Fun with Data – Chinese MAUs
Before social media and AI, MAUs (Monthly Active Users) were metrics that measured the success of mobile applications, web applications, and online gaming, and even further back, the performance of early internet companies. Since those days, MAUs have become the yardstick for AI chatbots and similar AI tools, with an emphasis on the need for MAU base growth month after month or quarter after quarter, to sustain ‘leadership’ roles in the AI space. Much of what we regularly see is MAU data for the US, but less so MAU data from China, the world’s largest market by the number of potential users. Facebook (FB) has the largest number of MAUs globally (~3bil.), but from a country standpoint Facebook has between 250 and 280m MAUs in the US, while WeChat (700.HK) has between 1.2 and 1.3 billion MAUs in China. The China/US population ratio is a bit over 4x, so based on population alone, WeChat has a higher country specific MAU than Facebook and gives significant value to MAU data from China.
Figure 1 - Top 10 Chinese Applications by MAU - Source: SCMR LLC, China Innovation Watch
As some of these companies might be unfamiliar to US investors, we summarize the primary business of each and provide the closest US equivalent:
Other than Huawei’s weather app, all of the top 10 applications with the highest MAUs are owned by either Tencent or Alibaba and e-commerce dominates the pack, along with digital payment applications. However, with so many of the largest applications owned by two companies, we look toward those Chinese applications that are growing their MAUs, and some of these are growing quite rapidly. Deepseek (pvt), the Chinese AI that challenged incumbents on cost at the training level did not have a comparative year to generate y/y MAU growth, but would have likely been the fastest growing application followed by AI assistant Doubau (pvt) at over 400% MAU growth, followed again by Honggou (pvt), a short-form video application with MAU growth of over 150%, and CloudPay (pvt), at almost 80% growth. From there things quiet down to between 25% and 35% MAU growth for a number of service and ‘utility’ apps that continue to gain users.
While we in the US are certainly not immune to trends, fads, and the mania behind on-line applications, China seems even more so, so when something gets going, the momentum behind such a large population base can be quite strong. Its worth checking in on user growth on the mainland to see if anything new has moved into the top 10 position and we do it regularly. While Deepseek will have to wait for a y/y comparison, we expect it will remain at or near the top of the list during the next MAU round.
- WeChat: A multi-purpose messaging, social media, and mobile payment app. The closest equivalent (there is really no equivalent in the US) would be a combination of Facebook Messenger, PayPal (PYPL), and Yelp (YELP).
- Taobao (BABA): An e-commerce platform for C2C. The closest US equivalent would be eBay.
- Alipay (BABA): A third-party mobile and online payment platform and digital wallet service. PayPal would be the closest US equivalent.
- Douyin (pvt): A short-form video app. TikTok (pvt) would be the equivalent..
- Amap (BABA): A digital mapping, navigation, and location-based service provider. Google Maps would be the US equivalent.
- Baidu (BIDU): A Chinese technology company that primarily provides search engine services. Since it is often called “The Google of China”, Google would be the equivalent.
- Sogou Input (700.HK): A Chinese language input method utility. This is an application that sits between the keyboard and the WP software that takes Pinyin text (Romanized Chinese) and offers suggestions for Chinese characters. The closest US equivalent would be Google’s GBoard, which is a predictive utility (suggestions) but not a word processor.
- QQ Browser (700.HK): A web browser developed by Tencent. The equivalent would be Google Chrome.
- Tencent Video (700.HK): A video on-demand streaming website owned by Tencent. US equivalents would be Hulu (DIS) or Paramount (PARA).
- Huawei Weather (pvt): A weather forecasting and information app provided by Huawei. The US equivalent would be weather.com or Accuweather.com.
Other than Huawei’s weather app, all of the top 10 applications with the highest MAUs are owned by either Tencent or Alibaba and e-commerce dominates the pack, along with digital payment applications. However, with so many of the largest applications owned by two companies, we look toward those Chinese applications that are growing their MAUs, and some of these are growing quite rapidly. Deepseek (pvt), the Chinese AI that challenged incumbents on cost at the training level did not have a comparative year to generate y/y MAU growth, but would have likely been the fastest growing application followed by AI assistant Doubau (pvt) at over 400% MAU growth, followed again by Honggou (pvt), a short-form video application with MAU growth of over 150%, and CloudPay (pvt), at almost 80% growth. From there things quiet down to between 25% and 35% MAU growth for a number of service and ‘utility’ apps that continue to gain users.
While we in the US are certainly not immune to trends, fads, and the mania behind on-line applications, China seems even more so, so when something gets going, the momentum behind such a large population base can be quite strong. Its worth checking in on user growth on the mainland to see if anything new has moved into the top 10 position and we do it regularly. While Deepseek will have to wait for a y/y comparison, we expect it will remain at or near the top of the list during the next MAU round.
Figure 2 - Top 10 Fastest Growing Chinese Mobile Applications by MAU Growth - Source: SCMR LLC, China Innovation Watch
- DeepSeek: A Chinese artificial intelligence company that develops large language models. US equivalent would be Gemini (GOOG) or ChatGPT (pvt).
- Doubao: An AI-powered conversational assistant platform that provides a variety of services, including real-time video calls and a video generator. The equivalent would be a combination of ChatGPT, Jasper.AI (pvt) and any of a number of creative AI tools.
- Hongguo : Short form videos. US equivalent would be TikTok ().
- CloudPay : A global pay solutions provider focused on platform for payroll, payments, and pay-on-demand services. US equivalents would be Workday () or Paycom ().
- ChinaMobile (600941.CH): A state-owned Chinese telecommunications company (World's largest mobile network operator). US equivalents would be T-Mobile (TMUS), Verizon (VZ), and AT&T (T).
- Dianping (3690.HK): An online-to-offline (O2O) platform for consumer reviews and information on merchants, as well as services like group buying and online restaurant reservations. Yelp () would be the US equivalent.
- MiHome: (1810.HK) A Xiaomi application that gives users access to all of their mobile devices. Apple (AAPL) would be a US equivalent.. .
- Quark (BABA): Publishing software and content automation. US equivalent would be Adobe (ADBE).
- Didi (pvt): A Chinese mobility company that offers app-based transportation and related services, including ride-hailing, taxi services, and bike-sharing. US equivalent would be Uber ().
- ABC Bank (601288.CH): An international wholesale banking provider that offers corporate banking, trade finance, and treasury products. US equivalents would be JP Morgan Chase (JPM) or Bank of America (BAC).
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