Baidu, the Chinese search giant, has acquired 59% of Nuomi, the group-buying service under Renren. The Chinese social networking service provider announced today that Baidu would purchase Renren’s remaining stake in Nuomi. It’s not disclosed whether the price will be based on the valuation for last acquisition. The Renren announcement says the deal will be closed in the first quarter of 2014.
Nuomi never turned a profit for Renren in the past three years since it launch but has become cost burden with roughly 2000 employees as of August 2013. For Baidu, the merchants that have signed up to Nuomi platform can be leveraged by its ambitious map-based local lifestyle service project.
Derek Shen, former VP of Renren and the founding leader of Nuomi, left Renren after the announcement of the Baidu deal. Mr. Shen then joined LinkinIn as country manager for China.
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