One interesting thing about React is how some big names (Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Yahoo) rallied to React instead of creating their own libraries, whereas they all had their own-cooked libraries before.

Also, which is more of a personal opinion, but I've tried a lot of frameworks/libraries and React is the first one that really "clicked" with the way I work and design. I don't think it will "replace jQuery", but for modern single web application, I think React is the way to go. Or said differently, "Nobody will get fired for choosing React" ;)