We use cookies that are necessary to provide the Tencent Cloud website. We would also like to use other cookies to improve your experience, optimise and analyse Tencent Cloud website features and usage. For more information, please refer to our Cookies Policy.
Cloud Perspective - Interview with Steven Choi, Head of Tencent Cloud Hong Kong & Macau
Stepping out of your comfort zone is always easier said than done. Leaving a company where you’ve served for more than 22 years takes courage, but that decision may open the door for bright, new opportunities. That’s the story of Mr. Steven Choi, who is currently taking the helm of the business team of Tencent Cloud in Hong Kong and Macau, where the business is recording another consecutive year of high double-digit year-on-year growth.
A journey of a thousand miles begins with a tiny little step
Steven, who dubbed himself as a strong believer in cloud being the IT delivery model of the future, is a veteran in the IT industry. He previously worked with IBM for more than 22 years, followed by a one-year tenure at AWS, and finally joined Tencent Cloud three years ago. “It was indeed a tough decision. When I joined Tencent Cloud in early 2019, I recall our business in Hong Kong and Macau was almost a complete greenfield. Tencent was famous in the market, yet people seldom knew about its cloud business.”
However, Steven was moved by the company’s determination to strategically focus on the cloud business. He decided to take on the challenge, leveraging his profound knowledge and solid experience in the industry to build up Tencent Cloud’s business in Hong Kong and Macau from scratch.
From IaaS to PaaS and SaaS
After only a few years, Tencent Cloud’s business in Hong Kong and Macau has seen healthy and steady double/triple growth. In the beginning, the primary business focus was to build key customer cases and to establish Tencent Cloud’s presence in the market. With concerted efforts, the team won the trust of Blue, Hong Kong’s first digital life insurer, which completely migrated its core systems to Tencent Cloud, being the first one in the market to do so. In Macau, the team also supported CTM Macau, one of the city’s leading integrated telecoms providers, in building a public cloud facility, CTM Cloud, backed by Tencent Cloud Enterprise (TCE) technology in 2019. With these two influential customer testimonials, the team successfully proved its capabilities, gained more trust, and has since had many similar success stories in the market. Up to this day, Tencent Cloud has already penetrated several key industries, including banking, education, government and retail, and continues to expand its presence across different sectors in Macau.
But when it comes to cloud development, Steven believes there is still room for Hong Kong and Macau to grow, especially when compared to their counterparts in other developed markets which have long been adopting the cloud-first strategy. Nevertheless, Steven thinks that local customers can take a different path in terms of cloud adoption. “Instead of building everything on their own with IaaS, customers will adopt more PaaS and SaaS services, where they can quickly develop something based on what people have already built.”
“A university in Macau has chosen us over our competitor to build their private cloud with our TCE technology; in the banking sector, we offered eKYC solutions for their remote customer on-boarding; our flagship product, WeCom (the enterprise version of Weixin), is also well received in the market – the Education and Youth Development Bureau (DSEDJ) in Macau leveraged it as the primary communications tool among the government, schools, parents, and students, covering 80% of the primary and secondary school population in the city; Retailers also utilize WeCom for their client communications and social CRM.”
“All these customers we won over the past few years are a testimony to our commitment in transforming business from infrastructure services to a higher value, solutions focus.”
Assisting businesses in harnessing tremendous opportunities in the Greater Bay Area
Tapping into opportunities in the Greater Bay Area (GBA) has been the trend in recent years given the enormous market size. However, Steven pointed out a number of challenges that enterprises in Hong Kong and Macau may need to overcome; namely low brand awareness in GBA, lack of understanding of mainland customer behaviour and insights, as well as the unique digital ecosystem in China. “Tencent Cloud is well-positioned to be the digital assistant for these ‘Go-GBA’ enterprises. Leveraging our 20+ years of ToC (To consumer) experience, advanced AI, and cloud technologies, we can help customers drive end-user traffic, enhance customer experience, improve efficiency through better collaboration, and provide them with agile, secure, and legally compliant cloud infrastructure.”
Indeed, Tencent’s unique C2B (Customer to Business) approach is what Steven believes to set the brand apart from other market players. “If you look at the other global cloud service providers, most of them also evolved from ToC business to cloud business. But the major difference is that we are making full use of our ToC experience, methodology, and a vast ecosystem to help our cloud customers to improve their operational efficiency and enhance the connection with their employees, customers, partners, and suppliers.” This unique C2B2C strategy is exactly what differentiates Tencent Cloud’s offerings from the competition.
Looking ahead – industry solutions and partner ecosystem are key to success
As for the future direction of the cloud business in the Hong Kong and Macau market, Steven identified industry solutions as the key to success going forward. These include helping financial institutions expand their business in GBA through an integrated customer digital journey, empowering retailers to better engage and serve customers, facilitating the digital transformation of media and telecom industries via Tencent Cloud’s audio and video solutions, as well as collaborating with the public sectors to drive smarter cities.
“On top of that, we are adopting an ambitious approach to build up our channel partner ecosystem as we believe it’s crucial to further ramp up our business. We are working closely with distributors, system integrators, and global consulting partners, all of whom appreciate the unique value brought by Tencent Cloud.”
“Though a relative latecomer to the market, our team has endeavoured to win a lot of great customers across industries. I am confident we can progress further and captivate more customers and partners.”
Seizing opportunities: The small one counts
When asked about one of the most exciting projects in his Tencent Cloud voyage so far, Steven shared an exhilarating story. “We were invited to deliver a speech on digital transformation in an internal workshop of a major retailer in town. To me, digital transformation is a very broad topic that has been covered by many consultants before. We could easily fall into the trap of being too academic or seeming just like all the others. Therefore, our team, including solutions architects, conducted extensive research and underwent a thorough brainstorming to make the presentation impactful and relevant to the audience, which included all C-suite levels in the workshop. It was also a great opportunity for us to convey our beliefs, capabilities, and experience, as well as share some of our customers’ stories.”
“It turns out all the preparation time was well spent. Hard work did pay off. On the spot, their management saw a lot of potential for collaboration with Tencent Cloud, and we subsequently initiated a few more workshops targeting the retailer’s different business units. When they understood more about how our expertise and offerings can help address their business challenges, we were invited to participate in a tender and finally closed the deal. This is yet another major milestone for Tencent Cloud Hong Kong and Macau in the retail industry.”
Looking back on the case, Steven was proud of the strides he has taken. “I reckon for any successful sales professional, driving new pipelines by seizing every little opportunity is as important and challenging as closing a deal.”
The three golden elements – salesmanship, technical skills, industry know-how
As a leader of the Hong Kong and Macau business, Steven emphasized it is important for everyone in the team to acquire three skills – salesmanship, technical skills, and Industry know-how, regardless of the role they play. “Nowadays the IT-related purchase decisions are often made by frontline technical staff who are more concerned with technical aspects. Enterprise cloud sales have been shifted from traditional relationship-based to more technical-based. Gaining technical knowledge is a lifelong learning process as it’s essential to keep our skills up-to-date.”
“Another uniqueness of Tencent Cloud is that we focus a lot on industry applications of cloud technologies as we serve as a ‘digital assistant’ in all walks of life. We must continuously enrich our understanding of the industries we are responsible for, explore the opportunities and challenges our customers are facing, keep up with the trends in those industries, and understand who the major industry players are."
Beyond work
For leisure, Steven loves jogging and hiking and sometimes spends time enjoying movies and music at home. “These activities can really give me a temporary break from the busy schedule and intense work-life.” He is also a cat lover. Playing with his two kittens, Charcoal and Sapphire, allows him to recharge his battery so he can set forth again.
A team of strong players
Reminiscing on the past three years filled with challenges, joy, and excitement, Steven is thankful to have a team that has been striving for the best every step of the way. “Team, be proud of what we have achieved together, be optimistic and passionate for the future, and be faithful with where the company will lead us.”