Gou Goes Online

When the Wall Street Journal finagled a on-site visit to Foxconn, many wondered why its media-shy founder, Terry Gou, was letting down his guard, even slightly, after years of refusing to let the press light in.

This may be why. Forbes and others are reporting Gou, a billionaire at least five times over, is taking a $100 million stake in Alibaba, a Chinese e-commerce startup that may someday wish to compete with Google, Yahoo and other Internet titans. (Yahoo may be hedging its bets: the company has also invested $100 million.)

In remarks to a conference and later in his blog (you read that right), Gou predicted Asia’s e-commerce development will catch up with the West. His speech and a slideshow are among the (to date) four posts on his blog; I’d suggest taking a look.

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About Mike

Mike Buetow is president of the Printed Circuit Engineering Association (pcea.net). He previously was editor-in-chief of Circuits Assembly magazine, the leading publication for electronics manufacturing, and PCD&F, the leading publication for printed circuit design and fabrication. He spent 21 years as vice president and editorial director of UP Media Group, for which he oversaw all editorial and production aspects. He has more than 30 years' experience in the electronics industry, including six years at IPC, an electronics trade association, at which he was a technical projects manager and communications director. He has also held editorial positions at SMT Magazine, community newspapers and in book publishing. He is a graduate of the University of Illinois. Follow Mike on Twitter: @mikebuetow