Today, NYSE-listed Chinese live-streaming platform Huya announced that Tencent Holdings, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Linen Investment Limited, exercised its option to acquire additional shares in the company to increase its voting power in Huya to 50.9% (on a calculated based on the total issued and outstanding shares of Huya) and became the company’s largest shareholder. According to Huya, it will continue to operate independently, with its existing management team staying responsible for all aspects of business management and operations.
Tencent acquired roughly 16.5M additional shares of Huya for an aggregate purchase price of approximately $262.6M USD in cash from Huya’s previous owner, Chinese social media platform YY.com parent JOYY. The purchase price was determined based on the average closing prices of Huya’s American depositary shares in the last 20 trading days before the receipt of Tencent’s written exercise notice by Huya and JOYY. Following the share transfer, JOYY represents 43% of the total voting power in Huya.
“We believe this transaction will further expand Huya’s access to Tencent’s rich resources and bring more values to our shareholders and our users,” said Rongjie Dong, CEO of Huya, in a release. “Huya’s management team will work closely with Tencent to explore more business opportunities in-game live-streaming, esports tournaments, and other online entertainment areas and provide more innovative and compelling services and products to better serve our users.”
Furthermore, Tencent appointed its interactive entertainment group general manager and TJ Sports director Lingdong Huang as a director and the chairman of Huya’s board of directors as well as installing Tencent’s Assistant General Manager Zhi Cheng, Tencent’s General Manager Hai Tao Pu, and Tencent’s Interactive Entertainment Group General Manager Guang Xu as directors of Huya.
