German Parliament to Bulk Purchase Hanvon E-book Reader

The Cooperation Between Hanvon and Publishing Giants Reveals Hanvon Global Strategy

BEIJING, Oct. 17 /PRNewswire-Asia/ -- The Frankfurt Book Fair began at noon on Oct. 16. China, as the guest of honor at this book fair, is in the spotlight. In the Chinese hall "moving towards E era", Shanda, Qidian, and Hanvon have exhibited their products. Hanvon is the only hardware exhibitor and its 60 e-readers have attracted many visitors. Meanwhile, in the international exhibition area, reporters find that Hanvon has released a new series of overseas versions of their e-book reader. The new series are preloaded with 3,000 original English books and support multi-language operating including English, German and Portuguese, etc. Visitors are able get hands-on experience during the Fair.

(Photo: http://www.prnasia.com/sa/2009/10/16/20091016285421.jpg )

It was reported previously that the exhibition fee for Frankfurt Book Fair this year would remain the same as last years' considering the effects of the financial crisis. However, most of the exhibitors have scaled booths down while Hanvon takes part in this fair with a high profile, which indicates that the e-book reader really brings great success to Hanvon.

Hanvon also welcomed some special guests on the opening day -- staff from the German Parliament. They were satisfied with the quality and functionality of the Hanvon e-book reader after successful demonstrations. They plan to purchase Hanvon e-book readers in bulk for their MPs. According to Hanvon staff, the German Parliament is going to invite Hanvon sales and R&D staff to parliament to give them a detailed introduction to the e-book reader. The cooperation will be fulfilled later.

During the Fair, Hanvon and Harper Collins are also expected to cooperate with each other. According to insiders, Hanvon intends to purchase the copyrights to thousands of books. Hanvon not only plans to "go out", but also "bring excellent books into China," providing Chinese people with more chances to read more great books.

Harper Collins, headquartered in New York, is the sub-company of News Corp and the largest English book publisher worldwide. It was the first publisher to digitize books and to establish a digital book town with the goal of protecting writers' rights and satisfying customers' needs. The cooperation between Hanvon, emphasizing copyrights, and Harper Collins will benefits both readers and writers.

The CEO of Harper Collins agrees with the Hanvon e-book reader model which is "preloaded + internet bookstore." He thinks that Hanvon should bring in more copyrights. Besides cooperation with Hanvon, he will recommend the Hanvon e-book reader to Barnes&Noble.

In the IT industry, there are few enterprises that can be listed top companies in less then one year. Therefore, media at home and abroad have reported on the Hanvon e-book reader and regard Board Chairman, Mr. Liu Yingjian, as "the sermon person in the Chinese e-book industry" and "the king of the Chinese e-book reader". The fast development of Hanvon under the world financial crisis environment is a clear example of "overtaking in a corner".

20 years ago, Liu Yingjian devoted himself to "Chinese character handwriting recognition." This technology has occupied over 80% of the market share. 20 years later, he has devoted himself to the "e-book reader" and allocates most of the resources to this project. Liu Yingjian considers the e-book reader as a terminal device with great potential.

"Core technologies are important, you have the core technologies, you have the Mastercard." In the view of Liu Yingjian, one of the core technologies is E-ink display, but everyone could have the display. While Hanvon handwriting technology and electromagnetic technology are the best after 20 years development, those technologies are closely related to the e-book reader industry. For many years, the trends of most high-tech products, no matter television or air conditioner or camera and cell phone, are led by overseas enterprises. In the e-book reader industry, only Amazon and Sony optimized the displaying effect, while Hanvon integrates the two technologies together and makes writing and reading perfectly combined, which shows that China, for the first time, has taken the lead in high-tech product development.

Based on the model of "products with sources-brand-channel-sale," Hanvon has achieved great success despite the financial crisis environment. The Hanvon e-book reader was loaded in the "Shenzhou 7" spacecraft. It is a great "quality certification" for the Hanvon e-book reader to undergo this "trip".

Mr. Liu Yingjian remains clear facing applause. What he really cares for is the digital publishing industry behind the e-book reader. The manufacture of terminal devices might be the lowest point in the value line, while Hanvon is moving towards an industry platform update realization.

Providing "reading solutions" is Hanvon's goal, and in order to do this, Hanvon plans a three-step strategy. The first step is collecting a wide range of excellent books, digitizing those books and banding them with e-book readers. To realize sales breakthroughs while cultivating the market and building a strong base for realizing industry update; the second step is establishing a convenient e-book and e-paper platform-e-book mall that will be the first platform for selling and purchasing e-books. This could lower cost and enhance efficiency. The third step is building an integrating reading solution platform. This platform is going to provide readers with all round, multi-channel reading solutions, provide publishing institutions and related companies with reading solutions including digitization services, information exchange, the second time development of intellectual property, paperless offices, personalized publishing, self-publishing consultants and a financing platform.

At present, Hanvon has accomplished the first step and is moving towards the second step. Hanvon is establishing wide-reaching strategy alliances, taking advantages of the industry chain to try to become the largest reading service provider in China. Therefore, Hanvon, as an IT company, now frequently shows up at various publishing exhibitions and conventions. The cooperation with Harper Collins is a very good example.

Mr. Liu Yingjian said that Hanvon is going to become the main competitive power in the e-book reader industry. It is believed that Hanvon, who boomed the Chinese e-book reader market, will bring a strong Chinese shock in this Frankford Book Fair.

About Hanwang Technology Co. Ltd

Hanwang Technology Co. Ltd., founded in 1998, is a world leader in the fields of character recognition technology and diverse intelligent pattern recognition technologies and products. Hanwang has obtained self-owned intellectual property rights in the field of On-Line Handwriting Cursive Recognition, Optical Character Recognition, and digital drawing tablet. The comprehensive technology level is positioned top in China. The Company's handwriting technology was awarded the First Prize at the National Science & Technology Progress Award. OCR was awarded as the second Prize for the National Science & Technology Progress Award.

Hanwang has developed a wide range of products and promoted the application of recognition technology, which is popularized in the field of electronic administration, intelligent traffic, mobile communications and home appliances. Hanwang is a great force in the Chinese informatization course. Now, Hanwang has over 70% market share in the electronic handwriting market and over 50% in OCR market. Microsoft, Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, LG, Lenovo and TCL have adopted Hanwang technologies, which illustrates that the national software industry has already gained international acceptance. Hanwang was appraised as a Chinese famous brand in 2006.