About 3 months ago at the joint press conference hosted in Guangzhou, China, founder and chairperson of Alibaba Jack Ma （Ma Yun, in orange）and the chairman of Evergrande Group Xu Jiayin（in blue）confirmed their highly anticipated partnership during a signing ceremony. The e-commerce portal will pay 1.2 billion Yuan（US $19 million）for a 50-percent share of Evergrande.

Guangzhou Evergrande is one of China’s most successful football clubs and Alibaba is the Chinese, even to some extent, the worldwide leading e-commerce company.

So, what is the rational for this unusual horizontal alliance?

“We’re not investing in football, we’re investing in entertainment,” Mr. Ma told a press briefing on Thursday. “Alibaba’s future strategies are health and entertainment.”

It seems that Alibaba Group’s IPO has little to curb its appetite for acquisition, and this acquisition marks the firm’s latest attempt to diversify its business and to bolster its online entertainment offerings include Youku, AKA the YouTube of China.

Although it is not common for an Asian tech company wanting to make a foray into sports, it should not be surprising if you know Guangzhou is a stronghold of Alibaba’s arch-rival, QQ.

Who can be a better assistant in penetrating the market than a super property agent?

Photo Credits: BBC, CFP and Bizjournals