【答案解析】Ma Huateng, the man at the helm of Tencent, China"s largest Internet operator, recently admitted that "Tencent is little known outside of China for all the size of its users and popularity it boasts at home."
And he puts it rightly/This is indeed the case with Tencent.
Weixin, known as WeChat in English, is a mobile text and voice messaging communication service developed by Tencent in China. The service platform boasts an enviable following of 400 million users at home, whereas progress towards its "go global" strategy is discouraging/ depressing/lackluster/disappointing/with a mere 50 million overseas users registered so far.
Japan can be a case in point where most of WeChat users are overseas Chinese. The finding of a research undertaken by overseas Chinese working in Japan suggests that WeChat is not consistent with/compatible with/acclimated to local user habits. Japanese users are highly vigilant against those who "search and befriend" them online. That means they vehemently exclude/repel/frown upon Look Around, a WeChat function that helps identify like-minded people in your immediate neighborhood. There is no QQ culture or obsession among the Japanese, who naturally find QQ-based facial expression signs awfully absurd/weird. Beyond that, WeChat has no game offering. That explains why it is given the cold shoulder in Japan where game industry is in its heyday.
WeChat has to fight archrivals, such as Kakao Talk in South Korea and LINE in Japan, as it seeks to expand its reach into Southeast Asia. As such, the western market, particularly the US market, holds the key to its global presence.
That said, it is getting still tougher for WeChat to secure a footing/foothold in the US.
As the cradle of global Internet innovation, the US boasts well-established communication products, such as WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. How could WeChat build public recognition as an advanced product while competing with Facebook that has over 1 billion users? How could WeChat replicate its innovative functions in the US? On top of that, WeChat is thriving in China thanks to its extensive endorsement of QQ users, but it is obviously challenging for WeChat to gain market access given its lack of existing users in the US.
Moreover, virtually no large Chinese Internet companies have ventured into the US market because of language barriers and data security concerns. Privacy Bill of Rights promulgated by the Obama Administration last year dictates more prudence in handling privacy information of users by Internet and mobile Internet operators. In this connection, one can imagine how hard it might be for WeChat to gain trust of American users.
The thriving Internet has ushered in an era of a truly global village. Estrangement persists with geographical barriers already removed, though. Among others, people have to deal with cultural clash, cope with different ways of communication and address data insecurity. Google lost ground to Yahoo in Japan and to Naver in South Korea. Facebook as a globally dominant social network operator was bitterly beaten in Brazil by Orkut, a social networking website that Google almost forwent. Shanda Games Limited ended up getting delisted after being traded at Nasdaq for 8 years. These failures all point to strategic challenges for Internet companies as they expand globally.
In China, Alibaba.com has crossed the border to establish its global presence on the back of the market environment of international trade. It is followed by Baidu.com and WeChat, both of which are well-positioned to take their products to overseas market. Sadly, WeChat has to "cross the river by feeling the stones" as there is no established paradigm for Internet companies to follow as they go global.