NBA Partnership with Tencent

The NBA announced a 5-year partnership with Tencent stating that Tencent will be the league’s Exclusive Official Digital Partner of live NBA games in China for the next five seasons. Beginning next season, fans will no longer able to watch NBA games on Sina.com, letv.com and v.qq.com, but only on Tencent’s platform. Tencent paid $500 million (about RMB 3.12 billion) for the deal. Fans in China will be able to watch NBA games on Tencent’s platform (QQ.com, v.qq.com, QQ mobile, Qzone, etc.) on both PC and mobile devices. NBA and Tencent will also publish NBA games on Tencent’s platform.

App Zombie Rates

Turns out that China has the highest overall “app zombie rate” in the world at 81%, and the second highest “game app zombie rate” at 79%. One might think that we are talking about zombies such as the undead creatures in Plants vs. Zombies, but in fact we are talking about apps that are not visible in any ranked lists in the app stores. This means that discovery is not possible by browsing category lists, but rather a user must do a direct search for the app by title.

China Lifts FTZ Restrictions on Consoles

The State Council of China officially issued the “Notice of Promoting China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone and Replicable Pilot Reform Experience.” The notice includes “allowing foreign-invested enterprises engaged in the production and marketing of video games and other entertainment equipment” to “sell games nationwide after going through the censorship of Ministry of Culture,” indicating that China will officially permit the manufacture and sale of game consoles nationwide, after the trial program in Shanghai’s Free Trade Zone. The policy will take effect by June 30th 2015.

Alibaba Invests in Ouya

Alibaba invested $10 million in Ouya and partnered for content to the extent that Ouya will transfer its software and 1,000+ games to Alibaba’s TV OTT platform.

Indonesia Plans to Boost Game Industry

The head of Indonesia’s Creative Economy Agency, Triawan Munaf, plans to boost Indonesia’s game industry. He recognizes that local game developers lack in government support and experience difficulties in getting local funding. He said that his agency will subsidizes local game developers in order to promote the local game industry. He is also trying to increase training for game development, in coordination with Ministry of Education and Culture.

China Has 557 Million Mobile Internet Users

The China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), a government organization, announced that as of December 2014 there are 557 million mobile Internet users in China, up 11.4% from the year before.