Shanda again a big brother

Shanda has been considered a dud in the last few years when China's online games business had literally little interest in investing the entertainment outfit, which saw its share price nose-dived from more than $40 to just $12 by mid-2006.

Chen Tianqiao, the founder and chairman of Shanda, witnessed his gloomy days when his archenemy Netease seized Shanda's long-held status as China's big brother of MMOG.

But Chen didn't shiver for his gloomy time.

Chen insisted, on various occasions, that Shanda would overtake its rivals, mainly Netease and The9, in the upcoming years.

There's no bravado indeed, we saw the giant woke up again in 2007 with a successful "come-stay-pay" model, which was originated from Korean gaming industry and later introduced by Shanda in 2005.

The Nasdaq-listed company fared pretty well in 2007 and regained its control on the MMOG market after the massive slump. All These came with no surprise. We knew that Chen had well planned his revival right before the slump, or you can say, it's a strategical slump orchestrated by himself.

The battle between these three big wheels will go on and on. It's still too early to say who would win at last, however, no one would ever deny that Shanda is going to have the upper hand in an endless virtual war, at least in the short run.