Meituan.com, a group-buying site backed by Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd and consumer review service Dianping.com, which is funded by Tencent Holdings Ltd, said in a joint statement that they have struck a strategic merger. [Photo/IC]

Meituan-Dianping has been seeking to raise as much as $3 billion from investors to bankroll its expansion, reported the Journal citing people familiar with the matter. Among them, Tencent is planning on investing $1 billion.

The online-to-offline service in China is expected to generate a market size of 7.2 trillion yuan by 2017 from the current 6 trillion yuan, according to a report from Beijing-based research consultancy iResearch.

The country's BAT Internet giants - Baidu, Alibaba and Tecent - are in a lockup battle, splurging billions of cash acquiring O2O service companies ranging from map navigation, ride-sharing to food deliveries, manicure and movie ticketing.