Tencent eyes China JK Rowling to emerge

Tencent Inc will invest more than 100 million yuan ($16 million) in online literature this year to attract star authors who will be offered monetary support and may have their works integrated into videos and games, China's No. 1 dot-com company said yesterday in Shanghai.

Tencent Literature, a relatively new unit founded last year, aims to become the country's No. 1 online literature firm in the market with over 100 million online readers, said Wu Wenhui, Tencent Literature's chief executive.

Tencent Literature plans to attract at least 10 star authors this year, each of whom will get about 10 million yuan from the company for marketing and promotions as well as a possible expansion into the video and game sectors.

"Star authors still have great influence in the online literature market in China," said Wu, an online literature industry veteran who used to work in Shanda Literature, the country's leading online literature website.

"China's JK Rowling may appear from the authors," Wu said, referring to the author of Harry Potter books.

Tencent Literature's works are published in the company's applications like QQ Reading, Wu added.

Separately, Tencent Literature signed a deal with popular online author Mao Ni yesterday to invest 50 million yuan to spread his works online and make videos and games based on themes of his novels. Mao has more than 1 million readers online.