Recruiting in China

Google has started a large-scale recruitment campaign on the Chinese mainland. Google's recruitment ad showed that the firm is seeking employees covering 26 positions in research and development, products, sales, operation, IT, human resources and marketing.

According to the notice posted, most jobs would be in Shanghai and Beijing but it did not elaborate the quantity of employees the firm is to recruit.

Ever since Google announced its exit from the Chinese mainland this march, many employees of the company have been contacted by domestic internet firms on the purpose of being hired.

The company now sees itself without a few senior officials. Former vice director of Google China R&D Center, Wang Jin, Song Zhongjie, Google China's general manager for sales, and Liu Jun, assistant dean, who was in charge of web search development in Google China Project Research institute all have left their positions.

According to Iresearch, Google's market share in the second quarter declined to 27.3 percent, while its counterpart, Baidu, boasted 70.8 percent. Some of the company's agents like Tianya, also cut off relations with Google.

While industry analysts were worried about the company's development on the mainland, Yu said that its current situation is temporary, and its market grip will be gradually regained.

HONG KONG (Dow Jones)--Chinese search engine company Baidu Inc. (BIDU) said Wednesday it is looking to hire 30 software engineers from the U.S. next month to help make the company more innovative as it seeks to take advantage of rival Google Inc.'s (GOOG) shrinking participation in China.

Baidu is set to gain market share in China from Google as the Chinese government objects to Google's recent strategy of redirecting Chinese users to an uncensored site in Hong Kong and threatened the U.S. company with the loss of its license.

Kaiser Kuo, a company spokesman, said Baidu, China's biggest search engine, will hold a job fair in Milpitas, Calif., and is aiming to hire mid-level to senior engineers.

"Baidu believes that talent is the key to our success as a company, and we go wherever the best talent can be found, whether here in China or in Silicon Valley," said Zheng Bin, human resources director at Baidu, in a statement.

Baidu's hiring in the U.S. market underscores the need for more experienced engineers in China. Analysts say having insufficient number of engineers means companies will fall behind other rivals as competition intensifies in the Internet space.

"It's good to see Baidu taking initiatives to expand its talent pool and speed up the company's technology development. New technology is vital for its long-term growth," said Elinor Leung, an analyst at CLSA.

Baidu currently employs about 2,500 engineers. It has research and development centers in Beijing and Shanghai.

According to figures from Analysys International, Google's market share in China declined to 31% in the first quarter of this year from 35.6% in the previous quarter, with Baidu benefiting at Google's expense.

Baidu reported in February its fourth-quarter earnings rose 48% to CNY427.9 million on a 40% increase in revenue to CNY1.26 billion.

Telecom equipment provider ZTE is likely to send 250 Chinese employees back as it is obliged to recruit Indian employees in all of its operations in India over the next 3 years.

The move has taken place in the wake of the release of the Government's directive, last month, which expects all the foreign telecom equipment companies in India to employ only Indian engineers.

At present, out of the total 2,300 staffers of ZTE in India, 15% are Chinese. The company has been planning to recruit another 1,000 engineers by March 2011.

The company's unit in India contributes to over 10% its global revenues, which was reported to be $8.8 billion in fiscal 2009-10.

DK Ghosh, Chairman, ZTE Telecom India, "It is part of our localization policy and has nothing to do with the department of telecom (DoT) directive".

Mr. Ghosh added that around 95% of ZTE's manforce in India constitutes engineers. The move, as directed by the Government, will reduce its Chinese staff strength to merely 3%.

The Government's directive, called DoT, was issued in March, asked for a strict adherence of the foreign operators to the new instructions.

By NICK WINGFIELD

Microsoft Corp. said it is investigating allegations of worker abuse at a factory in China that makes computer mice, cameras and other devices for the technology giant.

The move was prompted by a report published this week by a Pittsburgh-based human rights advocacy group, the National Labor Committee, which alleges a factory in Dongguan, China, operated by KYE Systems Corp. overworks young employees and houses them in harsh conditions.

Microsoft devices represent a significant portion of the products made at the factory, though KYE makes products for other companies there as well, according to the report.

"The factory was really run like a minimum security prison," Charles Kernaghan, director of the National Labor Committee, said in an interview.

In a statement issued in Taiwan, where it has headquarters, KYE Systems said it has never hired workers under 16, and that its employees get one day off every seven, with extra hours in peak season but never more than 12 hours a day. It said that while its wages are low by U.S. standards, they are in accordance with Chinese regulations. "We regret that the NLC reported a one-sided story without offering us a chance to explain," the statement said. The company's Web site says it employs between 3,600 and 4,500 workers in China, depending on seasonal demand.

In a blog post on Thursday, Microsoft executive Brian Tobey said, as a result of the National Labor Committee's report, the company has "a team of independent auditors en route to the facility to conduct a complete and thorough investigation."

Mr. Tobey said Microsoft auditors inspect KYE facilities annually and haven't detected violation of child labor laws for the past two years. He said worker overtime "has been significantly reduced" at the factory and that compensation is in line with labor standards for the area where the factory is located.

Mr. Tobey is corporate vice president of manufacturing and operations for the Microsoft unit that makes the Xbox videogame console, the Zune music player and other hardware.

The National Labor Committee report alleges KYE recruits employees many of whom are 16 and 17 years old to work 15-hour shifts six to seven days a week, paying them 65 cents an hour鈥攐r 52 cents an hour after deductions for food.

Workers are housed in cramped quarters in factory dormitories and prohibited from talking, listening to music or using the bathroom during work hours, the report says.

The report is another sign of growing scrutiny of the companies the technology industry widely relies on to make electronics products.

In February, Apple Inc. said an internal audit of its suppliers last year uncovered more than a dozen violations of the company's labor policies, including several in which contractors hired underage workers. Apple began auditing worker conditions after reports of worker abuses at Chinese factories that made iPods.
鈥擳ing-I Tsai contributed to this article.

After news last week that Facebook, the world's largest social networking service (SNS), aims to enter the Chinese market, a domestic head-hunting company disclosed that Facebook has hired it to recruit the person to manage its business in China. This signals Facebook's timetable to enter the Chinese market is drawing nearer.

According to the recruiter, Facebook wants to hire a general manager overseeing its Chinese operations and this person would be based in Beijing.

But according to the detailed description of the post, the company also wants this person to lead the SNS game lab team to make products for the western market, and the position may match the requirements for a person leading a research institute in the Chinese market.

Also, the head-hunting firm said that Facebook was hoping the person would be from its headquarters, but the firm does not want to exclude those who are interested in the post to apply.

According to last week's information, Facebook may enter Chinese market as soon as in three months, and this latest recruitment announcement adds fuel to the possibility.

But according to local media reports, in order to enter the Chinese market now, Facebook may only just establish the research institute first. According to the requirements of the position, the products designed by the lab are mainly aimed for the western market, which means that Facebook will not launch products for the Chinese market for a while.

Nevertheless, an insider from the recruiting company said that if Facebook wants to enter the China market, it first needs to set up a management team and begin its relations with the Chinese government, which is only still in its preliminary stages.

US internet giant Google today posted ads for dozens of positions in its China business.

The move suggests it may be rethinking its threat to leave the country over cyber attacks and online censorship.

Google is seeking to hire 40 staff, including engineers, sales managers and research scientists in Beijing, Shanghai and the southern city of Guangzhou, according to advertisements seen on its website.

The job ads - the first since Google threatened to shut down its Chinese language search engine google.cn rather than bow to government censors - could mean the firm planned to stay in China, technology analyst Li Zhi said.

"They are in the process of resolving this issue (with the government)," said Li, a Beijing-based analyst at research firm Analysys International.

"Their business in China won't change too much this year."

Google threatened in January to leave China over what it said were cyber attacks aimed at its source code and at the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists around the world.

Meanwhile, Google has continued to filter search engine results in China, which has the world's largest number of online users at 384 million.

A spokeswoman for Google China did not respond to emails or phone calls from AFP seeking confirmation of the recruitment drive and the status of Google's talks with Beijing.

Google representatives and Chinese officials were to resume talks in the coming days after a break for China's Lunar New Year holiday, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.

The talks will centre on whether the US firm can deliver unfiltered internet search results in China, the report said.

Google China spokeswoman Marsha Wang told AFP yesterday she had no updates on plans for talks when asked about the report.