Tencent, China’s No.1 online game operator and its largest instant messaging provider, had bought Comsenz, a Beijing-based social-networking provider, Comsenz said in a statement on its website. Comsenz is backed by Google Inc, Sequoia Capital and Morningside Ventures.
Tencent, which bought a 10 percent stake in Russian Facebook investor Digital Sky Technologies (DST) for $300 million earlier this year, could be on the look out for more acquisitions as it seeks to expand its dominance beyond China.

China’s Internet space is becoming more cut-throat as users become more sophisticated and selective over which products and services they use and companies jostle for attention in an increasingly crowded arena.

Source : Konaxis

Currently, only in Shenzhen city opened this businesss. Sina found that tencent used the 2nd level domain named QQ tuan. Login from tuan.qq.com, Sina found default page was QQ tuan Shenzhen site, while Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing etc. have no this business yet.

QQ tuan business model is no difference from other main stream sites, all trade large orders with low price. Insiders analyzed QQ tuan would develop users taking advantage of its low dataflow, but before the end of this article, QQ tuan did not seem to be very hot.

Furthermore, Ganji Net launched group shopping web navigation page. News said domestic life classified site-Ganji.com announced to officially enter group shopping market, launching group shopping sites navigation rss page.

It is known that, Ganji’s Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou portal all have “group shopping navigation” entrance, which can be used to view all group shopping sites and goods information in each city.

Analysis pointed out, Tencent and Intel are cooperating on MeeGo mobile operating system, not excluding the outside world misunderstanding.

Today, there were media reports that Tencent was developing a mobile operating system, mainly for mobile phones and similar to iPad’s ultra-portable Tablet PC, seamlessly integrated a variety of services from Tencent based on QQ.

In response to these reports, Tencent relevant official told Sina science and technology those content was not true, Tencent had no independent development of mobile operating systems of related programs. The Tencent employees Sina contacted through other sources also knew nothing regarding the development of mobile operating system.

Source in connection with Tencent said, Tencent and Intel were cooperating on MeeGo mobile operating system, not excluding the outside world misunderstanding.

On April 13 this year, Tencent and Intel signed a letter of partnership to jointly work on the innovation of MeeGo platform, in the next 30 months, Intel and Tencent will have close cooperation focusing on specific R & D objectives and innovation, focusing on function integrated with communications, interactive entertainment.

Tencent CTO Xiong Minghua once publicly said, Tencent would introduce a unified software framework on MeeGo platform for smart phones, handheld computers and the Internet computer.

There always has been guess on the development of the operating system. In Tencent Sousou system, there was a question about ?When Tencent will have its own operating system” , the best answer is fabricated by a net User: Tencent in 2010 will launch its own operating system, named Tindows.

Tencent said it saw weaker seasonality in the second quarter for its IVAS business, citing fewer holidays in the period and students’ exams.

The company, China’s largest online game operator and instant messaging platform, reported 90.8 percent growth in revenue from online games. IVAS revenue totaled 3.39 billion yuan for the quarter.

IVAS contributed most of Tencent’s total revenue, online advertising contributing 4.8 percent and mobile services 14.6 percent.

Tencent said net profit rose to 1.78 billion yuan in the first quarter, from 1.035 billion yuan a year earlier. Revenue rose 68.8 percent to 4.23 billion yuan.

Last month, Tencent paid $300 million for 10 percent of Digital Sky Technologies, an investor in the Russian equivalent of Facebook, which also recently purchased chat messaging platform ICQ from Time Warner.

Tencent’s ambitions to expand overseas comes as China’s online game market becomes more cutthroat, with companies churning out similar games, jockeying for the attention of an audience whose tastes are becoming more sophisticated.

Online game revenue in China rose more than 40 percent in the first quarter to 7.82 billion yuan, said Beijing-based Analysys International.

Source : Konaxis

Shenzhen-based Tencent, which popularized instant messaging in China and operates an online game portal and other Chinese Internet services, said it will invest about $300 million in Moscow-based Digital Sky, also known as DST. The companies plan to explore “new business opportunities” in the Russian-speaking Internet markets, said Tencent President Martin Lau in a joint statement Monday.

Digital Sky is known for its stakes in Russian Internet companies including Mail.ru, one of the country’s largest Web sites.

The step is the biggest commitment Tencent has made so far in taking its business outside of China, just as other Chinese online game companies are setting their sights abroad.

In addition to gaining entry to the Russian-speaking Internet market, Tencent may also benefit from Digital Skys stake in U.S. companies Facebook and Zynga Game Network Inc., the largest provider of online social games such as the games played on Facebook or on Apple Inc.’s iPhones. Last year, Digital Sky purchased a 3.5% stake in Facebook for $100 million, and has also invested $180 million in Zynga.

Through the deal, Tencent will get a roughly 10.26% stake in Digital Sky, as well as 0.51% of total voting power and the right to nominate one observer to Digital Sky’s board of directors.

Source : Konaxis

The important achievements by this Hong Kong-listed private enterprise in the field of instant messaging triggered a broad discussion inside the industry.

According to Tencent official data, on 19:52:58 of the March 5, 2010, the number of QQ concurrent users exceeded 100 million, and became one of the important tools for daily communication in China.
Tencent today produced specifically feature to celebrate for this, and interviewed dozens of Internet industry people to make interpretation of it.

Tencent released the first version in 1999, called OICQ, and later changed its name to QQ, and in rapid development in the following later to bypass the competitors to become the first major instant messaging software in China, and in 2004 was listed in Hong Kong.

Currently the largest shareholder of Tencent is media companies in Africa-Naspers, which owns 35.2% shares of Tencent.

Several sources said, ICQ’s bidding price was about 200 million U.S. dollars, but only one potential acquirer’s bid was higher than this amount. AOL spokesman declined to comment.

In November last year, there was news that AOL transferred its attention to content and advertising business, the company was planning to sell ICQ. Subsequently it was report that the bid for ICQ was by the traditional way, that is, the potential acquirer submitted bid to investment bank Allen & CO and Morgan Stanley hired by AOL.

The sources indicated that the potential acquirer had completed quotes, and AOL selected 4 buyers. It is said that a number of bidders were international Internet companies. ICQ has around the world 40 million to 50 million active users, outside the United States markets, especially in Germany, Russia, Eastern Europe and Israel and other countries and regions it is still popular.

Industry insiders speculated international companies which might bid including Russia Investment Group, Facebook’s investor DST, China’s Tencent, South African media giant-Naspers, the largest Internet portal Seznam of the Czech Republic and Russia’s largest search engine- Yandex. There are also people who think that Google is a major ICQ bidder.

No matter what price ICQ eventually will be sold at, it will be much lower than the price of AOL’s purchasing ICQ in 1998. ICQ was once the Internet’s most popular instant messaging tool, and AOL’s price then was 287 million U.S. dollars, moreover, the terms of the acquisition also included the extra fees of 120 million dollars offerred to ICQ team.

However, ICQ in the United States have failed to catch up with Microsoft, Yahoo and Google’s similar services. In addition, Facebook, and Twitter are rapidly rising in the Internet communications. AOL’s AIM and the performance is better than ICQ, and was once the most popular instant messaging services in the United States.

ICQ was originally developed by an Israeli start-ups company called Mirabilis. ICQ’s current headquarters remains in Israel, having about 100 employees and be able to achieve profitability.

Companies like Shanda Games, Perfect World and Changyou.com have tapped China’s huge pool of young Internet users with their games and raked in revenue from sales of virtual items. Players pay real-world cash for items like powerful magic weapons that help them defeat enemies, or for virtual clothing or pets to refine their online image.

Many popular online games in China draw on well-known cultural themes like martial arts or the wars of the nation’s ancient Three Kingdoms era. But China’s game companies face a new culture, different user preferences and competition from market leaders like Activision Blizzard as they work to expand in the U.S.

Shanda Games drew eyes last week by unveiling plans to acquire Mochi Media, a U.S.-based game network that Shanda says will distribute its games worldwide. Shanda, which like Changyou and Perfect World has raised funds by listing its stock in the U.S., will dish out US$80 million in the acquisition.

The move highlighted Shanda’s ambitions abroad. Shanda also has plans with local operators to offer six of its games in the U.S., said Diana Li, CEO of Shanda Games, in a phone interview. Li declined to name the games but said they would keep the free-to-play model they have used in China. By contrast, many U.S. games rely on subscription fees for revenue and do not sell in-game items for real cash.

Shanda’s popular titles include fantasy role-playing games World of Legend and Legend of Mir. Shanda is also looking at offering games in Europe, Li said.

Shanda rival Perfect World has already launched several games in the U.S. and offers them under altered names including Jade Dynasty and Ether Saga. Changyou late last year started open beta testing in the U.S. for Dragon Oath, a martial arts game.

Source : Konaxis

In a statement over the weekend, China Mobile spokeswoman Rainie Lei said recent media reports that China Mobile is in talks with Tencent is “groundless.” Hong Kong-listed Tencent runs the popular Chinese instant messaging system QQ.

The statement came after local Internet portal Ifeng.com cited sources as saying over the weekend that a China Mobile delegation led by the company’s president Wang Jianzhou visited Tencent headquarters and the two sides held a discussion over the potential acquisition.

China Mobile launched its own instant messaging service, Fetion, in 2006, to attract more subscribers as part of an effort to increase its revenue.

According to the Xinhua report, by the end of September, Fetion ranked the third among instant message programs after Tencent and Microsoft Corp.’s MSN.

Source : Konaxis

Analysis pointed out that the participation in bidding meant that Tencent was accelerating overseas expansions.

This morning foreign media reported that the Friendster – “father of social networking sites” would be sold to an Asian buyer at the end of December with 100 million U.S. dollars and Tencent was among the Bidders.

About this, Tencent Investor Relations Department did not give a positive response on the matter when communicating with the Sina science and technology, just saying that Tencent “would not comment on market rumors”. Meanwhile, the Tencent Public Relations said they had no idea on this incident.

Analysts said the involvement in bidding Friendster meant that Tencent was speeding up the pace of overseas expansion, and Friendster has a certain market share in Southeast Asian markets including Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines, which will help Tencent rapidly expand the local business.

Friendster began to find a buyer as early as in July , the site’s brief fact sheet sent to potential acquirers said its number of global registered users was more than 100 million and it attracted more than 100,000 new users everyday, strongly promoting the influence and bright prospects of Friendster in the Asia Pacific region.