Essay About Tencent Aiming And Live Games

Nfl – Tencent Aiming for China’s Smartphone Screens
Article SummaryIn the article “NFL, Tencent Aiming for China’s Smartphone Screens” (Wall Street Journal, August 22, 2017) Wayne Ma and Alyssa Abkowitz analyzed a latest deal between NFL and Tencent Holdings Ltd. that Tencent was given exclusive rights to digitally stream live games and other NFL content free of charge on mobile platforms. Managements of NFL were expecting that the NFL can successfully enter the Chinese sports market.         The deal with Tencent is a wise movement for NFL and managements’ expectations are likely to be realized for several reasons. For one thing, the time difference between U.S and China will contribute great to both NFL and Tencent in doing well in the ratings. Though football games usually come in on Monday, Tuesday and Friday morning in U.S, for Chines audience, football games come in on Sunday, Monday and Thursday evenings, which means Chinese audiences will be able to watch games through their smartphones at home without worrying about their work. For another, NFL chose the right partner. Tencent is one of the largest media and Internet company in China. By streaming live games and other NFL content free on charge on mobile, especially its WeChat, one of the most popular social media app in China with millions of active users, NFL will surely connect a lot of new Chines audiences. Other than a bright view of the future business, NFL still faces a big challenge on how to popularize its games and players as successful as NBA. After all, NBA entered the market earlier than NFL and already gained a large amount of audiences with the help of a former Houston Rockets player Yao Ming.        NFL will consider connecting a small portion of Chinese population a big success, since China is the most populous country in the world. If NFL would like to be successful in China, cooperating with the media giant in China, learning from the successful example of NBA basketball games and properly delivering the culture of the NFL are important steps.