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A heavy focus on ecosystem development and, increasingly, on overseas expansion has fueled aggressive M&A strategies among China's dominant Internet companies: Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, JD.com, and Xiaomi (collectively, "BATJX"). BATJX acquisitions previously comprised mainly Internet and mobile service firms, but have expanded in scope to include areas such as offline retail, logistics, hardware, financial services, TV and film production, newspaper publishing, property management, sports teams, and cosmetics brands. The BATJX M&A race continues to change the competitive positioning of each of the acquiring companies, and is also providing many target companies a lucrative, early exit option compared to the longer time frame and less certain prospects of an IPO.

To help investors and tech industry enterprises better understand what acquisitions each of the BATJX firms has made over the last 26 quarters, how these deals fit in to each acquirer's ecosystem strategy and improve its overall competitiveness, and what firms, based on the remaining holes in each Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, JD.com, and Xiaomi's respective ecosystems, are most likely to be the target of future acquisitions, Marbridge has developed the Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, JD, and Xiaomi M&A Matrix.

The Q3 2018 edition of the Matrix covers all major confirmed and rumored BATJX acquisitions (both minority and majority stakes) revealed over the 26-quarter period ending September 30, 2018, as well as a selection of particularly significant M&A deals preceding that period, in Excel (read-only) format. Note that the Q3 2018 issue of the Matrix, for reference, continues to cover Qihoo 360. For each portfolio firm, the Matrix provides the following information:

• Company Name
• Sector
• Business Scope
• Country (if not mainland China)
• Ticker Symbol (if applicable)
• Stake Acquired (where known)
• Acquisition Price (where known)
• Date of Acquisition / Rumor of Acquisition
• Type of Investment (e.g. Series A, pre-IPO Funding, JV, Post-IPO Stake)
• Reference Article in Marbridge Daily

The Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, JD, and Xiaomi M&A Matrix covers approximately the following number of deals (multiple investments in the same target company are detailed separately, but here are counted as a single deal):

• Baidu: 170
• Alibaba: 405
• Tencent: 405
• JD.com: 120
• Xiaomi: 200
• Qihoo 360: 65

The above totals include acquisitions made not only directly by a BATJX company, but also those made independently by one of their CEOs/Chairmen or an investment fund controlled by one of their CEOs/Chairmen (e.g. Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun's Shunwei Capital or Alibaba Chairman Jack Ma's Yunfeng Capital), and key joint ventures.

During Q3 2018, Alibaba further accelerated its pace of new acquisitions, while Tencent appeared to scale back somewhat compared to the first two quarters of 2018. Xiaomi/Shunwei increased their rate of M&A activity during the quarter, driven largely by a jump in deals announced by Shunwei as it drives into the Indian social networking and financial services sectors. Baidu and JD.com followed, although at considerably more modest rates than during Q2 2018, and Qihoo had a generally quiet quarter. While acquisitions spanned a variety of different sectors, e-commerce and entertainment media were two of the biggest focal points during the quarter, followed by O2O, financial services, enterprise services, big data/analytics, and transportation. Also of note were logistics, smart devices, gaming, artificial intelligence, healthcare, education, and social networking.

The ratio of overseas deals to total deals during Q3 2018 picked up slightly compared to the previous two quarters, with approximately one-fifth of the new deals covered in this edition of the Matrix comprising investments in overseas firms, concentrated most heavily in India and North America, but with several deals in Russia, Southeast Asia, Western Europe, and other regions.