Lex专栏：腾讯会是下一个Facebook吗？

Watch out Facebook, Tencent is following you. On Wednesday, shares in the Chinese online games and messaging service provider jumped as much as 6 per cent after revealing second-quarter revenues up 50 per cent year on year. Net profit rose by a similar proportion, beating analysts’ forecasts by 10 percentage points. The figures are impressive for a $250bn company, and Tencent still has plenty of growth potential.

Facebook得小心点了，腾讯(Tencent)正在紧追你的脚步。周三，在这家中国网络游戏和消息服务提供商披露其第二季度营收同比增长50%后，其股价一度跃升6%。净利润增幅也和营收类似，比分析师预期高了10个百分点。对于一家规模为2500亿美元的公司来说，这些数字令人印象深刻，而腾讯仍有充足增长潜力。

Tencent remains reliant on gaming and subscription revenues, which make up three-quarters of the total. Mobile game revenues, in particular, more than doubled year on year. Subscriptions also grew strongly, confirming the company’s ability to charge for content previously free in China, such as music and video.

腾讯仍依赖于游戏和会员费营收，占其总营收的四分之三。特别是手游营收同比增长一倍以上。会员费增长强劲，确立了该公司对此前在中国免费的内容(比如音乐和视频)收费的能力。

Its other businesses, however, show the most promise. Tencent has barely begun to profit from the 800m monthly active users of its messaging apps, which double as social network accounts. The potential in advertising as well as marketing fees is substantial. Despite growing by 60 per cent, advertising revenues were less than $1bn. In its second quarter, Facebook made nearly all of its $6bn top line from ads. And according to China Skinny, a China-based marketing consultant, there are more stores on Wechat — mostly run by individuals, but some also branded — than there are on Alibaba’s Taobao. Christian Dior, the French atelier, recently sold a limited-edition handbag through a social posting on Wechat, reportedly selling out in just one day.

不过，显示出最大前景的是腾讯在其他方面的业务。腾讯几乎才刚刚开始从其消息应用每月8亿的活跃用户身上盈利，这些应用也被用作社交网络账户。广告费和营销推广费潜力十分可观。尽管腾讯的广告营收增长了60%，但总额还不到10亿美元。而今年第二季度，Facebook的60亿美元营收几乎都来自广告。而根据总部在中国的营销咨询公司China Skinny的说法，目前微信(WeChat)上的商店(这些商店多数由个人运营，但部分商店也有品牌)比阿里巴巴(Alibaba)的淘宝(Taobao)上还多。法国工作室克里斯汀•迪奥(Christian Dior)最近曾通过微信上的社交帖销售一款限量版手袋，据报道该手袋仅仅一天就售罄。

So payments, too, show promise. The “other” division, in which they are lumped with cloud services, grew nearly fourfold, but is still less than one-tenth of the top line. Yet of China’s 710m “netizens”, a smaller proportion play games than shop or make payments online, according to government data. China’s internet is underpenetrated, too. Just over half of the population is connected to the internet, compared with four-fifths of the US. Yet China’s users are far more mobile with their usage, which also plays to Tencent’s strengths.

而支付业务也显示了广阔前景。与云服务一同被归类到“其他”业务的部门增长近四倍，但营收仍不到总营收的十分之一。然而，根据中国政府的数据，在中国7.1亿“网民”中，玩游戏的网民比例低于网购或网上支付的网民比例。而且，中国的互联网渗透率还不够。连上互联网的人口刚过一半，相比之下美国的比例为五分之四。不过，中国用户使用移动互联网的比例高得多，而这正是腾讯的长处所在。

Tencent looks like a game-maker for now. Its true potential will emerge as it becomes more like Facebook.

如今，腾讯看起来像是游戏制作者。随着它更像Facebook，它的真实潜力将逐渐显露出来。