Corporate China | Weibo: Xiaomi's strange name, Tesla's Musk charms techies

I've become a fan of smartphone sensation Xiaomi over these past two years, not because I actually own one of their phones but because I'm continually amazed at how good the company is at manipulating the media and general public to create buzz around its products. So I was somewhat puzzled and even a bit disappointed to read about the company's choice of English name for its new global brand, which included a hefty price tag to purchase the relevant Internet domain.

Meantime, another master of buzz was also well represented in the microblogging realm, as Elon Musk, CEO of electric car sensation Tesla (Nasdaq: TSLA), won kudos and praise from many of the tech world's top executives. Last but not least was a quirky microblog post from an executive at fading smartphone maker HTC (Taipei: 2498), showing that Edward Snowden was quite the common man. The HTC executive revealed the US intelligence super-leaker opted for super-cheap accommodations and dined on ordinary fast food during his brief stay in Hong Kong last year.

The choice of Mi as its global brand name isn't a huge surprise. Xiaomi gave its main low-cost model, known as hongmi in Chinese, the English name of Red Mi during the Singapore launch last month. Still, this Mi moniker, which means "rice" in Chinese, will mean nothing to most people outside China. Something with "rice" in the name would have been much catchier, or at least the name "Me" or "Mee" instead of "Mi". But now that it's paid such a big price for the name, the world will just have to digest this fast-rising Chinese company under the new Mi brand.