(Yicai) Jan. 27 -- Tencent Holdings founder Pony Ma has praised efforts by rival Alibaba Group Holding to fully integrate the Qwen artificial intelligence assistant across its ecosystem and criticized ByteDance’s push to embed Doubao in phone operating systems, when outlining the Chinese internet giant's own AI development strategy to staff.

Tencent will treat large language models and AI products in an integrated way, and will create future products and arrange organizational design based on team cross-functionality, staff secondment, and co-design, Ma, who is also chairman and chief executive, told employees at the Shenzhen-based firm’s recent annual gathering.

Alibaba's efforts to deeply integrate Qwen across its ecosystem are "commendable" and the platform linkage makes sense, Ma noted, but cautioned that an “all-in-one” AI bundle may not appeal to everyone.

Regarding Doubao's approach of integrating at the OS level to help users carry out phone operations, Ma said the use of gray-market plug-ins to record users' phone and computer screens and upload that to the cloud was "extremely unsafe and irresponsible." Tencent is “firmly opposed” to this practice, he pointed out.

WeChat's AI integration "appears relatively slow,” Ma said, because Tencent’s super app will not create a centralized AI entry point but will maintain a decentralized approach, allowing users to define when and where AI activates.

Tencent will continue with its decentralized strategy to balance user needs with privacy and security when planning WeChat's intelligent ecosystem, he said, adding that the app should develop according to its own characteristics rather than rushing to copy whatever others are doing.

With so many users already on WeChat, it is never too late to invest in AI, but this needs long-term investment, according to Allen Zhang, who led the team that created the app.

After Chief AI Scientist Yao Shunyu joined Tencent last summer, the company accelerated recruitment of AI-native talent to restructure its research and development team and bolster the synergy between the Hunyuan LLM and Yuanbao AI assistant, Ma pointed out. AI is a major business where the firm has focused investment, he stressed.

On Jan. 25, Yuanbao announced a CNY1 billion (USD143.7 million) “red envelope” giveaway campaign for the upcoming Chinese New Year.

On the topic of Tencent’s other businesses, Ma confirmed that cloud operations have achieved profitability at scale, while gaming is "almost scarily strong" this year. Overseas gaming income exceeded USD10 billion last year, accounting for over 30 percent of its total gaming revenue, thanks to strategic investments, co-development tie-ups, and self-developed titles going global, he said.

Tencent’s Cloud and Smart Industries Group has "fully turned around," with revenue exceeding CNY37 billion (USD5.3 billion) last year and gross margins above 30 percent, an executive said.

Tencent's exit rate for junior, middle, and senior management was 11.4 percent over the past year, another executive noted.

Editor: Martin Kadiev