Twitter opens office in Hong Kong

Microblogging site Twitter has opened an office in Hong Kong today, with the goal of helping companies in China to market to overseas consumers.

The South China Morning Post quoted Twitter's vice president for South Asia, Shailesh Rao, as saying, "Opening our Hong Kong office now, and hiring a sales team to work directly with advertisers across the Greater China market, will contribute to our next phase of growth in Asia."

Twitter faces daunting competition from local Chinese social networking services like Sina Weibo, which has 503 million registered users as of December 2012. This is Twitter's second office in Asia, with the first being opened in Jakarta, Indonesia.

Twitter is banned in mainland China, but there is still plenty of money to be made beyond the "Great Firewall", reports the TechCrunch.