Jeffrey Li, the managing director of Tencent Investments who conducted $5bn worth of equity deals in some 100 companies last year, took the stage this morning to talk about its parent company, China-based internet group Tencent.
Li, who is also the general manager of Tencent M&A, began by providing an overview of Tencent, a company that he acknowledged is less well known in Europe than e-commerce group Alibaba despite being one of the top five internet companies worldwide in terms of market capitalisation.
Tencent’s corporate venturing efforts are currently handled by a team of nearly 40 people, all based in China, who have jointly invested more than $10bn in more than 300 companies.
The unit’s vision for the future is significant, with its sights set on a huge ecosystem that includes everything from gaming and entertainment to transport to e-commerce and local services.
Tencent Investments is hoping to foster innovation in sectors such as virtual and augmented reality, driverless vehicles and pharmacology, as it drives consolidation across sectors including transport, where ride hailing apps Didi Dache and Kuaidi Dache merged to form Didi Chuxing, a Tencent portfolio company, in February 2015.
Li said: “We have luckily had very strong organic growth, as we make investments off the balance sheet.”
Tencent Investments is also taking an interesting approach to its portfolio companies, choosing to treat them as business units rather than separate entities, and Li said e-commerce company JD.com, in which Tencent owns a 20% stake, benefits significantly from that partnership model.
Currently, around 80% of Tencent’s deals are conducted in China, though Martin Haemmig, the adjunct professor at Center for Innovation & Technology Management who introduced Li, hinted the company might further increase its focus on Europe in the near future.
Li concluded with his unit’s philosophy, dubbed ‘alliance of heroes’, by alluding to online game World of Warcraft and stating that: “Rather than having one powerful hero in the game to play with, we try to play with an alliance of them in collaboration.”
In this regard, he paid tribute to the insights from its own corporate venturing investor, South Africa-based Naspers’ MIH unit, which has retained its stake taken more than a decade ago.
Finally, James Mawson, editor-in-chief of Global Corporate Venturing, took the opportunity to present Jeffrey Li with an award for taking the top spot in the GCV Powerlist 2016.