A SMART community network that allows residents to make appointments with doctors or shop at nearby grocery stores via television will be expanded to more than 2,000 Shanghai communities, half of the city's total, by the end of the year, an official said yesterday.

The network, which lets residents pay utility bills and check medical history, will cover all communities in the city by 2015, said Zhang Weihua, general manager of China Telecom, the major operator of the network.

Chinese coupon provider Velo and group buying website Didatuan.com announced via internal emails that the two companies have completed a formal integration.

After the integration, a new company will be established and maintain the Velo brand. Song Zhongjie, former chief executive officer of Didatuan.com, has been appointed chief executive officer of the new company.

SHANGHAI'S 8,000 public phone booths, used less and less, will become new smart devices with features including Wi-Fi and touch-screens with public transportation and weather information, officials said yesterday.

The plan, however, still needs the support of the electricity authorities and other agencies, according to officials at China Telecom's Shanghai branch, which already have added Wi-Fi to some booths.

In all 32 companies’ IPO applications were accepted during the period from Dec. 28, 2012 to Jan. 4, 2013, including Xinhua Net, according to information disclosed by China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC)

It is expected that Xinhua Net’s IPO size will be around 1 billion yuan, nearly twice that of the initial planned financing of People.com. When People.com first landed in A-share market, it confronted overheated speculation. It was first listed with 20 yuan per share issue price, and the price doubled within 12 trading days, during which it climbed to the highest of 48.04 yuan per share. As a result, Xinhua Net’s financing size and stock price performance has drawn wide market attentions as well.

Government measures aim to rev up sales of new-energy vehicles

A policy aiming to encourage more local residents to buy energy-saving electric cars - by offering free license plates and rebates - has been unveiled by the Shanghai authorities.

Rising labor costs and an upcoming demographic crisis are driving up demand for 'automated workers' in China, as companies strive to retain their competitive edge.

Sun Zhiqiang says the timing of China's robot spree is perfect for his business. As managing director of Risong Group, an automation company in Guangzhou, Guangdong province that provides robotic systems, Sun's company has cashed in on the robotics boom during the past two years. Although he declined to provide details, Sun revealed that the company is making almost 20 times the revenue it did when the business started 15 years ago.

THE number of invention patents approved in the first nine months of this year in Shanghai was five times the number set as a national goal. But there's still room to grow, the Shanghai Intellectual Property Administration said yesterday.

At the same time, officials said there is a need to make sure patents are genuine and converted into products, not filed just to take advantage of government incentives or to gain local residency, officials said.

MORE than 10,000 people set up their own business in Shanghai in the first 10 months of the year under a government-backed project to encourage entrepreneurship, the Shanghai Human Resources and Social Security Bureau said yesterday.

The project, providing guaranteed loans and subsidies, was early in fulfilling its goal of helping launch 10,000 startups in 2012.

THE first thing that retired local housewife Xiao Anli does every morning is turn on her television.

That's how she finds out which grocery store has the lowest price, how long she would need to wait at nearby hospitals and what the traffic and parking conditions are like around her home.

TRAVELERS logging onto free Wi-Fi services at the city's two airports now need to use their real identification to register, Shanghai Airport Authority announced yesterday.

Cell phone users registered with a local mobile operator can go through the verification by logging in with the password automatically sent to the phone via text message, while roaming or foreign passengers can acquire a password by scanning identification documents such as passports and ID cards, according to the airport operator.

SHANGHAI launched an entrepreneurial park for professionals returned from overseas in the Fengxian District yesterday to woo international talent, officials said yesterday.

A 100 million yuan (US$15.7 million) fund has been created to help overseas returnees to set up business in the 13.8-square-kilometer park. Qualified professionals who set up companies in the park can use office space of less than 500 square meters or a production area of no more than 1,000 square meters at no cost for three years.

ZHANGJIANG High-Tech Park plans to invest 100 billion yuan (US$15.7 billion) in the creative zone development over the next five years, Shanghai officials disclosed yesterday.

The total investment in the zone over the past two decades amounted to only 138.9 billion yuan. The park celebrates its 20th anniversary today. The park generated 188.9 billion yuan in revenue last year, 54 times more than in 1999. It initially was 25 square kilometers but is now 75.9 square kilometers.

SHANGHAI students have invented an emergency fire hose system for buildings which they claim can go into action within 10 seconds.

This compares with the several minutes it can take members of the public to get conventional fire hoses operational, say the young inventors from Dajing High School in the city's Huangpu District.

YOUNG people tired of online role-playing and video games turn to live puzzle and rescue games testing wits, nerve and physical agility as they rescue maidens and escape from time tunnels and boxes. Xu Wei gets a shot of adrenalin.

Racing around a converted warehouse or an air-conditioned mall, reality game players look for clues, obscure meanings and hidden objects to unlock puzzles. They nimbly weave their way through a web of laser beams, testing their knowledge and thinking outside the box.