China's Internet giant aims to take WeChat overseas
- By Zhang Fang
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E-mail China.org.cn, March 14, 2013
With the development of mobile Internet, China's Internet companies now get a big opportunity to go global, the CEO of Tencent, China's biggest Internet company, said during the ongoing session of China's National People Congress (NPC) this Tuesday.
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Ma Huateng [file photo] |
"In China, most enterprises going overseas are manufacturers, while the tertiary industry has not yet done that much. Over the past 16 years, China's main business strategies -- where the Internet was concerned -- came from abroad and it was difficult to go overseas [ourselves]," said Pony Ma, who is also the NPC deputy to the session.
Ma said the development of mobile Internet is a rare chance for Chinese Internet companies starting from almost the same line with global enterprises.
"WeChat and other online games are very competitive in both the national and international markets, and we will seize this opportunity," he said. "But we are taking steps to find out the suitable and profitable way to promote it."
WeChat, a mobile application that supports voice, photo, video and text messages among its users, has gained 300 million users so far.
As one of the steps in venturing overseas, the company has joined hands with Indonesia's largest media company PT Global Mediacom, a move which was announced by the firm on Feb. 28, 2013.
It has launched a WeChat TV commercial in Indonesia aiming to further explore local Internet service potential by promoting WeChat, which has been available in Indonesia since 2012.
After opening up the Southeast Asian market, Tencent focuses on the North American share. The company has sent an internal email to all its staff members that they have established a first office in the U.S., in charge of the R&D with American WeChat users, to create sound client relations and further develop business, as reported by Huxiu.com.
