There is no doubt China is becoming a global M&A player: foreign M&A deals by Chinese firms totalled $US95 billion ($A127 billion) in the first three months of the year, 136 per cent from the same levels a year earlier.
There is equally no doubt of the Middle Kingdom's high level of interest in Australia. According to Bloomberg, purchases of Australian assets involving Chinese companies almost doubled to a record $8 billion in 2015 from a year earlier. 
Chinese interest has been seen in resources, real estate, agribusiness, insurance, tourism, technology, healthcare and infrastructure - and now transportation, as separate investments in Virgin Australia in   June by HNA Group (owner of Hainan Airlines) and Nanshan Group (which controls Qingdao Airlines) have placed about one-third of the airline in Chinese hands.
David Heathcote, head of deal advisory at KPMG, says the fact that Chinese investors have a very long-term investment horizon means they are happy to buy good assets in Australia and pick up a currency gain as well.
"Clearly they are opportunistically looking to get into some of the agribusiness assets, infrastructure and other sorts of safer, long-term assets which they will hold for a long period. But they also have a currency relativity that is going to improve over their long-term investment horizon, given that the (Chinese) renmimbi is expected to depreciate over time."
In particular, interest from Chinese investors in Australia's agriculture sector surged with total direct investment value of nearly $US1.5 billion in 2015, up more than six-fold on 2014. Heathcote says KPMG predicts that Chinese investor activity in Australian agribusiness will remain high and that Chinese agribusiness companies expect to benefit in the long term from the signing of the China Australia Free Trade Agreement (FTA).
Philippa Stone, partner at law firm Herbert Smith Freehills, says Chinese investors both have a different view of commodity prices - particularly, at the moment, agricultural commodity prices - and "seek a safer regulatory haven" for investment. "There's active Chinese encouragement to go out and invest in other economies and I think Australia is seen as a safe, legally regulated economy in which to do that.
"The other aspect is that they often see investment into Australia businesses as an opportunity to leverage the business skills and processes and the brands of that business back into China. Those are the marriages that are really made in heaven - although sometimes they turn out to be a mirage - where there's the opportunity, for example, to take an Australian healthcare business to China."
The same thinking applies to the Chinese financial services groups that have expressed interest in buying into Australian insurers: the strategy is not to take over the company, but to gain seats on the insurers' boards to study how they operate, and use the learning to grow their businesses.
Peter Turner, partner, deal advisory at KPMG, says this is a very important part of the Chinese thinking. "Not just in Australia, but you see Hony Capital (a Chinese private equity firm, owned by the Hong Kong-listed Legend Holdings) buying Pizza Express out of the UK, which has passed through private equity hands several times. Everyone wondered where it would go next, but Hony said, 'we can buy this very established brand and we can roll it out quicker than anyone else in China because we've got the relationships and ability to do so'.
"Fosun (Chinese international investment company Fosun International Limited) did the same thing with Club Med, and they've built a couple of resorts in China, and the amount of tourism into Club Med is quite phenomenal. They're not just looking for safer havens or commodity plays, they're looking for high-quality assets, whether it's consumer brands or otherwise, to take those brands into China," says Turner.
On the same principle, Turner says Hony "looked pretty hard" at Australia's Swisse Wellness, but were outbid.