How a messaging client became Tencent
Ma Huateng's fortune rests on his stake in Tencent Holdings, the internet company he co-founded in Shenzhen in November 1998 with four partners from his school and work circles. Its first major product, OICQ, was an instant messaging program inspired by the Israeli service ICQ. After a trademark dispute it was renamed QQ, and it quickly gained a very large audience among young Chinese internet users.
In its early years Tencent struggled to make money from free messaging and survived on investment from IDG and the Hong Kong telecom group PCCW, and later from the South African media company Naspers, which bought a large stake in 2001. Tencent found its business model by selling virtual items, membership services and, above all, online games to QQ users. It listed on the Hong Kong stock exchange in 2004.
The second defining product came in 2011, when Tencent launched Weixin, known abroad as WeChat. The mobile app combined messaging, social feeds, payments and mini programs and became part of daily life in China. Its payment function, WeChat Pay, made Tencent a central player in mobile payments alongside Alipay. Ma has run the company as chairman and chief executive since its early years, and his holding in Tencent, while well below a majority, is the basis of his wealth.
Tencent's businesses and investments
Tencent today operates in many areas of the digital economy:
- Social platforms: WeChat and QQ, which connect a large share of China's population
- Games: one of the world's largest games businesses, with titles such as Honor of Kings and full ownership of Riot Games, maker of League of Legends
- Fintech: WeChat Pay and related financial services
- Cloud and business services: Tencent Cloud and enterprise software such as WeCom and Tencent Meeting
- Media: Tencent Video, Tencent Music Entertainment and China Literature
The company is also one of the largest technology investors in the world. Over the years it has taken stakes in Epic Games, Supercell (which it bought control of with partners in 2016), Ubisoft, JD.com, Meituan and many startups in China and abroad.
Regulatory pressure has shaped the company in recent years. In 2021 Chinese authorities tightened rules on internet platforms, gaming time for minors and anti competitive practices, and Tencent reorganized parts of its business, sold or distributed some holdings and stressed its contribution to social goals.
Engineer from Shantou to Shenzhen
Ma Huateng was born in 1971 in Chaoyang, in Shantou, Guangdong province. In 1984 his family moved to Shenzhen, which was then a new special economic zone, after his father took a job at the port authority there.
He studied computer science at Shenzhen University and graduated in 1993. As a student and young engineer he was interested in astronomy and software, and he went to work for China Motion Telecom Development, a company that developed paging systems. That experience in internet and telecom software led directly to the idea for Tencent.
In 1998 he started the company with university classmates and friends, including Zhang Zhidong, who became chief technology officer, and Chen Yidan, Xu Chenye and Zeng Liqing. Over time several co-founders left the company, but Ma remained at the helm. He is known as a reserved leader who rarely gives interviews and who is closely involved in product decisions, and his English nickname, Pony, is a play on his surname, which means horse.
Charity and public duties
Tencent set up the Tencent Charity Foundation in 2007, one of the first major corporate foundations in China's internet sector. It runs an online donation platform and the annual 99 Giving Day, which encourages small donations from the public with matching funds from the company.
In 2016 Ma pledged a portion of his own Tencent shares to a charitable fund focused on health, education and environmental projects in China. In 2021, as the government promoted the idea of common prosperity, Tencent committed large sums to programs for rural development, social welfare and basic science, including prizes and research funding for young scientists.
Ma has served as a deputy to the National People's Congress, China's legislature, where he has proposed measures on the digital economy, technology and industry. He has also supported education institutions in Shenzhen and Guangdong. His public role has shifted with the political climate in China, and like other technology founders he has emphasized the company's alignment with national goals in recent years.