Alibaba Among 3 Suitors Vying to Make China’s Next Big Video Site Acquisition?

After last year’s billion dollar merger between Youku and Tudou, and last month’s acquisition of PPS by Baidu, the time’s now ripe for the next major act of consolidation among China’s red-hot video sites. According to rumors circulating in Chinese tech media, the next site to be snapped up will likely be PPTV, a Hulu-style service full of (mostly) licensed TV series and movies.

The three suitors said to be vying to acquire PPTV are Sohu (NASDAQ:SOHU), which already has the prominent Sohu TV streaming site; Suning (SHE:002024) the brick-and-mortar electronics retailer turned e-commerce star; and Alibaba, China’s e-commerce titan. For the latter two, a video site would be an entirely new proposition and a major expansion of their online scope.

(See: China Watched 4.1 Billion Hours of Web Videos in One Month)Suning is reported to have even sent a letter of intent to PPTV regarding a buy-out.

Alibaba’s rumored bid could be tied to whispers of China’s top e-shopping platform working on a TV set-top box. Presumably if Alibaba wants to take e-commerce onto the big screen in everyone’s living rooms, it’ll need to be bundled in with some fun content. Alibaba has been diversifying into social media in the past year, most recently paying over half a billion dollars for a sizable stake in Sina Weibo.

2013 is shaping up to be a blockbuster year for China tech deals.

(Source: Netease Tech – article in Chinese)