W: I really understand those investors’ reaction to this phenomenon. Just because the stock price of ChinaCache increased by 95 percent on the first day of trading, people have very high expectations for us. They think they will get huge returns from the investment. And now the high expectation may turn into disappointment. I think high expectation and disappointment are neither normal. I think China’s economy and development and these Chinese companies are not as bad as they have described, and of course, not as good as they have expected. I think it’s normal. I think things will become normal through the adjustment of the market.

H: Were there any misunderstandings between the investors and Chinese enterprises that led to the trust crisis?

W: Yes, that’s true. The fast development of China’s economy enables so many Chinese enterprises to list in the US. However, in the past, US investors’ paid about 90 percent of their attention to US enterprises. China is fresh to them. They are excited but also worried. So if there is a rumor or something, they will react immediately. I think Chinese companies, including my company, should learn how to communicate with the US investors and the US capital market. Because of the different cultures, the two sides may encounter troubles in their communication. I think more communication and coordination are needed, especially after listing in the US. We meet a few US investors every month. They get a chance to know us and we also introduce ourselves. Through this, they will see real hope in China’s economy. They will understand what problems are fatal, and what are not as serious as they think. This kind of communication is really needed.

H: ChinaCache is the biggest CDN service provider in China now. Many big e-commerce sites, portals and video sites are ChinaCache’s clients. As a regular netizen, we may use the services of ChinaCache every day without evening knowing its existence. Could you briefly describe what CDN is?

W: To explain it in a simple way, we provide express delivery service on the Internet. We deliver contents to the users. Logistics is a very important platform for e-commerce. However, the development of CDN industry still lags behind the international level. The US CDN market is very mature, but in China, CDN has just started. The 12th Five Year Plan defines CDN as a network of basic application providers. If China’s Internet wants to have a real development in the next five to 10 years or surpass that of the US, its CDN service still has a long way to go.

H: What about China’s CDN technology compared to that in the US?

W: As China’s biggest CDN service provider, we started CDN services at about the same time as other countries in the world. Our company was established in 1998 and started providing services since 2000. It was the same for the CDN providers in the US. But the industrialization of the sector in China falls behind that in the US. The overall bandwidth in China is 30T, of which less than 5T of the traffic is delivered by CDN. But in the US, more than 50 percent of the traffic is delivered by CDN. So you will find that the Internet in the US is much efficient than that in China. The popularity of CDN will greatly reduce the operating cost of the Internet. Some video websites are still losing money now, but if we could reduce the cost of delivering their content, they may be able to start making money now. This is a problem we are facing. If we do the same thing, the operating cost will be far more than our counter parts in the US. That’s why CDN services are needed to help reduce the cost.

H: Does the comparatively low market popularity imply huge opportunity for your company?

W: The potential and opportunity in this market …yes if we could raise the penetration rate from 5 percent to 25 percent, we will make a five-time increase. If we reach the level of the US, the growth would be 10 to 20 times. We could also see the development of China’s Internet. Now China has the biggest population of netizens in the world. If the mobile Internet gets really popular, the pressure for the bandwidth of the networks will be an exponential growth. So it’s a big challenge as well as a huge opportunity for CDN technology and the whole industry.

H: What is ChinaCache’s future development plan? Will it expand businesses in other sectors other than CDN?