Tencent Holdings is one of the biggest technology companies in the world, but its gaming business is undisputed as the top revenue generator in the empire. According to Tencent’s latest financial report for Q2 2020, the company recorded total game revenues of ￥46.9B RMB ($6.8B USD), representing 40.8% of Tencent’s total revenues in Q2 2020. In Tencent’s executive structure, there are two employees with the highest salary and directly report to Tencent President Martin Lau. One is Allen Zhang, who’s in charge of the businesses of Chinese social media WeChat, the other one is Mark Ren, the COO of Tencent Holdings, who oversees all gaming and online content business of the company.
On Aug. 24, Tencent Holdings and the Hainan government held the Tencent Global Esports Summit in the Hainan Bo Ao Asia International Conference Center. Multiple Chinese leaders from esports companies were in attendance. Ren represented the highest level of attendance from Tencent Holdings, and gave a 10 minute speech called “Drawing the blueprint of global esports” at the beginning of Summit.
Ren identified that esports has become a new form of sports, “esports is a modern and beloved exercise for young people, and a new language can cross different nationalities.”
In Ren’s speech, he highlighted the following four key trends for the future esports globalization that Tencent believes in:
The development of sports is changing, and esports and traditional sports are embracing each other. Ren pointed out that esports is a product of the sports industry and digital society.
“Traditional sports leagues like NBA, La Liga, and F1 are trying to follow esports, and break the ice of offline events suspending due to COVID-19 pandemic,” Ren said. “Esports also learns traditional sports in tournament system building, talent training, and global collaboration.”
Ren also mentioned that the establishment of the Global Esports Federation (GEF) accelerated the process of standardization in global esports.
With esports as the core, a new sports pattern and a new order of more extensive participation are forming globally.
“Despite that esports has widely developed in China, South Korea, and the U.S., esports has grown with high participation and acceptability in Europe, Latin America, and Southeast Asia,” Ren explained at the main stage. “The new order will improve the esports commercial value with raising sponsorships and media rights, and also have a profound impact on the global cultural exchange.”
According to Ren, Tencent and tournament organizers hosted over 1.7M PUBG MOBILE esports competitions over the last year, covering 169 countries and regions. In addition, China’s top League of Legends competition, the League of Legends Pro League (LPL) has also been streaming in five languages, covering multiple countries in the world.
Under the flow of a new technology revolution, esports and technology will deeply integrate. Ren attributes this to China’s development direction of “new Infrastructure,” and commercial use of 5G technology. In March, Central Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China announced that the country would accelerate the process of building 5G infrastructure, and expects to build over 600K 5G base stations across the country by the end of 2020.
“From PC esports to mobile esports, the application of new technologies can always overturn our imagination of esports,” Ren said. “In the meantime, esports is also improving and pushing new technology innovation, which rely on large user involvements and massive commercial value from esports.”
Ren also revealed that Tencent has deeply collaborated with state-owned China Central Television, discovering the possibility of 4K and even 8K definition in the esports broadcasting environment. In addition, Tencent will also actively develop AI and VR in the esports application scene, such as virtual esports shoutcasters, AI trainers for players, and esports VR venues for esports audiences.
Also during the summit, Tencent signed partnership deals with Chinese telecommunications giant China Unicom, tournament organizer VSPN, and Shanghai Juss Sports to build 5G infrastructure in Shanghai Eastern Sports Center. The infrastructure will be first used in Peacekeeper Elite Championship (PEC), which taking place Nov.13-15.
Esports has become a new “economy,” through a combination of online and offline events. It will also provide new energy to recover the global economy during the COVID-19 pandemic. Ren stated that during the 2019 League of Legends World Championship, Riot Games and Louis Vuitton co-branded products that generated massive commercial and economic value to the industry. In addition, this year’s King Pro League (KPL) Spring Split Final, China’s top Honor of Kings competition, also broke the viewership record on Chinese live streaming platforms.
“In the future, Tencent will provide more high-quality esports competition, in conjunction with tournament organizers like VSPN,” said Ren.
Ren concluded by saying that he believed that it has been proven that esports still has a wide space for development, but more challenges need to be faced and solved. At the end of his speech, he thanked the Hainan government and stated that Tencent Esports and Tencent Picture have registered and placed offices in Hainan.
A member of the Hainan Resort Software Community (who asked not to be identified) told The Esports Observer that multiple foreign companies, such as Apple and Amazon have shown interest in opening offices in Hainan, due to low taxes and other beneficial policies.
Source: https://esportsobserver.com/tencent-coo-mark-ren-tegs/
