In a country where being connected is seen as crucial, Ushi, China's answer to LinkedIn, expects explosive growth over the next few years in the world's largest Internet market. The professional-social networking site plans to have 10 million users in two years from the current 300,000, and aims to raise $5 million by the end of June, Dominic Penaloza, Ushi's chief executive, told Reuters in an interview on Monday.

"We're aiming to ultimately serve a very large portion of China's 40 million Internet users who are white collar or entrepreneurs. Call it 10 million in two years," said Penaloza.

"There's more proportion of Chinese who will only do business with people they have met before and people who have a mutual friend," said the Filipino-Chinese who grew up in Canada.

Venture capitalists and private equity funds have flocked to Chinese Internet firms, with U.S. IPOs of companies such as Youku and Dangdang surging as they market themselves as the YouTube and Amazon of China.

The growth is being fueled by China's Internet industry which has more than 450 million users.

Ushi, which launched in October, is backed by Milestone Capital, U.S.-based Richmond Management, Li & Fung private equity and Simon Murray & Co.

The firm competes with Tianji.com, another social-networking site that caters to professionals. Tianji, which was founded in 2005, is now part of France's Viadeo.

Tianji aims to have 10 million users by the end of the year and to start monetizing the website this year, its founder Derek Ling told Reuters separately.

The user base of Ushi, which means "outstanding professionals" in Chinese, doubled to 300,000 from 160,000 in about 60 days in March and April, Penaloza said.