Tencent continues to reign as world’s largest games company

Chinese gaming giant Tencent has reported profits in excess of $1bn in its first financial quarter.

Profits reached $1.1bn, up eight per cent year-on-year, while revenues jumped 22 per cent at $3.65bn. Operating profit climbed 20 per cent to $1.5bn.

Online game revenue grew 29 per cent to $2.1bn while social network revenues grew by 32 per cent to $856m. Smartphone revenues shot up by 82 per cent to $700m. League of Legends enjoyed what was described as healthy” year-on-year growth.

During the first quarter of 2015, we continued to expand our mobile user base and improve our engagement with users, while delivering solid financial results,” Tencent chairman and CEO Ma Huateng said.

Our key mobile properties extended their leadership in China and continued to broaden user activities from social and communications to gaming, entertainment, media content, payment, and beyond. Driven by mobile social and video advertisements, our total advertising revenue more than doubled year-on-year.

Looking ahead, we aim to bring further technology benefits to users through our ‘Internet +’ strategy of connecting users with services in various vertical industries through collaboration with a broad range of partners.”

Tencent has stakes in arrange of video games companies including Activision Blizzard and Epic Games. It has also just announced a minority investment in US War Dragons developer Pocket Gems.