Fridae.com, Asia's largest (non-pornographic) gay and lesbian portal, will launch a Chinese language Personals site based on an updated version of its current popular personals engine in May 2003.

The Fridae website provides over 65,000 registered users and several hundred thousand more who choose not to register, with up-to-date news and entertainment features as well as the most popular and largest Asian online community meeting space - Fridae personals, which has over 30,000 profiles.

While some of China's largest web portals offer gay sections for posting messages and chatting, as well as the availability of many amateur gay-themed websites, Fridae is confident that the native speaking Chinese gay and lesbian communities, particularly in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan will take to its new Chinese language personals, which will be Asia's first personals online service, customised for and dedicated to the needs of this community in Asia.

By the third quarter in 2003, Fridae will also launch its Chinese site with original Chinese content with contributions from writers in North Asia.

The Chinese-language market represents the largest growth potential as surveys consistently report that the number of Internet users in china will continue to skyrocket. According to data published by the government of China in August 2002, at least 45 million Chinese have access to the internet currently.

"The Chinese market will continue to grow exponentially in the years ahead. I believe we'll continue to see younger, better educated and more cosmopolitan gay and lesbian individuals who will be progressively more open about their sexuality. They will want to come out, network locally and internationally - and Fridae and the Internet would be their main gateway to the world." Says Dr Stuart Koe, Chief Operating Officer, Fridae.com.