Influence Empire

In 2019, the Chinese firm Tencent moved past Facebook to become the world's fifth-largest company. For Western observers who have long viewed the global technology sector through the lens of Silicon Valley, with Facebook, Google, Apple and Microsoft at its center, the shift was a jolt. Many of the more than two billion people living on the other side of the Pacific saw it differently, since the company's rise came as no surprise to them.

Tencent aims to be woven into everyday digital life, and its portfolio spans music, games, messaging and film. Drawing on interviews with people inside the organization and on previously unreported details about its internal culture, technology reporter Lulu Chen traces how the company is reshaping the world and considers what that may mean for everyone else.