Why is every consumer tech model in China huge in scale?

When we first started TheLowDown, we posted an article on “Global internet giants – Only American, Chinese, and maybe Indian” (In Part 1 and Part 2). In our opinion, China and US dominated global tech giants because of the following reasons:

1.     Large population with numerous metropolitan areas,
2.     big middle class, with disposable income and big consumption power
3.     single market,
4.     homogenous language,
5.     relatively homogenous consumption habits

Tech majors from other regions have to overcome a lot more challenges to become global (we are glad, and optimistic, that Singapore-headquartered SEA Group is making such an attempt).

A new set of statistics from the Chinese government probably shed some lights on this: 7 cities in China have (each) an urban population of more than 10 million; while 14 other cities boast (each) an urban population of between 5 million and 10 million.

The total urban population of these 21 cities is 205 million. There are only 7 countries with a total population of more than 200 million in this world, including China – let alone total urban population.

Now imagine the scale of nation-wide consumer tech businesses that manage to overcome all the domestic competition to reach the top in China.