Tencent Music sued by investor ahead of $1.2 billion US IPO – TechCrunch
What happened: Co-President of Tencent Music Entertainment (TME) Xie Guomin is facing an accusation of using misinformation, threats, and intimidation to force an early investor to sell his equity stakes in Ocean Music—a company Xie co-founded and eventually merged with Tencent Music. Chinese investor Guo Hanwei filed a motion for discovery last week at a New York district court, demanding Xie return his stake and compensate him for his financial losses.
Why it’s important: The accusations come as the music streaming service operator prepares for its $1.2 billion mega IPO, which is scheduled to debut on the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday (Dec. 12). Tencent Music is a spin-off of Chinese tech giant Tencent, which owns a number of popular streaming apps in China, including QQ Music and Kugou. Collectively, the music streaming service has over 700 million monthly active users and around 14 to 21 million subscribers. The much-anticipated IPO was put on hold in October due to unfavorable global stock market conditions.