Flipboard to refocus on China market

California-based Flipboard, a magazine app that provides tailor-made content from social and traditional media, will make China one of its top priorities this year after giving limited resources to the market since the app's Chinese version was released at the end of 2011.

Eric Feng, Flipboard's chief technology officer, told China Daily on Tuesday that the company has grown the number of its staff in its Chinese office from one to four since the beginning of this year and expects to add another 10 employees over the summer.

"We will have a dedicated team to innovate and offer a high-quality product in China," Feng said. The Beijing office is Flipboard's only one outside the United States. The four-year-old tech company, which has 135 employees, has more than 100 million users around the world.

According to Feng, since the Chinese version of Flipboard was released in December 2011, the company has witnessed tremendous growth in China even though it hasn't made much investment in the country because of the start-up’s limited resources.

The company has seen the number of its users surge from 50 million in March 2013 to 100 million at the end of last year. "The growth of Chinese users is even faster than our overall growth," he said, adding China is one of the top three markets for Flipboard.

The 500 million mobile Internet users in China are what attract Flipboard most. "There are so many people using tablets and mobile phones in China and they love to consume great content on mobile devices," said Feng.

"With our new investment in China, I would not be surprised to see China becoming the clear No 2 market for us. Maybe the year after, it could be No 1," he added.