KUALA LUMPUR (Dec 15): Yahoo! has launched ‘Yahoo! Malaysia Entertainment’, a celebrity and entertainment site which offers celebrity and entertainment news and trends from Malaysia and beyond.

In a statement Thursday, December 15, 2011 Yahoo! Malaysia said the site offers a daily celebrity news fix with content of the most celebrated stars in the industry, from local celebs like Fasha Sandha, Siti Nurhaliza, Lisa Surihani to International newsmaker Kim Kardashian who made it to the Top 10 list for the most searched celebrities for 2011 on Yahoo! Malaysia..

It said the Yahoo! Malaysia Entertainment site contains both original and syndicated content and offers the latest updates on the favourite local and international stars, in Bahasa Malaysia as well as English.

The content is divided according to geographic regions and features news from Hollywood, Asia (Far East, K-pop, Bollywood, etc) and Malaysia, along with carrying content from the international music scene as well.

Styled on the U.S. omg! site (omg.yahoo.com), which ranks #1* worldwide for entertainment news, the Yahoo! Malaysia Entertainment site is the only site in Malaysia to deliver a holistic bundle of offerings that contains high quality local language content, Asian entertainment coverage, photos and videos.

Yahoo! Malaysia country editor Marc Lourdes said Yahoo! Malaysia was excited to be able to provide our audience with a dedicated Entertainment portal.

“Being 100% operated by our Malaysian editorial team, we are hopeful Yahoo! Malaysia Entertainment will be able to provide the best blend of local and international stories, photos and videos that will satisfy the appetite of our Malaysian audience,” said Lourdes.

The local entertainment market is big and growing by the day, especially with the resurgence of the Malaysian movie industry in recent years.

According to Yahoo!’s Net Index 2011 study, Malaysians have an appetite for international/local music and entertainment-related news and content.  Yahoo! has also been able to tap into this interest in various Southeast Asian countries like Indonesia [Yahoo! omg! (http://id.omg.yahoo.com/] and Vietnam [‘Yahoo! The Gioi Sao’ (http://vn.thegioisao.yahoo.com)].

Yahoo! The Gioi Sao’, which was launched in September 2011, has doubled up the number of page views to nearly 22 million in October (up from 11 million in Sept) and currently has a 21% reach (comScore Oct 2011), said Yahoo! Malaysia.