Tencent Cloud, the cloud business of global technology company Tencent, has been a trusted partner of McDonald’s China since 2017 – a partnership that has helped McDonald’s China bolster its operational efficiency and be at the leading edge of digital innovation in food service. Tencent Cloud supports the seamless operation of McDonald’s digital and store expansion initiatives by leveraging its digitalisation and cloud computing expertise. Moreover, it enhances McDonald’s China digital ordering system to manage both regular peak times and promotional surges efficiently.
Over the past 70 years, McDonald’s has become a leading retail food service giant with over 40,000 locations worldwide. Shihong Chen, chief information and experience officer of McDonald’s China stated, “McDonald’s China chose to create an in-house digital department instead of acquiring a digital system from external suppliers. At the same time, a highly skilled cloud computing partner is still essential to McDonald’s China, for the partnership on architecture and technology while fully understanding the company’s business requirements.”
In the food service industry, consumers expect quick ordering and food pickup. Today, more than 90% of transactions at McDonald’s China are from digital channels. Therefore, McDonald’s digital ordering system must be robust enough to handle both regular peak times and promotional surges to ensure a consistently positive customer experience. However, simply increasing server bandwidth to boost capacity would lead to escalating costs.
David Su, industry general manager of Tencent Smart Retail, said, “By leveraging Tencent Cloud’s capabilities, the two companies collaborate on auto-scaling to reduce costs during low-traffic periods while maintaining an optimal ordering experience during peak times. In complex and variable offline network environments, where network quality could be very low, ensuring that consumers can quickly access McDonald’s China’s online ordering APP and Mini Programme presents a big challenge and is a key focus for Tencent Cloud.”
“Additionally, during promotional periods, Tencent Cloud provides extensive technical support to safeguard applet data and protect consumers while ensuring that product discounts reach genuine customers rather than being exploited by ‘coupon hunters.’ We work very closely with McDonald’s. Whenever new challenges arise, the Tencent Cloud team is there working together on finding the best solution from both a product and technical perspective,” he added.
By the end of 2024, McDonald’s China currently manages over 6,800 stores and has set ambitious plans to expand to 10,000. By leveraging Tencent Cloud’s big data solution, McDonald’s China is now capable of conducting intelligent assessments of over one thousand factors for a smarter store location selection.
Su explained, “For a specific location, we can assist the brand in determining the rationality of the site selection, as well as the specific store scale, format, and operational direction, based on desensitised environmental and demographic big data. Tencent Cloud is dedicated to empowering its clients through the strategic use of big data.”
McDonald’s China’s digital transformation journey signifies not only a commitment to technological innovation but also a profound reimagining of its traditional business model. From the introduction of self-service ordering kiosks to today’s constantly evolving, comprehensive digital strategy, McDonald’s China has consistently prioritised consumer needs, leveraging technology to innovate and optimise the dining experience. Throughout the ongoing collaboration, Tencent Cloud has provided McDonald’s China with robust technical support and invaluable experience, serving as a model for other food service enterprises seeking to drive digital transformation. The partnership between Tencent Cloud and McDonald’s China exemplifies how digital continues to shape and drive efficiency and innovation at the leading edge of the food service industry.
