[eMarketer] LinkedIn exits Chinese market

Tech giant Microsoft recently announced it would shut down its LinkedIn professional networking site in China this year, making it the last major American social media network to pull out of the market, per the Wall Street Journal.

LinkedIn said in a statement that it had come to the difficult decision after “facing a significantly more challenging operating environment and greater compliance requirements in China.”

This development comes as the Chinese Communist Party sets out to gain more control over its largest tech companies—and western companies are no exception.

China is LinkedIn’s third largest market, with 54 million users, but makes up less than 2% of Microsoft’s revenues, according to Microsoft president Brad Smith.

LinkedIn said that after seven years of China operations, it had “not found the same level of success in the more social aspects of sharing and staying informed.”

According to eMarketer, LinkedIn joins a long line of Western internet companies that have either stopped doing business in China, or were blocked outright.

Read the full eMarketer article here

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