ChinaNet Online Holdings Receives Four Awards at the 2015 Chinese E-Commerce Industry Gateway Conference

BEIJING, Sept. 8, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- ChinaNet Online Holdings, Inc. (Nasdaq:CNET) ("ChinaNet" or the "Company"), a leading B2B (business to business) Internet technology company providing online-to-offline (O2O) sales channel expansion services for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and entrepreneurial management and networking services for entrepreneurs in the People's Republic of China, announced today that the Company won four awards in Chinese Entrepreneurial SME Business Development Marketing category at the 2015 Chinese e-Commerce Industry Gateway Conference held in Beijing on September 8^th, 2015.

The conference, organized by the China Electronic Commerce Association (CECA) achieved record attendance. Hundreds of well-known leading Chinese Internet companies and media attended the conference including Baidu, Sohu, LEJU, Meituan (meituan.com), 58.com, Jingdong (jd.com), Tencent, eLong, Ganji (ganji.com) and Xiaomi (xiaomi.com) and others. Government officials and business leaders talked and shared ideas about the Internet and e-commerce industry. During the conference, CECA presented a number of industry awards to recognize contributions to the Internet and e-commerce.

ChinaNet won awards in the category of Chinese Entrepreneurial SME Business Development Marketing for "Best Company", "Most Powerful Portal", "Most Expandable Portal", and "Best Potential for Future Development". The four awards were based in part on ChinaNet's ability to provide exceptional service and a wide range of online-to-offline (O2O) sales channel expansion technology solutions for SMEs.

Mr. George Chu, COO of ChinaNet, delivered the keynote address about B2B2C commercial systems at the conference. His talk focused on how the complexity of the Internet has increased dramatically and as a result of the rising mobile and cloud industry, businesses small to large need solutions and tools to be more efficient and target-oriented in delivering digital messages to their business partners and customers. He explained how ChinaNet is growing from a business opportunities platform to a comprehensive 1:1 digital advertising and marketing service provider with a total big data solution for the B2B2C ecosystem, helping businesses expand sales and customers through mobile and Internet.

"Businesses need to ensure that every marketing dollar spent is effectively bringing in revenue, stated Mr. Chu. "This is the beauty of Internet, especially in today's cloud and mobile environment. With the advent of the mobile Internet era, the innovation of user needs and applications have become the main trend of the Internet, including online payments, location-based services, online and offline interaction and more.

"ChinaNet, together with Baidu, have embraced this trend by jointly launching Baidu Direct Reach with Business Direct 3.0 to open the mobile Internet's 'direct era' for business. With this joint product and service, ChinaNet plans to attract more SMEs to utilize mobile and Internet advertising as SMEs have limited budgets and often find this limitation does not give enough or any visible result by advertising and marketing on mobile and Internet."

About the China Electronic Commerce Association(www.ec.org.cn)

CECA is a national trade association approved by China'sState Council and the Ministry of Civil Affairs to promote growth and healthy development in China's e-commerce industry as well as help the government in terms of regulations. Since it was founded in 2000, CECA has received strong support from the standing committee of China'sNational People's Congress and the National Industry and Information Ministry.

About ChinaNet Online Holdings, Inc.

The Company, a parent company of ChinaNet Online Media Group Ltd., incorporated in the BVI ("ChinaNet"), is a leading digital B2B (business to business) Internet technology company focusing on providing online-to-offline (O2O) sales channel expansion service for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and entrepreneurial management and networking service for entrepreneurs in China. The Company, through certain contractual arrangements with operating companies in the PRC, provides Internet advertising and other services for Chinese SMEs via its portal websites, 28.com, Liansuo.com and Chuangye.com, TV commercials and program production via China-Net TV, and in-house LCD advertising on banking kiosks targeting Chinese banking patrons. Website: http://www.chinanet-online.com.

Safe Harbor

This release contains certain "forward-looking statements" relating to the business of ChinaNet Online Holdings, Inc., which can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "believes," "expects," "anticipates," "estimates" or similar expressions. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties, including business uncertainties relating to government regulation of our industry, market demand, and reliance on key personnel, future capital requirements, and competition in general and other factors that may cause actual results to be materially different from those described herein as anticipated, believed, estimated or expected. Certain of these risks and uncertainties are or will be described in greater detail in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These forward-looking statements are based on ChinaNet's current expectations and beliefs concerning future developments and their potential effects on the Company. There can be no assurance that future developments affecting ChinaNet will be those anticipated by ChinaNet. These forward-looking statements involve a number of risks, uncertainties (some of which are beyond the control of the Company) or other assumptions that may cause actual results or performance to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. ChinaNet undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be required under applicable securities laws.

CONTACT: MZ North AmericaTed Haberfield, President

         Direct: +1-760-755-2716

         Email: thaberfield@mzgroup.us

         Web: www.mzgroup.us

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