U.S. investment major KKR and Chinese music streaming services provider Tencent Music Entertainment Group, a unit of entertainment to internet company Tencent, are exploring rival bids for up to half of music company Universal Music Group.
The stake in Universal Music, a subsidiary of French mass media company Vivendi SA, will be bought in a transaction potentially worth up 20 billion euros ($22.73 billion).
Vivendi is in the process of selecting banks to oversee a partial sale of Universal Music Group.
Tencent Music has an existing licensing agreement with Universal Music and wants to reinforce its partnership with a partial acquisition.