(Bloomberg) -- Baidu Inc. has acquired the YY Live streaming platform from Joyy Inc., concluding a drawn-out deal that had been in the works since 2020.

The operator of China’s leading search engine is paying roughly $2.1 billion for YY Live, it said in a statement on Tuesday. Beijing-based Baidu and Joyy had previously agreed terms on a $3.6 billion takeover, however regulators did not approve that transaction in time and it was halted a year ago.

As part of the new transaction, approximately $1.6 billion that Baidu previously deposited into escrow accounts has now been released, and the company plans to invest those funds into its cloud and AI infrastructure, according to the statement.

China’s internet sector may have fixed its focus on artificial intelligence development and monetization, however there continues to be a fierce contest for user attention with or without AI. Video streaming services such as ByteDance Ltd.’s Douyin, China’s version of TikTok, have helped attract users and advertisers. Increasingly, those platforms are also turning into portals to online shopping networks.

For Baidu, the effort to catch up with upstarts like ByteDance is essential, as the two are also competing in the race to become China’s favorite AI chatbot. The latter’s Doubao edged out Baidu’s Ernie Bot as the most popular back in May, and Baidu this month announced it’ll make Ernie free to use from April.

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