Chinese music market marches to new beat

British singer Rita Ora in performance organized by QQ Music. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Also, by building a system which enabled the internet company to monitor piracy sites, Tencent, according to Ng, managed to persuade the government to change the rules.

Meanwhile, the paid services began to take off only after China's National Copyright Administration issued a notice in 2015 that online music delivery platforms had to remove all unauthorized songs.

"If you think about the past 15 or 20 years, few were willing to accept that music and content had value," Ng says. "But we are still working with music labels, helping them fight piracy and create business models for the labels and us to make money."

Speaking of his experience in Asia, Rob Schwartz, the Asia bureau chief of Billboard magazine and host of the QQ Music China Forum, said: "I have been to China many times during the past 20 years, and I have noticed that Chinese consumers are eager for music.

"In two years, much of the world music industry will be focused on China.

"I'm very excited about this. And their willingness to pay is important.

"I think it's a good strategy to keep the subscription fee as low as possible."

QQ Music has three popular payment tiers－ranging from 8 ($1.2) to 15 yuan per month.

The Chinese market is also an important part of Billboard's global-expansion plans.