BEIJING -- Tencent, China's largest instant messaging service provider, on Tuesday officially launched an English version of its microblog service or weibo, the Chinese equivalent of Twitter, in a move to meet the social networking needs of English-speaking users.

The English version of Tencent Weibo is the first of its kind in China, and has all the basic functions of posting, topic discussions, private messaging, photo and video uploading, and online chatting.

Xing Hongyu, general manager of the Tencent Weibo Business Unit, said that Tencent Weibo will deliver a high-quality user experience with the company's 12 years of experience in Internet services.

Xing said the English version of Tencent Weibo will enhance the company's influence globally.

Currently, the English service can be automatically accessed when the system recognizes a user's IP address as a foreign IP address. Users can also choose to change the setting and select the English service.

Weibo users in China are rapidly expanding, with the number increasing to 195 million, up 208.9 percent year-on-year in the first half of 2011, according to the latest data from the China Internet Network Information Center.