My Intern Experience in Tencent Strategy Department

In this article, Liner SHI (ESSEC Business School, Global Bachelor of Business Administration (GBBA) – Exchange Student, 2024-2025) shares her professional experience as an intern in Tencent Strategy Department.

About the company

Tencent is a leading technology company founded in 1998 with its headquarters located in Shenzhen, China. Tencent Group engages in a wide range of activities, offering both B2C and B2B services.

B2C: Tencent has released numerous globally popular video games and other high-quality digital content, providing rich interactive entertainment experiences for over 1 billion users worldwide by 2023.Here are specific B2C services that Tencent offers : famous games like Honor of Kings and Arena of Valor, popular social media apps like Wechat and QQ, other apps like QQ Music . Tencent has a wide user base in Asia, North America, and Europe.
B2B: Tencent offers a range of enterprise services including cloud computing, advertising, and financial technology, supporting partners in achieving digital transformation and facilitating business development.

Tencent has been listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong since 2004. Tencent’s revenue in 2023 was $83.97 billion, representing a 10% increase compared to the previous year.

Logo of Tencent.

Source: Tencent.

Introduction to WeCom Business

WeCom, also known as WeChat Work, is an enterprise communication and office collaboration tool developed by Tencent. Tencent created WeCom to provide businesses with a platform that integrates seamlessly with WeChat, allowing for efficient internal communication, project management, and customer engagement.

Logo of WeCom.

Source: KRDS.

Currently, WeCom primarily features are:

Support for various communication methods between enterprises and customers, such as messaging, group chat, announcements, and short videos.
Collaboration tools and lightweight internal management solutions including online documents, enterprise cloud storage, calendar management, and attendance approval.
Lightweight customer management and upstream/downstream collaboration tools including personal profiles, mass messaging, customer moments, lead tracking, upstream/downstream contact lists, and application sharing.

My internship

I collaborated with my mentor on the 2023 China SaaS (Software as a Service) Dynamics Report. This report covered policy interpretations, listings and financing updates, AI(Artificial Intelligence) integration, and overseas expansion.Initially, I wasn’t clear about the relationship between WeCom and other domestic SaaS companies, which led to a lack of focus in my first report. After discussing with my mentor, I realized our research had two main goals: to provide market insights for WeCom’s development and to find suitable ecosystem partners. With this clarity, my analysis improved significantly. This taught me the importance of aligning business objectives with strategic research. Also in the process, I collected data from various platforms like Easy Disclosure and Wind Consulting and realized the significance of comparing information across channels.

Also, I participated in interviews and summarized customer retention issues WeCom faced after commercialization.In 2023, WeCom began charging customers for using its platform for the first time. Some customers may churn or reduce their demand for Wecom due to charges. Therefore, it is crucial to collect the attitudes of key customers towards the pricing model of WeCom. My responsibility was to organize and analyze the interview results, identify the most valued commercial needs and pain points of customers.

I summarized the research on major comparable companies (such as Lark and DingTalk) My mentor focused on their strategies regarding revenue, organizational dynamics, target markets, and business expansion. This experience honed my skills in concise summarization and provided valuable insights.

Financial concepts related my internship

There are three key concepts related to my work in WeCom. Since WeCom is a collaborative office and customer management application, there are key metrics of SaaS companies that we should pay attention to. These metrics include Net Promoter Score (NPS), Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR), and Automatic Delivery Rate (ADR).

Net Promoter Score (NPS)

NPS measures customer satisfaction and loyalty by asking about the likelihood of recommending a product or service. In SaaS companies, NPS is crucial because they often operate on a subscription model. A high NPS indicates that customers are likely to continue using and renewing services. NPS reflects the appeal of SaaS products for sustained customer use. We also track customer retention rate and contract renewal rate.

Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR)

ARR is the total revenue generated from subscription services within a year. It is a key metric for SaaS companies to measure subscription income, calculated by summing up subscription fees from each customer.

Automatic Delivery Rate (ADR)

The automatic delivery rate reflects the level of automation in services or products provided by SaaS companies. High automatic delivery rates enable SaaS companies to offer more convenient, efficient, and stable services, reducing customer using costs and risks. It’s an important metric for measuring operational efficiency and service quality in SaaS companies.

Why should I be interested in this post?

This article offers an opportunity to delve deeper into the intricacies of Tencent’s WeCom business and analogous SaaS products, providing a comprehensive understanding of their operational frameworks. Plus, I hope that by sharing my own experience, you’ll get a better feel for what it’s like to work as a strategic intern and what you should focus on in the role.

Useful resources

Tencent 2023 Annual Report

Tencent 2023 fourth quarter and annual results presentation

About the author

The article was written in June 2024 by Liner SHI (ESSEC Business School, Global Bachelor of Business Administration (GBBA) – Exchange Student, 2024-2025).