Tencent Music is in no Rush to take ‘WeSing’ to Countries

Tencent Music senior executive said that they are in no hurry to bring its popular social karaoke app to more international markets.

The app, ‘WeSing” is available in the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, and China.

Dennis Hau, told CNBC on Tuesday that before going into more markets, Tencent Music wants to see more “sustainable” success for the app just yet.

Hau said that he is a product guy and that he really wants a product to be sustainable, not to be just popular. And also be able to retain users on an ongoing basis before they expand further.

If ‘WeSing’ is able to perform as the company hopes in markets such as the Philippines or Indonesia, then they have more confidence. Also, they can push out to more countries, according to the executive although it is going to be very costly.

WeSing lets people interact with others on the platform and upload their performances online. 10 million recordings are created per day, Tencent Music claims. To find talented amateur performers, an artificial intelligence program parses those files.

Moreover, when users on WeSing buy virtual “gifts” for their favorite performers, Tencent Music makes money.

Also, Hau said that the basis of their decision to enter the Four Southeast Asia markets was demographic research, marketing data and “gut-feeling.” Also, people in those countries love music and are generally very sociable.

Additionally, Hau also said that they also look at the market size and that they are still wanting a business. The population of Southeast Asia is 650 million people.

Tencent Music Missed Forecasts Revenue

Music streaming and social entertainment services like WeSing are the business of Tencent music.

Tencent’s online music streaming service, QQ Music, is popular in China.  Besides, since its 2005 launch, the company claims 800 million registered users for the service. It is almost equal to the Chinese government’s estimate for China’s entire internet population. Moreover, Tencent told CNBC that some individual users may have “unintentional created multiple accounts” after losing mobile numbers or through different social media apps when asked to elaborate on the 800 million number.

Furthermore, live streaming services Kugou Live and Kuwo Live. Those two let users watch live performances and concerts are also the company’s social entertainment products. Thus, they generated more revenue for the tech giant than online music streaming.

Tencent Music missed revenue estimates for the April-June quarter in the financial results. Therefore, it was said to be the slowest growth pace since Tencent Music went public last December. Since its reported average revenue per paying the user was 130.2 yuan ($18.37), a 16.5% on-year jump.

For media streaming companies, average revenue per paying user is a closely-watched metric.

Music labels including Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, and Warner Music Group. China’s antitrust authority was scrutinizing Tencent Music’s dealings.

The ongoing investigation or antitrust laws issue is declined to be commented by the Tencent Music.