Despite years of countless unfruitful attempts Mark Zuckerberg and his Facebook are still not giving up on the plan to reenter the Chinese market, according to Reuters Breakingviews.
The US tech giant is now exploring an indirect path which includes taking minority stakes in local tech firms, Reuters reported citing people familiar with the matter.
Facebook, the world’s largest social network, has been inaccessible to Chinese users since 2009. The government blocked it shortly after riots in the country’s restive Xinjiang province. However, the company is still able to earn revenue from Chinese advertisers through agents.
Chinese officials have said, on many occasions, that Facebook is welcomed in China as long as it plays along with local rules and regulations. But so far, the US social network hasn’t found a way back into the market. Google’s attempt to reenter China with its “dragonfly project” also failed. The Dragonfly project is a censored version of Google which caused huge controversy and was reportedly scrapped.