Baidu announces Qiyi’s completion of the issuance of convertible notes

Baidu today announced that Qiyi.com (“iQiyi”), a majority-owned subsidiary of Baidu, Inc., has recently completed the issuance of convertible notes to a group of investors for an aggregate investment amount of US$1.53 billion. Baidu invested US$300 million in iQiyi as part of the note issuance. Other major investors include Hillhouse Capital, Boyu Capital, Run Liang Tai Fund, IDG Capital, Everbright-IDG Industrial Fund, and Sequoia Capital.According to iResearch, in December 2016, iQiyi’s mobile app maintained its industry leadership with 481 million monthly active users and 5.579 billion hours of monthly user time spent, an increase of 20.08% and 27.18%, respectively, compared with the beginning of the year in January 2016. During the same time period, iQiyi outperformed the industry and was ranked the 7th top app by revenue globally, according to App Annie.“I am very happy to announce this transaction and proud of what iQiyi has accomplished.” said Robin Li, chairman and CEO of Baidu. “iQiyi has been a great asset and an important part of the Baidu ecosystem. We look forward to supporting its further growth and enhancing the company’s initiatives through artificial intelligence technology.”Yu Gong, founder and CEO of iQiyi said: “iQiyi is focused on our goal of becoming a world-class entertainment company leveraging Baidu’s artificial intelligence technology and content ecosystem. Looking forward, iQiyi will upgrade our IP ecosystem and accelerate our IP-related businesses, especially our subscription business. We will always work to provide the best viewing experience to the hundreds of millions of users helping to drive iQiyi’s rapid growth.”