Roblox and China’s Tencent defied the growing tech ‘cold war’ and announced a big gaming partnership – Business Insider
What happened: Game company Roblox on Tuesday announced that it would form a jointly owned company with Tencent, Business Insider reported. The new company, which will be based in Shenzhen, will initially focus on teaching coding fundamentals, game design, digital citizenship, and entrepreneurial skills. Roblox said in the announcement that its final goal is to bring Roblox, a massively multiplayer online game as well as game creation platform, to China. Roblox was valuated at more than $2.5 billion in September after raising $150 million.
Why it’s important: Roblox has more than 70 million monthly active players globally. Its entry into the China market through the new partnership, though partial at first, could supply Tencent with one or more age-appropriate titles for young audiences in China. Tencent already has an existing line of titles featuring educational content and traditional Chinese culture, but many of them lack interactivity. The anti-addiction features that Tencent has been steadily rolling out across all of its games have also been limiting the number of titles underage users can access.