China's internet giant Tencent signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Department for International Trade (DIT) of the UK Wednesday, announcing strategic collaboration in the digital and cultural creative industries.
According to the MOU, signed by Liam Fox, Secretary of State for International Trade, and Seng Yee Lau, senior executive vice president of Tencent, Tencent will kick off collaboration with leading British enterprises and corporations in the arena of digital creativity, with initial focus on film and television, fashion art and video games.
In the film and television sector, Tencent Penguin Pictures will sign a three-year partnership with the BBC on co-production, content development, business licensing, and marketing and distribution of content-rich documentaries on diverse topics.
In 2017, Blue Planet II, which is jointly produced by Tencent Video and the BBC, broke the global record as the most viewed documentary. The program has garnered a record-breaking 220 million views and has topped the Douban Documentary ratings with an overall score of 9.9.
Douban.com is a Chinese social networking service website allowing registered users to record information and create content such as film, books and music.
In the art and fashion sector, Tencent has been working with the Royal Opera House for various projects, such as a 20-hour World Ballet Day live stream during the National Holiday in China. It will also establish partnership with the British Fashion Council to design innovative, digital solutions for the fashion industry, using the latest AI technology and big data analysis into fashion design to generate a deeper understanding of young people's preferences.
In the game sector, the Chinese company will work together with the British Tourist Authority, renowned British IP content corporations and British fashion institutions, to introduce a British version of its famous 3D mobile racing game which has 100 million registered users and more than 20 million daily active users to date.
Tencent takes long-term investment in cutting-edge technologies such as AI and quantum computing seriously, and has been identifying collaboration opportunities around the world. Among the technological collaborations with organizations in the UK, Tencent has forged a long-term partnership with the University of Oxford on frontier disciplines, such as quantum computing and computer vision to promote the integrated development of academia and industry sector. On AI technology, Tencent and Babylon Health, a leading UK-based AI healthcare provider, signed a collaboration agreement to offer AI health consultation service on WeChat, a Chinese multi-purpose messaging, social media and mobile payment app developed by Tencent with over 1 billion monthly active users, in the near future.
"We are delighted to enter into collaboration with Tencent, drawing on each other's strengths to accelerate the growth of the global digital creative industries, in which the UK is a world leader. As an international economic department, we are determined to help UK companies to forge new global trading ties that will boost trade, drive growth and provide jobs to every part of the country," said the state secretary Liam Fox.
Tencent's Lau said in the ceremony that the MOU signed between Tencent and the DIT of UK will have a profound impact on promoting an open, mutually-complementary model of cooperation between China and Britain.
Founded in November, 1998, Tencent is a leading provider of Internet value-added services in China.
