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　　On the evening of September 6, Beijing time, Ubisoft, a well-known French game company, announced that Tencent invested 300 million euros in its controlling shareholder Guillemot Brothers Limited to acquire 49.9% of the shares of Guillemot Brothers and 5 % of voting rights. In addition, Ubisoft stated that it has authorized Tencent to increase its direct shareholding in Ubisoft from the existing 4.5% to 9.99%, but Ubisoft's management and operations remain unchanged, and Tencent will not have any business veto power.

　　Details of the EUR 300 million increase in holdings

　　The announcement said that Tencent's investment in Guillemot Brothers Limited amounted to 300 million euros, including a 200 million euro share acquisition and a 100 million euro capital increase. In addition, Tencent provided a long-term unsecured loan to Guillemot Brothers Limited to refinance its debt and provide additional financial resources that could be used to acquire Ubisoft's stake.

　　Tencent acquired a 49.9% stake and 5% of the voting rights in Guillemot Brothers Limited, which is still controlled by the Guillemot family. Tencent will not have a representative on its board and will not have veto power over its business.

　　In addition, Ubisoft's board of directors has authorized Tencent to increase its direct stake in Ubisoft from 4.5% to 9.99%. Tencent cannot sell its stake in Ubisoft for five years, and more than five years later, the Guillemot family has the right of first refusal to buy that stake. Tencent also promised to not increase its direct shareholding in Ubisoft within 8 years after the transaction, and its shareholding ratio will remain unchanged at 9.99%.

　　As an old French game developer, Ubisoft owns a number of popular games such as "Assassin's Creed", "Prince of Persia" and "Rainbow Six" that are loved by players around the world. But Ubisoft's last four years have not been easy. Affected by negative incidents such as the delayed release of new games and allegations of sexual harassment by the company's management in recent years, Ubisoft's share price has fluctuated from a high of more than 100 euros in the US stock market four years ago. Shares hovered around 36 euros.

　　According to foreign media reports, in April this year, due to the long-term historically low stock price of Ubisoft, which attracted capital attention, buyout funds including Blackstone, KKR & Co., etc., expressed interest in acquiring Ubisoft, but these transactions were ultimately not reached. The transaction price of Tencent's acquisition this time has an implied valuation of 80 euros per share for Ubisoft, which is a high level in the company's historical stock price.

　　Tencent and Ubisoft have been linked as early as 2018, when Tencent first bought a 5% stake in Ubisoft at 66 euros per share, and also provided a long-term loan for Guillemot's controlling stake to refinance its debt. In 2015, the media giant Vivendi started a hostile takeover of Ubisoft, and it was Tencent who played one of the "white knights" to force Vivendi back. In March 2018, Ubisoft, the Guillemot Brothers, Tencent and the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan spent 2 billion euros to buy all Ubisoft shares in Vivendi's hands. Vivendi said that it would no longer acquire Ubisoft shares within five years. , declared that Vivendi's hostile takeover ended in bankruptcy.

　　Regarding the transaction, Ubisoft CEO and co-founder Yves Guillemot said in an interview with the media: "This transaction validates our strategy and highlights the strong intrinsic value of our long-established assets, which is very important to our Great news for the team, gamers and shareholders. Tencent is a valued shareholder partner to many industry leaders who create the most outstanding video games. This transaction strengthens our ability to create strong value for years to come."

　　Tencent's game business actively goes overseas

　　An analyst in Hong Kong who has been concerned about the TMT industry for a long time told reporters that Tencent's acquisition may be related to the fact that the regulatory authorities have not issued new game licenses to Tencent since June last year. "Like Tencent's purchase of overseas game companies before, Tencent may consider developing new game IPs through various forms of cooperation with these overseas game developers. Once the domestic regulatory environment changes, Tencent can directly bring ready-made games back to China." The analyst say.

　　In fact, Tencent has been making continuous moves in the game overseas business this year. Just a week ago, Tencent became the second largest shareholder of Japanese game company From Software, holding a 16.25% stake. On August 31, Japan's Kadokawa Group announced that its subsidiary From Software intends to issue 1,703 shares to SixJoy, a subsidiary of Tencent, at a price of 11.45 million yen per share, with a total transaction value of 19.5 billion yen (about 970 million yuan), The completion of this capital increase will make Tencent the second largest shareholder of From Software.

　　On the same day, NetEase announced that its game division NetEase Games had acquired French game developer Quantic Dream sa. NetEase did not disclose specific financial data for the acquisition, but as early as 2019, NetEase acquired part of Quantic Dream’s equity.

　　In the context of domestic anti-monopoly supervision, whether the growth of Internet platform companies has bottomed out has always been a hot topic in the market. In this regard, Wang Bo, an experience of the Southern Science and Technology Innovation Fund, once said that there are three factors for Internet growth: first, policy, which is the biggest factor affecting emerging industries; second, the Internet demographic dividend, which will begin to bottom out in 2020; the third is Going overseas, he said that both Internet game companies and live broadcast companies have begun to deploy overseas business. Regarding the future growth of Internet companies, Wang Bo said that the first two of the three growth factors mentioned above are in a state of being suppressed or unclear. It can be seen that the active deployment of overseas business may be the only clear growth factor for Internet companies at present.