亚洲聊天应用市场“三国大战”

    亚太地区拥有超过44亿人口，在某些地区，拥有移动设备的人还很少。但在另外一些国家，市场上的电子产品琳琅满目，人们日常对智能手机的依赖度程度比任何其它大洲的消费者还要高。

    这就解释了为什么很多科技公司都把亚太地区当作摇钱树。作为科技行业的热门领域之一，移动通信应用领域正在酝酿着一场大战。中国的微信（WeChat）、日本的Line和Facebook的WhatsApp已成鼎足之势，即将为争夺几十亿用户展开恶斗。

    IDC公司驻孟买分析师希夫•普恰指出：“这些聊天应用正在亚洲市场上展开一场平台争夺战。它们的发展已经远远超越最初的短信服务，现已包含娱乐、游戏甚至是支付等诸多功能。实际上，它们在移动平台上的影响力，很快就堪比谷歌（Google）和Facebook等公司在网络生态系统中的影响力。”

    为了准备即将到来的大战，这些聊天应用背后的公司正在抓紧排兵布阵，缔结同盟，以增加成功的机率。比如中国网络巨头腾讯公司（Tencent）最近刚刚收购了京东商城（JD.com）15%的股权，后者是中国第二大电子商务网站。这笔交易的目的是为了在微信这款热门应用中添加移动支付功能。腾讯（它也是亚洲最有价值的互联网公司，市值约1590亿美元）还计划为京东建立一个独家的购物渠道，使微信的4.38亿年轻的中国用户可以轻松登陆这家电商门户网站。

    日本的Line公司是腾讯在亚洲的最大对手。该公司已经在东京证券交易所（Tokyo Stock Exchange）递交了首次公开募股申请书，预计将融资98亿美元。Ovum公司分析师尼哈•达利亚指出：“在这个层次的聊天应用竞争中，产品创新将是决定成败的一个重要因素。看来Line已经了解了市场的这种变革，它的IPO之举也是非常明智的。”

    与此同时，这个市场上也不时上演着收购大戏。比如硅谷的Facebook和东京的乐天公司（Rakuten）分别收购了WhatsApp和Viber，使这些被收购的公司可以不必担心资金问题，专心研发新产品，扩展他们的用户群。

    Viber是一款由四名以色列合伙人创办的聊天应用，今年早些时候以9亿美元的价格被日本乐天公司收购。Viber的有趣之处在于，很多人认为它是微软（Microsoft）热门通讯软件Skype的克隆版。有些人甚至认为Viber在通讯上比Skype表现得更出色。

    WhatsApp继续在全球范围内享有大量用户群，但它在亚洲的前景则不那么清晰。与竞争对手相比，WhatsApp的缺陷在于功能还不够丰富。除了产品创新以外，WhatsApp能否获得更大范围的流行，还取决于它能否成功利用庞大的Facebook用户群，能否与其网络与信息系统进行整合，不过WhatsApp的CEO詹•库姆今年二月曾否定过这个可能，他在一次行业会议上表示：“目前没有与Facebook进行整合的计划。”说明WhatsApp被收购后的发展轨迹，很可能和Instagram差不多。

    高德纳公司（Gartner）驻上海分析师沈哲怡表示：“WhatsApp面向的是全球市场，但它在亚洲相对较弱，微信把目光瞄准了全球华人社区，所以它也在全球占据一席之地，但定位是不一样的。”

    There are more than 4.4 billion people in the Asia-Pacific region. In some areas, few people have mobile devices. In others, the market is so saturated with electronics that people deeply engage with their smartphones—more than consumers on any other continent, according to some estimates.

    All of this helps explain why so many technology companies see the region as potentially lucrative. In one of the hotter areas of the technology industry, mobile communications applications, a wicked chat war is brewing. China’s WeChat, Japan’s Line, and Facebook’s WhatsApp (American in origin, but especially popular in Asia) are engaged in a fight for the hearts and mobile devices of billions of people.

    “The chat apps are all competing with each other in a platform land grab across Asian markets,” says Shiv Putcha, an analyst for IDC based in Mumbai. “They have extended well beyond the original SMS replacement service to include entertainment, gaming, and now payments. In effect, they are fast becoming the mobile equivalents of the online ecosystems built by the likes of Google and Facebook.”

    In preparation for the coming fight, the chat providers are building war chests and forging alliances to improve their chances of success. Tencent, the Chinese Internet giant, recently bought 15 percent of JD.com, the second largest e-commerce website in China, with the intention of adding a mobile payment function to its hugely popular WeChat platform. Tencent (which is Asia’s most valuable Internet company with a market capitalization that hovers around $159 billion) also plans to create an exclusive shopping channel for JD.com, thereby connecting WeChat’s 438 million young Chinese users to the e-commerce portal.

    Japan’s Line Corporation is Tencent’s biggest Asian chat rival. The company has filed for an initial public offering on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and is expected to raise $9.8 billion. “Product innovation will be a strong differentiating factor at this level of chat app competition,” says Neha Dharia, an analyst at Ovum. “Line seems to have understood this change in the market and its I.P.O. move makes perfect sense.”

    Meanwhile, consolidation is taking place in the market. Silicon Valley’s Facebook and Tokyo’s Rakuten have acquired WhatsApp and Viber, respectively, allowing the acquired companies to focus on developing new products and expanding their user base without having to worry about funds.

    Viber, founded by four Israeli partners and acquired earlier this year for $900 million, is particularly interesting because it is considered to be a clone of Skype MSFT -0.04% , the popular Microsoft-owned communications software. Some argue that Viber is better suited to the task than the real McCoy.

    WhatsApp continues to enjoy massive global reach, but its future in Asia is unclear. Compared to rival applications, the service has limited functionality. Barring product improvements, its popularity could be dependent on its ability to leverage Facebook’s FB -0.52% immense user base and integrate with its namesake network and messaging system—a possibility WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum dashed in February. “No plans for integration with Facebook whatsoever,” he said at an industry conference, suggesting a post-acquisition trajectory similar to that of Instagram.

    “WhatsApp is for the global market but it’s weaker in Asia,” says Sandy Shen, an analyst for Gartner based in Shanghai. “WeChat is targeting the Chinese community worldwide, so it also has global presence. But its positioning is different.”