percent in March.

“The figure in June may be higher than 6 percent, and the government is expected to continue its tight monetary policy in the second half of this year,” said an economist with the China Center for International Economic Exchange.

The People’s Bank of China, the central bank, raised the reserve requirement ratio for banks by 0.5 percent on May 12, the fifth increase since the beginning of this year, to fight stubborn inflation.

Economists has further added that the move has made it more difficult for SMEs to borrow money

“Without enough funds, some enterprises in East China, in areas such as Wenzhou in Zhejiang province, ceased production or even went bankrupt,” Wang said.

“Under the high inflationary pressure, it is more important to reduce taxes for SMEs than raise interest rates,” said Gu, who believes that tax reductions will help businesses to increase salaries and improve domestic consumption.

He also urged the introduction of more private equity and venture capital investment institutions to support technological innovation by SMEs.

An index, published by the China Association of Small and Medium Enterprises and indicating their development, showed a 2.2 points decline to 104.1 in the first quarter of this year, compared with 106.3 in the fourth quarter in 2010.

David Bruce Warfel, global marketing director of Zippo, told China Daily that due to the booming Chinese consumer market, the company is gearing towards expanding more in China.

Zippo has presence in China since 1995, where the company began marketing in China through its current China importer, New Frontiers Ltd, headquartered in Hong Kong. It has so far opened more than 1,000 outlets across the country.

However, because of the limited market for lighters, Zippo has diversified since purchasing the W.R. Case & Sons Cutlery Company in 1993. In 2004 it acquired an Italian leather goods company called DDM Italia, establishing Zippo Fashion Italia.

Moreover, China Daily has been told by the company that Zippo has expanded into other consumer products including candles, writing instruments, watches, hand warmers, fragrances, clothes and outdoor specialty products.

It has also announced to the newspaper that it would also  introduce a fragrance for men in the run-up to Christmas in Western Europe that will be available in China next year. In addition, Zippo has been selling men’s sportswear in South Korea for the past five years. The line will be introduced to the United States next March and soon be launched in China.

During Zippo’s 75th anniversary in 2007, the company held an action in which it sold one of the original 1933 Zippos for $37,000.

According to figures from Zippo, it’s estimated that there are 4 million Zippo collectors in the United States and millions more around the world. Zippofans.com, one of the largest online collecting clubs in China, currently has more than 40,000 members.

To enhance the collecting experience, Zippo began hosting the Zippo/Case International Swap Meet in 1995. Currently, swap meets are held in Bradford every other year, alternating with a similar event in Japan.

China News Daily reported that Coach Inc,  is planning to open 25 stores in China during its current fiscal year of June 2011. New York-based Coach, which owns 665 stores worldwide, now operates 41 outlets in China. During the past fiscal year, it has opened 15 stores in the market.

A new Coach’s retail store will be opened in Dalian, Liaoning province, on Friday.As a mid-luxury brand, Coach sells products at a relatively low price – about half that of some European brands such as Louis Vuitton (LV), Gucci and Prada. In China, Coach’s handbags are mostly priced close to 5,000 yuan ($752) while LV and Prada are around 10,000 yuan.

China News Daily has also reported that earlier this month, the company announced its international growth strategy, focused on Asian markets, which includes establishing a new international retail organization with three major Asian hubs including the Chinese and Japanese markets.

According to Coach,  the global luxury market for handbags and accessories is about $24 billion and China comprises roughly 10 percent at present.

China News Daily has reported that The World Trade Organization adopted on Monday, at its Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) meeting, its final rulings on the China-US poultry dispute, outlawing the “Section 727″, applied by the US in 2009 practically banning Chinese poultry product from entering the US market.

The rulings, came after the WTO panel report on Sept 29, was adopted without US appeal.

China Daily has reported that  China’s box office takings are likely to reach between 30 billion yuan ($4.5 billion) and 40 billion yuan ($6 billion)  in 2015 to make it the world’s second-largest movie market, an industry association.

China news daily has also reported that The movie market in the world’s second-largest economy has witnessed strong growth in recent years as Chinese increasingly enjoy the cinema. China will build another 1,500 cinema screens this year, raising the total to 6,000, the industry research center of the China Film Producers Association said in a statement at a forum held in Jiangyin City in east China’s Jiangsu province.

Moreover, it added that the Chinese box office hit 4.8 billion yuan ($726 million) in the first half of the year, up 86 percent from a year earlier, Tong Gang, director of the film bureau at the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, said in July. Tong forecast the 2010 box office to reach 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion).

China Daily has reported that the $1.08 billion deal between China’s largest offshore oil company, CNOOC Ltd, and US company Chesapeake Energy Corp will likely pass a review by the Committee of Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), despite possible US political opposition.

CNOOC will buy a 33.3 percent interest in Chesapeake Energy Corp’s Eagle Ford shale project in southern Texas. The transaction is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of this year.

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On October 12, 2010, Rankings of China’s top 500 private enterprises in 2010 were published. Jiangsu Shagang Group was billed as No.1 for the second year in a row, with revenue of 146 billion yuan ($21.9 billion). Suning Appliance Co Ltd and Lenovo Group Ltd followed, with revenue of 117 billion yuan and 106 billion yuan.

China Non-Governmental Enterprise Directors Association and Enterprises Development and Research Center of China Academy Managerial Science jointly published the  results of the investigation and research on domestic private enterprises.

According to the report, revenue of the top 500 private enterprises totaled 4.7 trillion yuan, an increase of 15.38 percent year-on-year. Total assets amounted to 3.9 trillion yuan, a 38.76 percent growth year-on-year, while fixed assets totaled 1.7 trillion yuan, a 21.75 percent growth year-on-year.

Bloomberg has reported that China Petrochemical Corp,  which is also known as Sinopec, is paying a 76 percent premium to take an investment stake at Repsol YPF SA’s Brazilian unit as the world’s biggest energy user switches its hunt for oil reserves to Latin America from Africa.

The company, which is  China’s second-largest energy company, agreed on Oct 1 to pay $7.1 billion for a 40 percent stake in Madrid-based Repsol’s unit, which has reserves in the same area as the biggest oil discovery in the Americas this century.

Chinese companies has spent a record $32 billion last year alone buying energy and resources assets abroad.

Sinopec’s investment is the country’s second-largest overseas acquisition and follows the company’s purchase of Addax Petroleum Corp for C$8.3 billion ($8 billion) last year to gain reserves in Iraq’s Kurdistan and West Africa.

China consumed 8.6 million barrels of oil a day in 2009 compared with 4.47 million in 1999, according to the BP Statistical Review of World Energy.

The International Energy Agency estimates demand may reach 11.63 million a day by 2015.

A new automaker in China plans to manufacture and sell automobiles under the brand name “Beijing”, the company management announced on Wednesday.

Han Yonggui, who is deputy general manager of BAIC Group said that BAIC Motor,  is jointly funded by Beijing Automotive Group (BAIC Group), the Beijing State-owned Assets Management Co and four other companies and organizations, has total assets of more than 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion).

The new company plans to focus on building sedans, SUVs, new energy vehicles and electric vehicles branded “Beijing”, with an output of 700,000 autos in five years.

Furthermore, officials of the company said that the first Beijing sedans and jeeps will be manufactured by the end of 2010 and brought to the market in 2011.