> I think it's naive to think that the opinion of a 40% shareholder has no influence on the CEO. Even if that just presents as a bias in their decision making.
I'm more than willing to accept that I'm being naive. All I ask is some actual evidence of this influence/bias.
Given almost literally all of recorded corporate history in the United States, the onus is very much on the other side to continually demonstrate a lack of influence/bias.
Edited to add: I find the blind faith people place in billionaire CEOs insane. Maybe save the empathy for people who need it and treat the obscenely wealthy with healthy skepticism?
There are many American companies that capitulate to Chinese political pressure without even being owned by the Chinese. Tencent owns 2 of the top 5 biggest gaming platforms in the US, but the one that got accused of being too close to the Chinese is now owned by Microsoft.
I think the question is why is there an expectation that Tencent is somehow more nefarious than any other billion dollar conglomerate?
Because in a very literal sense every large Chinese company is not only "in bed with", but a direct extension of the Chinese government, which uses its other tentacles to attack foreign companies it does not control via market manipulation and hacking.
America as one of the largest economies does all these things but in a much more disparate fashion, with the corporations fighting each other and local law just as much as foreign influences, weakening overall effectiveness.
"the onus is very much on the other side to continually demonstrate a lack of influence/bias."
does 10 years of lack of influence count? Like, all Tencent did was try to make some LoL mobile game in china (in Unity, ironically enough). That's the one thing I can't imagine Riot/Epic doing without influence. But that's not really a smoking gun. China, mobile market huge, LoL big IP. No effect on LoL proper outside of the devs working on it.
Tencent don't seem to be the kind of company that cares about sticking fingers in the pudding of what works. They invest in successful companies and help other companies (including Sony and Nintendo) operate within China. At this point it feels like the skepticism is unwarranted.
I'm more than willing to accept that I'm being naive. All I ask is some actual evidence of this influence/bias.