Tencent CEO Pony Ma gave his most candid assessment yet of the company's AI efforts at a shareholder meeting, admitting that Tencent was not particularly strong in the early days. He likened the experience to "thinking we were on a boat a year ago, only to realize it was leaking."
Ma described Tencent's current AI status as "on board, but still can't sit down — hope the boat can speed up." He made it clear that while Tencent may not be the fastest to seize opportunities, it will steadily advance using its own strengths rather than blindly following trends. "You can't just jump into someone else's territory because they're doing something over there. We've tried that before, and it mostly failed," he said. For now, Tencent is addressing its shortcomings by restructuring teams and investing in talent.