Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, has opened a personal account on China's social media platform WeChat, greeting Chinese fans with his clumsy Chinese in his first post on Saturday.
He created a 30-second video clip on the social media platform. He first sent his greetings in Chinese, and then switched to English shortly.
He expressed that this social account will be his personal blog wherein he can share stories of people he meets, the books he's read, as well as the lessons he's learned.
Besides this, Gates will also post content that involves global health issues, energetic innovation and educational reform.
The video already has more than 100,000 views as of press time.
Many other Western celebrities also tapped into the massive Chinese social market in order to engage better with Chinese followers and potential customers.
Apple CEO Tim Cook and physicist Stephen Hawking both have Sina Weibo accounts. They have more than 890,000 followers and 4 million followers, respectively.
Gates also has had a Weibo account since 2010 which currently has 3 million followers.
Gates's WeChat account was opened by Boruizhi Consulting Company, a private company. It has yet to be officially authenticated on the social media platform.
Global Health Strategies is a shareholder in Boruizhi Consulting, and is connected to the Bill Gates Foundation. It is unusual to have personal WeChat accounts run by companies instead of the owner.
Chinese netizens were surprised to see Gates when he unveiled a personal account on WeChat. One user nicknamed "maozhebuyongsheng" said that he feels much closer to a billionaire now.
Gates has been featured in many inspirational Chinese "chicken soup" readings, and has been a source of motivation for the younger generation of Chinese.
Another user nicknamed "youshixiyuan" posted that he will only drink "chicken soup" from Gates in the future.
Other users joked that perhaps Gates would take advantage of a popular WeChat feature used to borrow/lend money in order to send Lucky Money packets to Chinese users.