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Tencent Holdings Ltd. (Chinese: 腾讯; pinyin: Tngxn) is a Chinese multinational technology conglomerate and holding company headquartered in Shenzhen. It is one of the highest grossing multimedia companies in the world based on revenue. It is also the world's largest company in the video game industry based on its equity investments, with Tencent Games being the subdivision of Tencent Interactive Entertainment Group (IEG) focused on publishing of games.[4]
Tencent is the world's largest video game vendor,[8] as well as one of the largest companies in the world by market capitalization.[9] It is among the largest social media,[10] venture capital, and investment corporations.[11][12] Its services include social networks, music, web portals, e-commerce, mobile games, internet services, payment systems, smartphones, and multiplayer online games.[13] It operates the instant messengers Tencent QQ and WeChat, along with the news site QQ.com.[14] The company surpassed a market value of US$500 billion in 2018, becoming the first Asian technology company to cross this valuation mark.[15][16][17] It has since then emerged as the most valuable publicly traded company in China, and is the world's tenth most valuable company by market value as of February 2022.[18][19][20][21] In 2015, 2018, and 2020, the company was ranked by the Boston Consulting Group and Fast Company among the 50 most innovative companies worldwide.[22][23][24] Tencent has stakes in over 600 companies,[25] and began focusing on tech start-ups in Asia in 2017.[26] TechCrunch characterized Tencent's investment strategy as letting its portfolio startups operate autonomously.[27] Tencent's valuation approached US$1 trillion in January 2021 before it plummeted.[28] Tencent Holdings was ranked 35th on Forbes Global 2000 2023 list.[29]
South African media company Naspers purchased a 46.5% share of Tencent in 2001.[36][37] As of 2023, it owns 26.16%[38] through Prosus, which also owns a stake in Tencent's sister companies, such as OLX, VK, Trip.com Group, Delivery Hero, Bykea, Meesho, Stack Overflow, Udemy, Codecademy, Brainly and PayU.[2] Tencent Holding Ltd was listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on 16 June 2004,[31] and it was added as a Hang Seng Index Constituent Stock in 2008.[39]
The company originally derived income solely from advertising and premium users of QQ, who pay monthly fees to receive extras.[30] By 2005, charging for use of QQ mobile, its cellular value-added service, and licensing its penguin character, which could be found on snack food[40] and clothing,[30] had also become income generators.[30] By 2008, Tencent was seeing profit growth from the sale of virtual goods.[41]
While Tencent's services have included online gaming since 2004, around 2007/2008, it rapidly increased its offerings by licensing games.[42] While at least two, Crossfire and Dungeon Fighter Online, were originally produced by South Korean game developers, Tencent now makes its own games.[42] On 21 January 2011, Tencent launched Weixin (微信), a social media app. Now branded as WeChat, the app is one of the "super apps", due to its wide range of functions and platforms, and its over 1 billion monthly active users.[43][44][45][46]
On 18 February 2011, Tencent acquired a majority of equity interest (92.78%)[47] in Riot Games, developer of League of Legends, for about US$230 million. Tencent had already held 22.34% of the equity interest out of a previous investment in 2008. On 16 December 2015, Riot Games sold its remaining equity to Tencent.[48][49] Tencent acquired a minority stake in Epic Games, developer of franchises like Fortnite, Unreal, Gears of War and Infinity Blade, in June 2012.[50] That year, Tencent acquired ZAM Network, parent of Wowhead and other websites, from Brock Pierce.[51]
Tencent in 2013 increased its stake in Kingsoft Network Technology, a subsidiary of Kingsoft Corporation, to 18%. Tencent previously had a 15.68% stake in the company and raised the stake through a US$46.98 million investment.[52] Tencent took part in Activision Blizzard splitting from Vivendi as a passive investor in 2013[53][54] and now owns less than 4.9% of the shares as of 2017.[55] On 17 September 2013, it was announced that Tencent had invested $448 million for a minority share in Chinese search engine Sogou.com, the subsidiary of Sohu, Inc.[56]
On 15 January 2014, Tencent said it would invest HKD 1.5 billion (US$193.45 million) in logistics and warehouse firm China South City Holdings Ltd to develop its e-commerce and logistics business.[57] On 27 February 2014, Tencent purchased a 20% stake in restaurant ratings and group-buying website Dianping for $400 million.[58] On 10 March 2014, Tencent bought a 15% stake in Chinese e-commerce website JD.com Inc. by paying cash and handing over its e-commerce businesses Paipai, QQ Wanggou and a stake in Yixun to JD.com to build a stronger competitor to Alibaba Group.[59]
On 22 May 2014, JD.com got listed on NASDAQ and Tencent expanded its stake in the company to 17.43% on a fully diluted basis by investing an additional US$1,325 million.[60] On 27 March 2014, it was announced that Tencent had agreed to pay about $500 million for a 28 per cent stake in South Korea's CJ Games.[61] On 27 June 2014, Tencent announced that it had agreed to buy a 19.9 per cent stake in Chinese e-commerce website 58.com (WUBA) Inc. for $736 million.[62] On 17 April 2015, Tencent announced it bought an additional $400 million worth of shares, rising its stake in the company to about 25%.[63] On 16 October 2014, via its wholly held subsidiary Hongze Lake Investment Ltd, Tencent announced that it had bought a 7% stake in lottery technology firm China LotSynergy Holdings Ltd for HKD 445.5 million (US$57.4 million).[64]
On 23 October 2014, Tencent pitched in $145 million for a 10 per cent stake in Koudai Gouwu, a Chinese mobile shopping portal.[65] In November 2014, the company announced a deal with HBO which would give it exclusive rights for distribution in China.[66] On 9 December 2014, Chinese taxi-hailing app Didi Dache announced that it had raised more than $700 million in a funding round led by Tencent and Singaporean state investment firm Temasek Holdings.[67] On 29 December 2014, Tencent launched the website for WeBank (China),[68] China's first online-only bank.[69] Trials for the service commenced on 18 January 2015.[70]
On 30 January 2015, Tencent announced that it had signed a US$700 million deal with the National Basketball Association to stream American basketball games in China.[72] Later that year, Chinese automaker BYD became the chief corporate sponsor for Tencent's NBA broadcasts.[73] On 21 June 2016 Tencent announced a deal to acquire 84.3% of Supercell, developer of Clash of Clans, with US$8.6 billion.[74] In July 2016, Tencent acquired a majority stake in China Music Corporation.[75]
In 2016, Tencent, together with Foxconn and luxury-car dealer Harmony New Energy Auto founded Future Mobility, a car startup (now defunct) that aimed to sell all-electric fully autonomous premium cars.[78] On 28 March 2017, Tesla, Inc. announced Tencent had purchased a 5% stake in Tesla for US$1.78 billion, the automotive control systems of which it subsequently successfully performed penetration-testing until 2019.[19][79]
In a "direct challenge to Chinese search engine Baidu," in May 2017, Tencent entered news feed and search functions for its WeChat app, which the Financial Times reported was used by 770 million people at the time.[80]
In May 2017, Tencent surpassed Wells Fargo to enter the world's top 10 most valuable companies.[81][82][83] Tencent has also entered an agreement with the Wuhu City Council to build the world's first eSports town in the city, which comprises an eSports theme park, eSports university, a cultural and creative park, an animation industrial park, creative block, tech entrepreneurial community and Tencent Cloud's data center. The site will be used for the education and accommodation of future eSports players, as well as hosting national eSports events and serving as a hub for Tencent's game development. Aside from Wuhu, another eSports theme park is planned in Chengdu.[84][85]
In June 2017, Tencent became the 8th most valuable company in BrandZ's Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands, signalling its growing influence globally as well as the rise of Chinese brands.[86][87][88] Alibaba overtook Tencent as Asia's most valuable company as its stocks surged after the company hosted its 2017 Investor's day.[89] The company has also developed its own voice assistant Xiaowei, and was in the midst of discussion to acquire Rovio Entertainment, the developer of Angry Birds.[90][91] At the same time, Tencent introduced its mini-programs feature that allows smartphone users to access mobile apps across the globe on WeChat without downloading them.[92]
In July 2017, Tencent bought a 9% share in Frontier Developments,[93] the creator of the Elite: Dangerous and Planet Coaster franchises; as well as developer for Rollercoaster Tycoon 2 & 3.[94] In August 2017, after Tencent announced the second quarter 2016 financial report, the stock price rose by 6.2% in the Hong Kong stock market, and the market value reached US$429 billion.[95] Tencent became the second Asian company after Alibaba Group to surpass US$400 billion market cap.[96] Tencent has also created an alliance to its own AI self-driving program, similar to Baidu's Apollo Project, recruiting numerous industry players in the automotive industry.[97][98] It is also collaborating with L'Oral, the world's largest cosmetics company, to explore digital marketing under the Joint Business Partnership (JBP) agreement.[99]
According to a report by Sina Tech in October 2017, Tencent employed over 7,000 members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and that CCP members took a leading role in the development of WeChat. "With over 7,000 CCP members, accounting for approximately 23% of the total workforce, and more than 60% of whom are core technical personnel, the number of CCP members at Tencent is increasing by nearly a thousand every year. In Tencent, a leading internet company, CCP members are becoming the main driving force in shaping the company's development direction."[100]
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