Tencent Holdings, which runs China’s biggest video games and social media businesses, has made a US$125 million investment in Kuaikan World (Beijing) Technology, a move that will see the two companies cooperate in the country’s vast online comics market. The deal, which the two firms announced separately on Tuesday through their WeChat channels, will provide fresh funding to support authors on Kuaikan World’s platform, which runs a comics app and connects a growing community of Chinese online comics fans. Kuaikan World and Tencent will also collaborate in the areas of user traffic and intellectual property, according to Chen An’ni, founder and chief executive of the online comics start-up. She said Kuaikan World will remain an independent operation, dismissing speculation that her company had been acquired by Shenzhen-based Tencent. The two companies did not provide the new valuation of Kuaikan World, following Tencent’s investment. The start-up raised US$177 million in its Series D financing round in December 2017, which was the largest funding deal in China’s comics industry at that time, according to the company. Tencent’s latest investment has come amid the steady growth of the Kuaikan Comics app, which has acquired more than 200 million users since the company was established in 2014. Kuaikan World counts about 40 million monthly active users, with about half of that number born in the 2000s, according to the start-up. That has made the app the most popular among the so-called Generation Z group of consumers, according to research firm QuestMobile. The Kuaikan Comics app currently hosts almost 2,000 original works from about 1,000 individual comics authors and more than 200 institutional content providers, according to the start-up. For more insights into China tech, join our Facebook group, subscribe to our Inside China Tech podcast, and download the comprehensive 2019 China Internet Report . Also roam China Tech City , an interactive digital map at our sister site Abacus .