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Tencent takes a slow path through the Chinese crisis

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During the most difficult year in China Big Tech, he has been doing business as usual at the country’s most valuable company, as well as the founder, who is now the richest man in China.

Tencent, a $ 730bn social networking site and sports giant, as well as Pony Ma, their 49-year-old boss, have avoided public criticism at a time when Alibaba, Ant Group and Meituan have faced tough questions from business executives and their market forces.

Tencent should not run away unscathed, according to officials who are quietly making accusations against his music business, but Ma’s downfall and interest in public relations have put the company in a good position to negotiate.

“Silence will help create wealth,” said two Tencent workers, referring to a high-value law for Chinese businessmen identified by former Communist Party leader Jiang Zemin.

In contrast, his former rival, Jack Ma, has not appeared in public since the regulators suspended $ 37bn for the first time to give to Ant Group, its fintech company, last year.

“Pony is what the government wants from a professional director. He is a lowly subject and often follows the dictates of the government, “said another professional founder.” You are against Jack Ma. “

According to two technical officials in Guangdong province, where Tencent is headquartered, the choir should receive a major fine this summer, following the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party.

Authorities could impose a fine on antitrust activists at Tencent Music, a two-thirds Chinese online music market that was recorded and recorded in the US in 2018, officials said. Tencent declined to comment on any potential fines.

Officials also added that Tencent would have vigorously negotiated behind the scenes to give up his music rights with some of the world’s largest artists, or sell music programs.

“Tencent has taken a fine. They need to show their loyalty and create a positive image [for Beijing]. It’s all in Beijing – government officials don’t have enough power to help, “said a Guangdong official.

But Tencent’s medium-sized businesses, video games and WeChat superpowers don’t think they’re facing problems from developers, even though WeChat has become an important and social networking site known as a “public service”.

Over the years, Ma has demonstrated the temporary ability to detect climate change in the digital environment.

At China’s annual conference this year, Ma, who has been a delegate to the National People’s Congress since 2013, called for online businesses to be established, and to provide top-notch support for the current state government.

The company operates a number of requests from various government offices for monitoring and evaluation of its windows.

In January 2020, WeChat analyzed hundreds of new keyboards related to Covid government administration. His remarks have led to arrests and penalties – especially for a man sentenced to life in prison for calling President Xi Jinping a “steamed bun”.

To improve its management skills, Tencent has developed visual presentation techniques. “The government wants WeChat – they depend on each other,” said one employee.

Tencent has also provided the government with computer services, as part of a push to build Chinese “smart cities” and its engineers worked to support the Covid-19 response.

While some Chinese supervisors are lagging behind in day-to-day care, especially Zhang Yiming at ByteDance, owner of TikTok, and Colin Huang at Pinduoduo, an ecommerce group, Ma is in her 23rd year at the top of Tencent.

Born into a middle-class family on the southern island of Hainan, he began enrolling at a university, actively becoming a “computer viral genius”, according to an authorized book on the history of Tencent journalist Wu Xiaobo.

“I write computer programs,” Ma told Chinese reporters. Even my parents did not expect a child like me to start a company. ”

According to his story, “he doesn’t like to talk”, or “good with words”. They do not offer frequent interviews or speeches, public appearances or video submissions.

Under his leadership, Tencent has earned more than $ 24 million in the last 10 years, and has become China’s largest investor, earning $ 160 million last year. The price of its exclusive public sale was Rmb1.4tn ($ 216bn) at the end of March, which is more than a quarter of its market share.

It has been successful in China as a Meituan food processing and ecommerce juggernaut Pinduoduo, where it buys shares in technology companies and foreign games such as Snap, Riot Games and Epic Games.

Tencent also invested in the business community it started with a son of China’s finance minister while taking money from the Tencent Music Group.

Excessive spending also undermines relationships with the company’s patrons, who have been paying the company several times in recent months for not seeking authorization to sell old stocks. According to the company, the company “works closely with management… Including some of the finances”.

Elsewhere, Ma led Tencent not to push the technical and economic boundaries. As Jack Ma’s heat group grew and became China’s largest lender, Tencent stepped back. And just a few months before Ant Group’s IPO was dissolved, Pony Ma offered to resign as Tencent’s representative on the Tenpay mobile payment platform.

“The key to financial security is stability and health. It will be for those who live longer, not for those who run fast for a short time, “Pony Ma said at a 2017 parliamentary conference where regulators are looking at financial risk.

The biggest challenges for the company so far have come four years ago, when parents and state media began to complain that Tencent’s sports business was introducing a habit for children, a campaign that prompted the government to suspend sports licenses for nearly a year.

Less than a day after People’s Daily first published Tencent’s business, the company announced it would introduce child labor, becoming the first group in China to do so, more than two years before state law forced the entire sector to comply.

Since then, Ma has been “very direct and inquisitive” about solving the problem, and has twice sent an e-mail to a child protection team in the morning to offer advice and encouragement, said a member of the group.

Quoted by Nian Liu, Yuan Yang, Ryan McMorrow and Sun Yu

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