Chinese internet giant Tencent Holdings Ltd is having to offer concessions in a plan to merge the country's top two videogame live-streaming sites in order to resolve antitrust concerns, two people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.
Tencent, China's No. 1 videogame and social media firm, first announced plans to merge Huya and DouYu last year in a tieup designed to streamline its stakes in the firms, estimated by data firm MobTech to have an 80per cent slice of a market already worth more than US$3 billion and growing fast.
Huya and DouYu are ranked No. 1 and No. 2, respectively, as China's most popular video game streaming sites, where users flock to watch e-sports tournaments and follow professional gamers. Tencent is Huya's biggest shareholder with 36.9per cent and also owns over a third of DouYu, with both firms listed in the United States, and worth a combined US$10 billion by market value.