Asian influence: Six Asian technology start-ups that influence the world

Asian markets are rapidly becoming key target markets for technology companies, especially mobile internet companies. China is now the world's largest smartphone market, while Japan and South Korea are among the world's most mobile internet needs. In other Asian countries, the use of smartphones (mainly Android) is growing fast.

Asian countries, while attracting Western companies, have produced many good companies in their respective markets, and these Asian companies are expanding outward to internationalize. Below we will introduce 6 Asian companies (products) that have the potential to be bigger in the international market.

1. Micro-letter (WeChat)

Country: China

Services: Voice, text information, social

Users: 200 million

Micro-letters can be said to be Asia's emerging mobile services. Tencent announced earlier this month that the number of micro-credit users exceeded 200 million, while the number of users had just exceeded 100 million by 6 months ago.

The service, though simple but very easy to use, currently supports 12 languages. Micro-Mail has many functions, you can use it to send text messages and voice information, but also high-definition video calls, but also a number of other features. The micro-letter interface is very beautiful, and its function is updated in the form of plug-ins, so that the update will not destroy the integrity of the application, as well as the user experience. This is very different from other applications, and most of the other apps are always in a confused way after the update.

Tencent's financial strength, Tencent to do the backer, micro-letter advantage is very obvious. Most of its competitors are startups, which have to consider the issue of profitability to meet the demands of outside investors. and micro-mail is not, which allows the micro-letter can focus on services, rather than do some can make money, but will affect the user experience of the function.

After China defeated early startups like Talkbox, Tencent turned its sights on the international market, and South-East Asia was its preferred area. Now, it's not fair to say when micro-letters will enter the U.S. market, but I've seen some people in the scientific and technological community using the app. In addition, we believe that micro-letters, like Sina Weibo, have at least a small number of users in America's Asian diaspora, and that it has the potential to grow better in the United States.

However, there is a problem. Huawei and ZTE, China's telecoms equipment maker, are now being investigated by the U.S. government for fear they will engage in espionage for the Chinese government, as we all know. As a result, services such as micro-trust, which permeates the American communications, are expected to encounter problems with Huawei and ZTE.

2.Line

Country: Japan, Korea

Services: Similar to micro-letters, social, voice, text information

Users: 60 million (add 5 million users every three weeks)

This mobile application has been popular all over Asia since this year, and line is one of the leaders. The app, which was released only a year ago, already has 60 million users, most of whom come from Japan.

The main difference between line and micro-letters is that line's social framework is built around the core of text information and voice information. Line has a special function-"line Channel". This feature allows users to play games, apply, and view other multimedia content. At the same time, it has some features similar to Facebook, such as personal pages and information walls.

Line is mainly for Asian users, especially in Southeast Asian countries. Currently, line has localized applications based on the needs of users in Thailand, Indonesia and other countries. At the same time, they are ready to enter the Middle East market, as well as China and the United States. However, given the Japanese government's dispute over the purchase of Diaoyu Islands, which has affected Japanese companies ' operations, their plans to enter the Chinese market should be postponed.

The line is also very "Asian", not very suitable for American users, but a line leader said they are working to solve the problem.

3.GREE

Country: Japan

Services: Mobile Social Games

Users: 50 million

Japanese users are heavily reliant on mobile internet, so Japan has a lot of mobile internet companies, and Gree is one of them. Gree's products are mobile social gaming platforms, where users can do a lot of social-related things, such as chatting, instant messaging, two-player games, and so on.

The company has been focusing on international markets for a long time and has laid a solid foundation in Japan. Gree in April 2011 with 104 million dollars to acquire the famous gaming platform operator OpenFeint, and released this summer, a new global platform for the beta test, the new platform to integrate Gree's own gaming platform and OpenFeint platform.

The game on the Gree platform, though a Japanese name, has been a huge success worldwide. Its financial data showed that Gree's turnover in the US had reached $16.87 million trillion in the second quarter, up 38% from the previous quarter.

The mobile internet is the next hot area for social gaming, and Gree is developing very well. Gree has benefited from the long-term profitability of its domestic business and is in a very good financial position, and we think it is likely to move aggressively into the US and European markets. In fact, he's already doing it. Gree recently set up a branch in London.

4.DeNA

Country: Japan

Services: Mobile Social Games--mobage (Dream Treasure Valley)

Users: 45 million (global download 160 million)

Dena is Gree's main competitor in Japan. Like Gree, Dena entered the US market in October 2010 with a 400 million dollar takeover of American game publishers Ngmoco. In October 2010, Dena A 400 million dollar takeover of Ngmoco, the US Big mobile gaming company, and merged its original Mobage-town platform with Ngmoco's mobile gaming platform plus+, which is called Mobage from March 28, 2011 onwards. Ngmoco's co-founder joined Dena after his company was acquired. "Gree is Dena's biggest competitor in the U.S. market," he said in an interview. ”

Dena Company has many very successful games on the Japanese mobage platform. But in Japan, some social-gaming experts believe that the two Japanese companies Dena and Gree are not easy to achieve in the United States.

However, Dena is struggling to win the US market, recently acquiring Gameview, a social gaming studio in California State.

5.Bubbly

Country: Singapore

Service: Bubbly is called the voice version of Twitter, social

Users: 19 million

Bubbly is now very successful in Asia. Bubbly application is a mobile voice based micro-blogging platform, called voice version of Twitter, users can use voice and fans, friends to share their status updates.

Recently, the company launched a new version of the bubbly. In the new version of the software, bubbly new voice "filter" function, like Instagram image filter, users can use the Voice "filter" to add special effects to their voice.

Bubbly now has more than 19 million users, mainly from Japan, India and so on. Bubbly attracted a large number of celebrities, Bubbly's CEO, Tom Clayton Tom Clayton, said, "Now more and more stars are using social media to communicate with their fans, and bubbly is associated with Twitter and Facebook, Have a great appeal to the stars of these entertainment circles. ”

Bubbly recently won 5 million dollars in investment from Japan's largest venture capital company and began to plan for market development in the United States. Clayton says they now need to make some adjustments to the US market to suit the needs of American users.

6.Twitmusic

Country: Philippines, United States

Service: A music application based on Twitter

User: Unknown (July 2012 hits 200,000)

Twitmusic has achieved some success in Asia, but the specifics have yet to be validated, so we put it in the end. Twitmusic is a Twitter based music application that allows users to log on to Twitmusic directly using their existing Twitter account. Then, share the music that you are listening to. In addition, you can also the @ So-and-so musician, click "like" a song.

Twitmusic's main function is to help users find their favorite music. There are already some musicians who have joined the Twitmusic, such as Bryan Adams and Jon Secada. By July this year, 8,000 musicians had registered for Twitmusic, and their monthly page views were also more than 200,000, up 823% from January this year.

Mobile version of the Twitmusic, has a very large potential, the company is also planning to launch mobile clients. But is there a word that says "content is king"? Therefore, now for Twitmusic, the most important thing is to attract more celebrities to join, accumulate more quality content, and it is now really trying to win the stars. They are planning to launch a star kit that allows stars to analyze how their songs have been heard. And this service will charge a fee, they believe it can bring them income while ordinary users can continue to use twitmusic for free.

"We want to accumulate content and have a lot of content and we can become powerful music discovery tools," said Sandra Seifert, co-founder of Twitmusic Sandra Sevet. ”

Summary

I personally believe that micro-letters are among the 6 applications that are most likely to be hugely successful in the United States. Because this is not only very beautiful, but easy to use, the most important thing is to have Tencent this big rich man to do the patron. There is no doubt, however, that the threat to Zynga from Japan's two gaming companies will grow.

Article Source: TNW

(Responsible editor: Liu Fen)