Telecom giants Tencent, Baidu and Alibaba invest a whopping $12 Billion in China Unicom

China Unicom, the country’s second largest telecom operator, has signed a deal with several leading technology brands- Tencent, Baidu, and Alibaba with an investment of $12 billion.

According to a statement, “The businesses carried out by these strategic investors are highly correlated to and complementary with the principal businesses of Unicom A Share Company, and are expected to contribute to combining the network resources, customer resources, data operation and marketing service”.

Unicom revealed in a report that it expects to optimise the corporate governance structure according to the market-oriented principles. This investment is a part of China’s ‘mixed ownership’ strategy which encourages the involvement of private capital into state-owned companies.

One of the investors, Tencent had previously worked with Unicom to launch a broadband card with unlimited data usage on Tencent applications. The company expects the scheme to be a momentous step in the country’s development.

Despite earlier denials, Baidu has also confirmed to be involved in the state purchase agreement under the mixed ownership reform pilot-run plan.

This move will also encourage innovative thinking in struggling business units and restructure the corporate organisation. Unicom has also promised to strategise with its investors in booming fields such as cloud computing, Big Data, IoT, Artificial Intelligence, Digital Content, Retail System and Payment Finance.