After seven years of launch, Microsoft decided to discontinue LinkedIn's services in China. This marks the departure of one of the few major US tech companies still operating in China. This decision appears to be because China is increasingly tightening their control over the internet.
Through its blog LinkedIn said it would replace its platform by the end of this year with a work-only version called InJobs. In the InJobs application there will be no social feed or sharing options as is the case on LinkedIn.
"While we've found success in helping Chinese members to find jobs and economic opportunities, we haven't found the same level of success in social aspects of more sharing and staying informed," LinkedIn said.
"We also face a much more challenging operating environment and greater compliance requirements in China."
LinkedIn's move in China has been closely watched as a model for how western social media apps can operate within the country's tightly regulated internet, where many other platforms such as Alphabet Inc's Twitter, Facebook and YouTube have been blocked.
The platform then expanded in China in 2014, at which point it had to censor some users of the content posted on its website to comply with Chinese rules.
It has been one of the tech companies hard hit over the past year by Beijing, which has imposed new restrictions on its internet companies in areas from content to customer privacy. The Chinese government has also said it wants the platform to more actively promote socialist core values.
In March, LinkedIn suspended new registrations in China as a form of compliance with Chinese laws. Two months later, it was among 105 apps accused by China's top internet regulator of illegally collecting and using personal information and ordered to make repairs.
News website Axios reported last month that LinkedIn had blocked from its Chinese platform the profiles of several US journalists and academics containing information deemed sensitive by China, citing "prohibited content".
Microsoft also owns Bing, the only major foreign search engine accessible from within China's so-called Great Firewall whose search results on sensitive topics are censored.