WeChat operator says will be aggressive in Malaysian market
Tencent vice president for international business Poshu Yeung
PETALING JAYA: China’s web giant Tencent will be more aggressive in the company’s expansion plans for Malaysia.
The company’s international business vice-president Poshu Yeung said this would involve WeChat, a mobile communications application.
He said the company would be setting up an office in Malaysia, introduce more innovative features such as games, localised stickers and content as well as teaming up with more local partners.
“Malaysia is growing very fast, recording healthy growth. It is a very successful market outside China. We also have a good position in Hong Kong and Indonesia,” Yeung told StarBiz in an interview. WeChat is a mobile communication tool which supports the sending of voice, video, photo and text messages. Surveys show that WeChat is being used by more than eight million Malaysians following the application’s June launch.
As of August, WeChat boasted 236 million monthly active users. Tencent yesterday reported a 20% rise in net income to 3.87 billion yuan (RM2.04bil) for the third quarter. Revenue increased by 34%. “We are always in the top position on GooglePlay and Apps Store. We have a very sizeable user base,” Yeung reckoned.
The application may be similar with other communication applications but Yeung said WeChat has innovative features such as voice chat, “moments”, “people nearby” or “shake” to enrich their communications.
Under the moments feature, users can view a streaming feed of friends’ photos and user themselves. As for the people nearby, users can see who are nearby, and send your greetings.
WeChat app users can also “shake” their smartphone and find other users anywhere in the world who are shaking their phones at the same time.
“We will be launching mobile games this month. We’ll be testing the water a bit. We have launched six or seven games in China and it is very encouraging,” Yeung said, adding that it would be offering a variety of games.
“We have a long pipeline for 2014.”
The popularity of WeChat is quickly catching up with rival WhatsApp. There are also reports indicating that WeChat may surpass Facebook.
Analysts who cover the Hong Kong-listed company said WeChat was Tencent’s burgeoning growth story.
Yeung said the company had just started selling stickers on its Sticker Shop two months ago and these stickers liven up messaging.
However, he said, it would be providing free stickers with local content going forward. WeChat would be engaging local illustrators on stickers. In addition, Yeung said WeChat would be setting up a local office here to facilitate Tencent’s marketing and business operations.
He added that the outfit would be located within the commercial business district and the actual investment was “pretty small”.
Meanwhile, WeChat is interested in working with more local companies to use its platform for creating brand awareness as well as conducting cross marketing activities.
WeChat carries a lot of potential for the Malaysian market, which have been implemented in other countries such as directory of restaurants and mall chains, shopping loyalty/member cards, barcode scanner as well as e-payment.
Yeung noted that WeChat recently collaborated with ChaTime for the ChaTime official WeChat account offering a RM1 second cup offer under the ‘1 Million Cups Celebration’.
It had also collaborated with Domino’s Pizza to offer WeChat users a special deal.
Star Media Group is also partnering WeChat to establish four official accounts namely TheStarOnline, StarProperty, MyStarJob and CarSifu.
“Star Media Group is very excited to work with Tencent group. We see them as an innovative and forward thinking technology company. The partnership will open doors for us to create more creative solutions for our advertisers and likewise our readers experience of our contents,” said Star Media Group general manager of corporate services George Chan.
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