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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 23 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 Q4 2017 edition of the Matrix covers all major confirmed and rumored BATJX acquisitions (both minority and majority stakes) revealed over the 23-quarter period ending December 31, 2017, as well as a selection of particularly significant M&A deals preceding that period, in Excel (read-only) format. Note that the Q4 2017 issue of the Matrix, for reference, continues to cover Qihoo 360. For each firm acquired, 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. pre-IPO Funding, JV, Post-IPO Stake)
• Reference Article in Marbridge Daily

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

• Baidu: ~130
• Alibaba: ~300
• Tencent: ~305
• JD.com: ~85
• Xiaomi: ~155
• Qihoo 360: ~55

The Matrix also includes acquisitions made not directly by a BATJX company, but instead 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 Q4 2017, Alibaba was extremely active in making new acquisitions, Tencent, Baidu, and Xiaomi/Shunwei each announced a significant number of new deals, and JD.com announced a moderate number of new investments. While acquisitions spanned a variety of different sectors, especially noteworthy areas included e-commerce and entertainment media, followed by smart hardware and transportation/automotive, with multiple deals also announced in artificial intelligence, online literature, financial services, healthcare, big data, virtual reality, logistics, travel, and education.

Q4 2017 saw a slight drop-off in the number of overseas purchases as a percentage of total new acquisitions, with roughly one-sixth of the new deals covered in this edition of the Matrix comprising investments in overseas firms, mainly in Southeast Asia, the USA, and India, but also in Europe and other regions.