Tencent, the developer of WeChat, revealed that the voice messaging service will remain free to use, in response to Chinese users’ concern over the possibility of being charged for using the service.
According to the company’s CEO Liu Chiping there will not be any need to charge users for the service, while the app’s large user base would also offer room for cooperation with telecom operators.
Liu’s remarks follow a statement from China’s Minister of Industry and Information Technology, Miao Wei, that the telecom service providers may be allowed to charge users for WeChat.
Incorporating free voice messaging and photo-sharing features, WeChat has been popular among Chinese mobile users and had over 300 million users in 2012.
According to reports, the telecom service providers allege that WeChat and other over-the-top (OTT) content service providers have to pay for generating excessive data flows, which occasionally lead to traffic jams in signalling channels.
Additionally, Tencent, which is China’s online gaming and social networking company, is planning to increase its investments in WeChat to attract more international users.
