As of the end of April 2023, there were a total of 147388 enterprises (5884 of them simultaneously holding value-added telecommunications operations licences issued by the Ministry of Industry and Informationization and the provincial communications authority) operating with a growth of 1.19 per cent over the previous month, of which 31598 cross-regional enterprises licensed by the Ministry of Industry and Informationization and 121674 local enterprises (districts, municipalities) licensed by the provincial communications authorities, respectively, were increasing by 1.24 per cent and 1.06 per cent, respectively, compared to the previous month.

Figure 1

At present, the regional development of the national market for value-added telecommunications operations is striking. Of the 31598 cross-regional enterprises, 6520 were registered in the east, 6422 in Beijing, 3159 in Shanghai and 50.96 per cent in three locations.

Of the 121674 local enterprises, 21235 in Beijing, 963 in the east and 9213 in the south of the river, followed by Jiang Su, Shanghai and Jiang, were concentrated in 51.16 per cent of the country’s value-added telecommunications enterprises and 16.92 per cent in the 12 western provinces.

Figure 2

In line with the classification of value added telecommunications operations in the Telecommunication Operations Classification, a total of 147388 value-added telecommunications enterprises have 212897 licensed projects. Of these, 100854 information services (on-line information services only), 51797 online data processing and transactions, 19071 information services (excluding Internet information services), 11491 Internet access services, 8305 Internet data centre operations, 687 domestic call centre operations and 14692 other operations.

Figure 3

Cross-regional licensing of value-added telecommunications

In terms of the number of trans-regional operators, the top three operations are, in turn, 16457 business operations (excluding Internet information services), 9420 enterprises operating Internet access services and 7174 enterprises operating Internet data centres, as detailed in the table below.

Table 1

The size of the registered funds varies considerably among the different operators, but there is still a large number of operators with a registered capital of 10 million yuan renminbi. Of the current 31598 operators, registered funds account for 71.64 per cent of the operator’s total, between 10 million yuan renminbi and 50 million yuan renminbi, 14.62 per cent of the operator’s total, 6.86 per cent of the operator’s total registered funds between 50 million yuan renminbi (including 100 million yuan renminbi) and 5.75 per cent of the total number of large enterprises registered with more than 100 million yuan renminbi, as shown in figure 4.

Figure 4

The domestic value-added telecommunications sector has now evolved into a diversified market for financing investment, private capital has developed into a major force in the field of value-added telecommunications operations, and the share of foreign investment enterprises has continued to increase rapidly. As of the end of April 2023, 1509 State-owned holdings of telecommunications operators, representing 4.78 per cent of the total number of operators, 28716 privately owned enterprises, representing 90.88 per cent of the total number of operators, and 1373 foreign investment enterprises, accounting for 4.34 per cent of the total number of operators, are shown in figure 5.

Figure 5

Data source: China Institute of Information Communication Operations Centre

For the possible transfer of Harland and mbape this summer, Harvey said: “the more world-class players we have, the better. If they come, they will improve the level of the clubs and the league.”

For his role in the negotiation, Harvey said: “maybe it’s an advantage for me to participate in it, but it’s more about explaining the club’s planning. And be honest with the players we want to sign. There are many aspects to explain the team’s model, style, club and city.”

Harvey said: “I haven’t seen anyone say ‘no’ to Barcelona. Of course, the terms of the contract and personal situation are another matter.”

For the media reports of Harvey’s meeting with Harland, Harvey said he would not give details, but if anything happened, he would report it as soon as possible.

From the book, iqiyi, which has suffered losses for years, has dragged down Baidu. From the strategic development of Baidu all in AI, the streaming media platform seems to be nowhere in the strategic layout. But in fact, baidu doesn’t want to let iqiyi go, and Baidu continues to transfuse iqiyi.

On March 5, iqiyi announced that it had signed subscription agreements with Baidu and other investment institutions. The investor agreed to purchase a total of 164705882 newly issued Class B common shares and 304705880 newly issued class a common shares by private placement, with a total purchase price of US $285 million in cash.

Among them, Baidu will subscribe for class B ordinary shares and other investors will subscribe for class a ordinary shares.

This subscription not only released the signal that Baidu continues to support iqiyi to the market, but also released that iqiyi still faces unsustainable cash flow problems after a series of actions such as layoffs, cost reduction and efficiency increase. According to the just released iqiyi 2021q4 financial report, iqiyi’s cash in the fourth quarter was 3.075 billion, a year-on-year decrease of 71.8%.

It is worth noting that according to the data given in iqiyi’s 2020 annual report, the minimum payments required by iqiyi in 2022, 2023 and 2024 are 6.24 billion yuan, 3.42 billion yuan and 1.286 billion yuan respectively, totaling 10.95 billion yuan. This part is mainly related to license copyright and content production. In addition, in the 2021 annual report, iqiyi’s accounts payable was 8.896 billion yuan.

It can be seen that iqiyi, which pursues profit, will also face a large amount of cash payment in the next few years.

With Baidu’s cash support again, iqiyi, which gives up burning money for scale and seeks to reduce losses and profits, can it break the curse of long video loss?

Anxious, key words of iqiyi cash flow

Iqiyi, with a total financing of more than 50 billion yuan, is still living in a tight time.

Iqiyi had a net loss of US $6.2 billion in 2021. According to the financial report, iqiyi had a loss of US $22.6 billion since its listing in 2018. In 2014, Gong Yu said that “iqiyi grew up four or five years later than others, and now it has surpassed its competitors in other industries. There is an important reason: money, throwing money.”

However, the long-term loss and throwing money will not only bring negative impact on the profit, but also whether the cash flow can support iqiyi to continue to live. In order to replenish blood, iqiyi not only frequently introduced financing, but also chose to frequently issue convertible bonds. The coupon rate of convertible bonds is low, so it is usually considered as a relatively cheap financing channel with the advantage of low-cost financing.

In November 2018, iqiyi issued US $750 million of five-year convertible bonds with a coupon rate of 3.75%, which will expire on December 1, 2023. On March 30, 2019, iqiyi completed the issuance of US $1.2 billion convertible bonds with a coupon rate of 2%, which will expire on April 1, 2025. In December 2020, iqiyi issued US $800 million of convertible bonds due in 2026. It is worth noting that after the third issuance of convertible bonds, the capital market no longer seems to be optimistic about iqiyi. After the news was released, iqiyi’s share price fell nearly 19%, the largest decline after listing.

The issuance of convertible bonds for three times puts forward high requirements for iqiyi’s repayment ability in the next few years.

According to the annual financial report data of iqiyi in 2021, current liabilities and non current liabilities have reached 36.799 billion, and the asset liability ratio has reached 86%. In the semi annual report of 2021, iqiyi’s asset liability ratio was 82%, an increase of 4% within half a year. Specifically, cash and cash equivalents are 2.997 billion yuan, short-term investment is 1.348 billion yuan, and total current assets are 11.524 billion yuan.

To sum up, on the whole, iqiyi’s cash flow is still in a relatively anxious state. This state is not only reflected in the cold figures in the financial report, but also can be seen by substituting it into iqiyi’s strategic development.

Iqiyi Q4 content costs fell to 4.9 billion, down 5% year-on-year and 8% month on month. The proportion of content cost in revenue decreased to 66%. According to the data, from 2019 to 2021, iqiyi’s new dramas and variety shows were 333, 309 and 339 respectively. The number of new dramas is increasing and the cost of content is decreasing. From 2019 to 2021, iqiyi’s content production costs are 22.2 billion, 20.8 billion and 20.7 billion respectively.

Content cost has always been the biggest obstacle to the profitability of the long video industry. According to public data, the long video platform has burned more than 100 billion yuan in content cost in the past few years.

Gong Yu said at the financial report meeting, “In order to reduce the loss, we optimize the organizational structure and save some human related costs and expenses. At the same time, we do fine operations in content production, content procurement and content operation, so that the head content will not be reduced. At the same time, we more strictly control the content with poor broadcasting effect, reduce procurement and reduce the output of ‘bad content’; the third is the content related library content and long tail content , let it play a greater value and generate more advertising inventory or member income. “

Perhaps the inflow and outflow sources of cash flow are not healthy, and the business model of burning money to grab scale is unsustainable. Iqiyi reduces the cost of content production in exchange for narrowing the loss. However, iqiyi still needs a booster to complete the operation profit and loss balance in 2022.

Baidu doesn’t let go

“Selling to Tencent and introducing bytes”, such rumors that Baidu wants to “abandon” iqiyi have always existed, but in fact, iqiyi and Baidu have long been inseparable, whether from the perspective of sunk costs or the future development of both sides.

First of all, from the perspective of iqiyi’s equity composition, according to the equity data previously disclosed by iqiyi (excluding this subscription agreement), baidu holds 7933331 class a ordinary shares and 2876391396 class B ordinary shares of iqiyi, with 92.7% voting rights, accounting for 56.1% of iqiyi’s total share capital. After this subscription, baidu obtained 164705882 class B ordinary shares of iqiyi again.

As iqiyi

According to information provided by the United Nations Environment Programme to the media after the meeting, heads of state, environment ministers and other representatives from 175 countries approved and signed the resolution. The resolution points out that an Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee will be established to reach an internationally legally binding agreement by 2024, covering the whole life cycle of plastic products, including their production, design, recycling and treatment.

The United Nations Environment Programme said that the resolution will promote relevant parties to fundamentally change the way they produce, consume and manage plastic waste. “Today we have made history, and all of us should be proud of it.” The president of the general assembly and Norwegian environment minister ESPEN Bart Eide said.

According to the statistics of the Department, the world plastic production soared from 2 million tons in 1950 to 348 million tons in 2017. Ed said that if immediate action is not taken, the harm of plastic pollution will further expand and threaten human survival. “If plastics are incorporated into the circular economy system, plastics can be recycled. It is time to issue a legally binding resolution to end the plastic pollution crisis.”

The executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme, inger Arnold, said that the resolution was the most important international multilateral environmental resolution since the Paris Agreement.

The United Nations Environment assembly is the highest decision-making mechanism for global environmental issues. Its predecessor is the Governing Council of the United Nations Environment Programme. In 2013, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution to upgrade the Council to the United Nations Environment assembly attended by representatives of Member States. The first United Nations Environment Conference was held in Nairobi in June 2014.

The first phase of the fifth United Nations Environment assembly was held in February 2021, and the resumed session from February 28 to March 2, 2022 was the second phase.