Aug.9 (NBD) -- Beijing Xin'ai Sport Media Technology Co., Ltd (Xin'ai Sports) has secured 500 million yuan (73.2 million U.S. dollars) in funding from three corporate investors, Chinese sports and entertainment company Wuhan DDMC Culture Co Ltd (DDMC, 600136.SH) said in an announcement Tuesday.

Two out of the three investors are subsidiaries of IDG Capital, subscribing a total of 13.33 percent stake in the new venture with an investment of 400 million U.S. dollars (58.6 million U.S. dollars).

Xin'ai Sports is a joint venture built by DDMC's Super Sports Media Inc (Super Sports), iQiyi Inc (NASDAQ: IQ) and two other parties. After the deal is closed, the existing website and app of Super Sports will be renamed as "iQiyi Sports".

The new platforms will bring together extensive soccer, tennis and golf coverage drawn from broadcasting agreements made by both iQiyi's sports platform and Super Sports, including top flight coverage of the English Premier League, the UEFA Nations League, the Australian Open, the ATP Tour and the WTA Tour.

In addition, existing members of both Super Sports and iQiyi's tennis-focused membership program can continue their membership on the new platform.

According a source close to DDMC, Super Sports and DDMC have the control over the new joint venture. In addition, Xin'ai Sports' A-round financing hasn't been completed.

Adam Zhang, CEO of Key-Solution Sports Consultant Company, told NBD in an interview that in addition to investment in copyrights, content operation is also very important to garner visitor traffic, which requires a team of professional talents in program production and commentating.

NBD noticed that unlike PP Sports and Tencent Sports, Super Sports and iQiyi Sports hadn't set foot in program production.

In response, the source at DDMC told NBD that Super Sports has a professional team in live streaming and signal generation, and more details of their operation plan will be revealed later.

It is noteworthy that Super Sports retains its right to distribute in the deal with iQiyi. Copyright distribution is now the largest contributor to Super Sports' revenue, added the source.

Email: tanyuhan@nbd.com.cn