Tencent was founded by Ma Huateng (Pony Ma) in 1998 with 4 of his friends in the city of Shenzhen during the late nineties. When he thought about launching the first product, Ma recalled attending an event where ‘ICQ,’ the world’s first instant-messaging service, was being launched.However, the company was initially not as successful as Ma thought it would be. It registered practically no profit in its first 3 years.
Despite the company not performing as good (because ‘OICQ’ was offered free of charge), the product was an immediate hit with the Chinese people. Experiencing a substantial growth, the company looked for more investors to bear their operational costs.
If you grew up or live in China, the WeChat and QQ apps represent your social media, your teenage years, your wallet, your professional updates, your shopping sprees and your food-ordering experience all at once.
Tencent owns WeChat, the “everything app” with almost 1 billion users — many of which are active for more than 4 hours a day. Bloomberg Businessweek says that’s more than the average time spent on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Twitter combined.
Ma was born in Chaoyang, Shantou, Guangdong. When his father, Ma Chenshu (马陈术), got a job as a port manager in Shenzhen, the young Ma accompanied him. Ma completed his remaining schooling from there and found a keen interest in computer technologies.
He was enrolled in Shenzhen University in 1989, and graduated in 1993 with a bachelor's degree in computer science.
In contrast to his outgoing rival at Alibaba, Ma has a low-profile style that befits his engineering background.
Following his college graduation, Ma started working at a telecommunications company named ‘China Motion Telecom Development’ (CMTD). ‘CMTD’ was engaged in the supply of communication services and products, and Ma’s job in the company was the development of software for pagers. Since he was earning less than $200 a month, Ma left the company later and worked at the R&D department of another internet and telecommunications company for a while. Simultaneously, he also kept toying with the idea of starting his own company and got in touch with four of his college classmates to make his business dreams come true.
Ma also runs a charitable foundation that he has established on his own. In 2016, he transferred $2 billion to his charity.
https://medium.com/hackernoon/the-chinese-social-network-bb282204af9c