One can find my last post
on this subject here:
Well, it is not looking
good for Tencents and its awesome killer application, WeChat. Today, the head
of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) of China gave
hints that he is going to charge money for users who uses WeChat.
See the following article
(in Chinese):
In the article, the
minister of MIIT gave the typical politician double talk on the subject. He
said that " It is reasonable for the Telecom operators to charge WeChat
users money. But we have to make sure there is no monopoly situation and to
protect Tencents."
MIIT is the foremost
government agency for this area. Unless, Tencents can convince the Premier or
the President, it is looking more likely that Tencents is going to be forced to
charge users fees for using WeChat.
Note that it is entirely
possible that the telecom operator can develop similar product but won't charge
users money (or gave discount rate), it could meant the end of WeChat.
I am not predicting the
end of WeChat. But Tencents is definitely in for some struggle.
For Sina, it could meant a
great opportunity to cut into Tencents lead in this area.
end
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