HEAD OF THE DAY
🇨🇳 Pony Ma
Source: Wikipedia By 中国新闻网, CC BY 3.0
📱 The man who built the everything app
Pony Ma didn’t invent the chat app, he perfected it. He weaponized speed and user feedback to build WeChat—the "super app" that now acts as the digital central nervous system for over a billion people.
Behind it stands tech giant Tencent, which is also one of the world’s largest gaming companies.
💡 Fun fact: ‘Pony’ is a play on his surname, which means ‘horse’ in Chinese.
👉 Lesson learned: It’s not about being first; it’s about iterating faster and better than everyone else. WeChat eclipsed rivals by releasing multiple updates per week when others managed only one a month.
The China Survival Guide for Western Businesses
Entity setup, WeChat strategy, hiring your first local team. 12+ years on the ground in Shanghai.
