Chinese internet giant Baidu has announced it is canceling its planned multibillion-dollar acquisition of live streaming platform YY Live, in part due to a lack of government approval.
In 2020, Baidu, China’s largest search engine, agreed to acquire JOYY Inc.’s Chinese live video business YY Live for $3.6 billion.
Baidu founder Robin Li said at the time that the partnership “will propel Baidu into the leading platform for live streaming and diversify its revenue streams.”
But Baidu said in a Hong Kong stock exchange filing on Monday that it was terminating the acquisition agreement.
“Completion of the proposed acquisition is subject to certain conditions, including obtaining necessary regulatory approvals from government authorities,” the company said in a statement.
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As of December 31, 2023, these conditions have not been achieved.
The deal was originally scheduled to be completed by 2021.
Live streaming is a multi-million dollar business in China, generating huge profits for e-commerce giants and popular influencers.
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Baidu has faced increasing competition in recent years from domestic rivals such as Tencent, which operates the messaging platform WeChat, and ByteDance, which operates the short video app TikTok and its mainland Chinese counterpart Douyin. confronting.
The company has sought to diversify into areas such as cloud computing, autonomous driving and artificial intelligence (AI), with mixed results.
Baidu stock fell in March after investors were unimpressed with the company’s ChatGPT-like AI software, Erniebot.
In November, the company announced that sales for the third quarter of 2023 would grow moderately by 6.0% year-on-year.