'Super Girl' met maker, but her spirit lives on.

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Author: Madden, Normandy

But with a price tag media buyers said was as high as $6.2 million, there were no takers for "Super Girl 3." Hunan Satellite may have found the next best thing in a deal with Jack Ma, the charismatic CEO of Hangzhou-based e-commerce giant Alibaba Corp. Its Alibaba.com acquired Yahoo's Chinese businesses last year in a $400 million deal.

Alibaba is developing an entertainment-reality-show concept with Hunan Satellite and Huayi Brothers Media Group, whose co-founder, Wang Zhonglei, helped produce the popular 2005 movie "Kung Fu Hustle." Instead of launching singing careers, the winners of "Yahoo Sou Xing" ("Yahoo Star Search") will star in Yahoo commercials shot by famous Chinese film directors.

Mr. Ma hopes the new show will create the same level of national buzz as "Super Girl." A hit would promote the recent repositioning of Yahoo China (yahoo.com.cn) from a general portal to a search engine aimed particularly at young adults who frequent cyber cafes but don't watch much TV.

"If you look at Yahoo in the U.S., entertainment is a core strength. One thing we're doing in China is making sure we keep the lead on entertainment news in China. This show fits in with that," said Porter Erisman, Alibaba's Hong Kong-based VP-corporate marketing.

He wouldn't confirm how much Alibaba has committed to the show's production, but local executives familiar with the project put the investment at $3.7 million. The deal with Hunan has not been finalized, but Alibaba has already enlisted three well-known Chinese film directors to create two-minute commercials for Yahoo China.

"The idea is not only to promote our search service but to get the whole country talking about the ads," Mr. Erisman said. "It's a much more exciting, all-encompassing marketing program compared to a straight-forward ad."

It's unclear whether the show will include the SMS voting system employed by "Super Girl," which raised some political concerns among government officials uneasy at seeing Chinese citizens voting. Alibaba execs said there is likely to be an online voting component, via Yahoo.

The only risk, Mr. Erisman said, is that, "After the success of the last show, there's probably going to be a million 'Super Girl' shows in the market this year and you have to make sure you're not just a copycat. But who wouldn't want to be in a Chen Kaige film?"

The three film directors-Mr. Kaige, who directed "Farewell My Concubine," Feng Xiaogang and Zhang Jizhong-rarely make commercials. They were coaxed into joining the project by Mr. Ma, a former English teacher who has become a celebrated entrepreneur in China after he founded Alibaba.com six years ago.

China's search-engine field is highly competitive. Yahoo trails market leader Baidu.com, a local player, by 5% in market share, according to iResearch. Google is also a player, along with Sogou.com. China had 111 million Internet users by the end of 2005, according to government figures.

A hit show could also create positive exposure for Yahoo in China. The company spent much of last fall defending its decision to help the Chinese government track down a journalist, Shi Tao, who was later jailed. Yahoo said it was legally compelled to provide the information.

Last week Google succumbed to pressure from the Chinese government as well, by agreeing to self-censor its Chinese search engine in order to expand its operation on the mainland, a decision that also has received widespread criticism from human-rights groups.

PHOTO (COLOR): MA: CEO of China's Alibaba Corp. is developing "Yahoo Star Search."

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By Normandy Madden