Tencent's Impressive Line Of Messaging + Social Platforms

Tencent, one of China's largest internet companies, released its second quarter earnings report today (PDF). The company posted 37% revenue growth and 58% profit growth, driven mainly by the success of messaging app WeChat (known as Weixin in China) and by a jump in revenue generated with mobile games within WeChat and Tencent's other messaging platform QQ.

Tencent operates three large messaging/social platforms, all with hundreds of millions of users. WeChat in particular is Tencent's biggest asset in its rivalry with Alibaba, as the company plans to leverage the app's reach among China's smartphone users to push its own services against Alibaba's competing offerings.

Valued at around $160 billion, Tencent is currently China's most valuable public internet company. However, it is widely expected that Alibaba will be valued even higher when it goes public later this year.