Baidu hinted at “a lot more exciting deals” to come in the video content space this year, after the Chinese internet giant inked an agreement with U.S. streaming giant Netflix to bring some of its shows to China.

The search giant, which is often dubbed the “Google of China,” has a video subscription streaming service called iQiyi, which has around 400 million users.

Last year, Netflix agreed to provide some of its content, such as “Stranger Things,” to iQiyi, giving the U.S. firm access to the Chinese market.

In an interview with CNBC at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Baidu’s President Ya-Qin Zhang, hinted at more deals to come with Netflix.

“Our head of content is working hard to bring more content to China and to produce more content,” Zhang told CNBC in an interview. “You’ll see a lot more exciting deals.”

Baidu’s core business is still in advertising, much like Alphabet-owned Google, but stricter rules around ads in China hit the business in 2016. The company has since recovered but is focusing investments around new areas such as artificial intelligence, driverless cars and video streaming.

Content is seen as a key driver of growth for several technology companies from Netflix and Amazon to Apple and Facebook. In China, the same is true with tech giants Tencent and Alibaba also challenging Baidu.

“Original content is becoming a critical differentiator for iQiyi and we will continue to invest in that,” Zhang told CNBC.

Source: cnbc
Chinese internet giant Baidu hints at further deals to bring Netflix original content to China