Viadeo, the French rival to LinkedIn, is to exit China in order to focus on becoming a profitable business. In a further cost-cutting move, it will also shutter its data center in California and migrate to the cloud. The company moved into China eight years ago when it acquired local professional social network Tianji.com, but that site will cease to exist once it is closed down on December 31. Viadeo claims that Tianji has 25 million users, but it has struggled to attract the “very considerable development resources” necessary to drive it forward in “China’s fiercely competitive market”. Post-China, Viadeo said it will refocus on its home market of France and other French-speaking countries, while putting great emphasis on its B2B sales model.