It is reported that WeChat registered users have surpassed 600 million.
In January this year, the mobile messaging app announced 300 million milestone. Its parent company hasn’t updated the public with registration accounts since then but only disclosed the number of monthly active users in the second quarter of 2013 that is 235.8 million. It was reported that WeChat reached 400 million users at the end of April.
On the earnings conference call for Q2 2013, Tencent disclosed WeChat overseas users reached 100 million in the quarter.
Six mobile games, developed in house, have been added to WeChat since the past July. And those casual/social games are highly profitable. Tencent reported that Tian Tian Ku Pao, a Temple Run-style game, had pocketed over 100 million yuan (about $16 million) in the first month since debut. It is estimated that a large chunk is from WeChat platform.
With the payment capability that was added to WeChat 5.0, the messaging app has been experimenting with mobile-commerce; for instance, now you can order dishes with WeChat. With the latest version, you can recharge your mobile phone .
Other monetization approaches include opening up the emoticon platform to third-party designers so as to share future emoticon sales with them.
Although it looks nobody could beat WeChat, Chinese Internet giants still hope to grab some shares of the mobile communication market. Alibaba Group is aggressively promoting its Laiwang internally with a wild wish of 30% of the market. EasyChat tries to differentiate from WeChat. Recently it announced 10 million registered users. Sina injected funding in WeMeet, a similar app headed by former Sina Weibo lead. Shanda also developed one named Youni.
Great article, thanks Tracey Xia!