Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has fully acquired the country's largest ticket seller Damai‍, as part of its push into the entertainment business

Alibaba announced the move in a post on Sina Weibo on Tuesday after it acquired a 32-percent stake in Damai and became its largest shareholder in mid-2014. 

Yu Yongfu, chairman and chief executive officer of Alibaba Pictures Group and head of Alibaba's digital entertainment division, dubbed the takeover a three-year romance.

Damai’s founders Cao Jie and Feng Yuhong, for their part, said that the decision to join Alibaba was not difficult to make. “In the past Damai focused on ticket selling, aiming to become China’s Ticketmaster. But now our goal is to become China’s Live Nation.”

Ticketmaster Entertainment Inc. is an American ticket sales and distribution company with operations in many countries. In 2010, it merged with events promoter Live Nation to become Live Nation Entertainment.

Zhang Yu, Alibaba vice president and secretary at the digital entertainment division, will be Damai’s CEO, while Cao Jie will serve as special advisor under the new arrangement.

Alibaba’s entertainment business group, which consists of mobile Internet browsing, video and music streaming, is expected to boost online to offline synergies in areas such as the fans economy, film production and distribution.

Damai is the largest live entertainment and distribution platform in China and occupies an absolutely leading position in performances, sports tickets and technology services in the Chinese-speaking world. Currently, Damai operates in 330 cities globally with 46 branches/offices. It claimed to have provided professional ticketing technologies, marketing and distribution services for over 1.8 million performances and sports events.