Ms. Laurence: Basically, the company was formed by combining the information and consulting segment that previously belonged to U.S.-listed E-House, China's largest real estate agency and consulting services firm, with the Internet real estate operation of U.S.-listed SINA Corporation, a leading online media company and Internet portal in China. By combining these two together, we believe we can achieve significant synergies, and that's the reason behind the merger. I could go through some more details if you prefer later and the rationale of the merger, but those are the two main pieces of the company's business line.
E-House, the merger of E-House's real estate information and consulting segment with SINA's Internet real estate operation and IPO, happened simultaneously on October 16 of last year. And as a result, we have become the leading online and offline real estate information and service provider in China.
TWST: What will the SINA merger mean for the company?
Ms. Laurence: Initially, I think the plan was just to spin off the real estate information and consulting segment, and then have an IPO. However, even before that, there was a joint venture between this real estate information and consulting segment of E-House and SINA's real estate portal, and the company was called China Online Housing Technology (COHT). Because the joint venture worked so well, and both management teams from E-House and SINA saw great potential in formally combining these two businesses, that's when we decided to take the opportunity of an IPO to formally combine those two businesses.
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