$20 mil, anyone?

Internet services provider China.com, a subsidiary of CDC Corporation, today announced its Web 2.0 Developer Program, which features a fat US $20 million allocated for investment in selected web development partners. China.com seeks to establish strategic relationships with leading local Web 2.0 companies to “accelerate the development of innovative products and services targeted specifically for the China market.”

The program’s stated goal is to foster “small- to medium-size developers with the technological skill, innovative vision and deep understanding of what drives the Chinese internet community to develop the next generation of products and services in online video, social networking, blogs, 3G and broadband content and mobile search.”

That US $20 mil that China.com is dangling out there will be issued through direct cash investment, equity investment, and / or lines of credit. China.com also promises partners access to their advertiser base (which is sizeable) and their customer base (which is really sizeable, with a reported 37 million registered users at CDC Games alone).

“We are very excited at the potential for Web 2.0 in China and our goal is to be one of the leaders of this vast emerging market,” said Dr. Xiaowei Chen, chief executive officer of CDC Games and chief financial officer of China.com. Obviously.

This latest round of bestowals echoes an August call for participating developers from Japan, Korea, China, the United States, Europe, India and Australia “with long-standing, successful track records in the development of top-quality and successful online games, and the vision and innovative skill to develop games from the ground up that will be culturally attractive to the vast and growing China gaming user base.”

This earlier development deal is to produce product for the aforementioned CDC Games. These programs appear to be based in the franchise partnership rolled out by CDC Software earlier this year, the reception of which by the Chinese enterprise software market has reportedly been impressive. CDC Games at that time promised to invest up to US $20 million per game development partner. Chen is also heading up the Online Games Developer Program.

Internet service and video game company China.com is a division of CDC Corporation. China.com has been established nationwide in thirty provinces and reportedly serves more than 5 million visitors daily. The China.com network currently supports the company’s widely online games, portal business and hosting services for more than 1,700 Chinese businesses. CDC Corporation is focused on enterprise software, mobile applications and online games. As part of its strategic review, the company has reorganized into two primary operating business units, CDC Software and China.com Inc.