According to a report from the Wall Street Journal:" China has long been seen as a buyer of natural resources and not much else".
"The shift in appetite has been noticeable in recent weeks. Chinese personal-computer makerLenovoGroup Ltd. is considering a bid for struggling Canadian Smartphone makerBlackBerry Ltd. . Should Lenovo pull the deal off, it would be one of the highest-profile acquisitions by a Chinese player on the global stage. Lenovo bought IBM Corp.'s PC business in 2005".
Meanwhileconglomerate Fosun International Ltd. announced plans last week to buy One Chase Manhattan Plaza in New York City for $725 million. That comes on the heels of China's biggest-ever outbound deal by a private company, when Chinese pork company Shuanghui International Holdings Ltd. agreed to buy Smithfield Foods Inc. for $4.7 billion in May.
"The shift in appetite has been noticeable in recent weeks. Chinese personal-computer makerLenovoGroup Ltd. is considering a bid for struggling Canadian Smartphone makerBlackBerry Ltd. . Should Lenovo pull the deal off, it would be one of the highest-profile acquisitions by a Chinese player on the global stage. Lenovo bought IBM Corp.'s PC business in 2005".
Meanwhileconglomerate Fosun International Ltd. announced plans last week to buy One Chase Manhattan Plaza in New York City for $725 million. That comes on the heels of China's biggest-ever outbound deal by a private company, when Chinese pork company Shuanghui International Holdings Ltd. agreed to buy Smithfield Foods Inc. for $4.7 billion in May.
The number of overseas deals done by private companies or non-state-owned publicly listed companies has been rising since 2004, when 45 deals valued at $3.7 billion were done by such players, according to Dealogic. So far this year, 238 overseas deals valued at $24.3 billion have been done by China's private companies.
It used to be that the country's big state-owned enterprises did the bulk of China's overseas mergers, and the need to secure resources was the main objective of deal-making activity. But as China's economy matures, the resource angle is narrowing. Energy deals made up 30% of overall outbound deal activity in 2010, but by 2012 this fell to 24%, according to a report this week on Chinese outbound acquisitions by data provider Mergermarket and law firm Paul Hastings.
"Mining and oil and gas have been accounting for the bulk of outbound M&A in the past,we are seeing a lower number of deals in natural resources,but they are still strong in volume,said Ken Wang, RBC Capital Markets' head of natural resources in Hong Kong.
"We also see interest in deals in agriculture, the food industry, the automobile industry, entertainment, theaters, real estate, technology—other sectors that are all related to consumers,"
