How Big is Dalian Wanda?
Dalian Wanda is a Chinese conglomerate with roots in the real estate sector. Its commercial division is considered as the world’s largest commercial property investor. But it has been diversifying its business over the years by going on a massive acquisition spree internationally.
Here is the video from this transcript: Dalian Wanda
Wanda is a huge real estate player in China, that owns over 200 plazas, malls and luxury hotels. It is also an active investor internationally, or at least it tried to. It was planning on buying the 600 million dollar Nine Elms square property in South London and had plans to build One Beverly Hills, a 1.2-billion-dollar luxury project in Los Angeles.
Wanda also had a 3.3-billion-dollar plan to build EuropaCity, an ambitious project near Paris Charles de Gaulle airport. The project would house attractions, a theme park, sports venues and restaurants. Wanda even had a 10-billion-dollar plan to build an industrial park and smart cities in India. However, none of these mega real estate projects panned out.
Wanda had better luck in the entertainment industry. To get a handle on sports broadcasting, Wanda acquired Infront Sports Media for 1.2 billion dollars in 2015. Infront owns broadcasting rights to sporting events and has the exclusive rights to broadcast FIFA’s events until 2022. It has worked with FIFA since 1999 and served as FIFA’s host broadcaster for the FIFA World cups since 2002.
In 2016, FIFA announced that Wanda would be a major sponsor for its events until 2030. Wanda also provides media production services to Lega Serie A, Italian Cup and French Ligue 1 and even represents all seven Olympic Winter Sports federations. It also has a media and sponsorship deal with the Badminton World Federation.
But as if broadcasting rights were not enough, it acquired a 20% stake in Atletico Madrid in 2015, which it then sold to Quantum Pacific Group in 2018. And to get ahead in the digital sports business, Wanda’s Infront acquired 51 percent of Omnigon, a company that develops sports mobile apps and websites. Omnigon has developed apps for World Rugby, PGA Tour, NASCAR, Fox Sports and WWE.
Wanda even owned the Ironman triathlon competition at some point. Wanda bought the World Triathlon Corporation in 2015, which gave it access to the Ironman competition until March 2020, when it sold the business to Advance Publications, the parent company of Condé Nast.
Wanda also wanted to make a dent in the movie industry. In 2012, it acquired AMC theatres for 2.6 billion dollars. Then in 2013, Wanda bought Sunseeker, a British yacht manufacturer for 500 million dollars. Funny thing is that Sunseeker produces the Yachts used in James Bond movies. There were even jokes about how James Bond would be using Yachts made in China to escape enemies.
To become the largest US movie operator, Wanda bought Carmike Cinemas in 2016. After that, it acquired theatres in Australia, UK and Nordic countries. Now that it had its hands on movie operators, it also wanted to have input on the movie production. It bought Legendary Entertainment for 3.5 billion dollars in 2016. Legendary has produced films such as Godzilla, Pacific Rim and Jurassic World and has distribution rights for series such as The Expanse and Lost in Space.
But to grow even more, Wanda wanted to snatch Paramount Pictures from Viacom in 2016. Wanda already had a history with Paramount as it co-financed the company’s TMNT movie. However, Viacom decided to not sell Paramount to anyone. After the deal failed, Wanda partnered with Sony Pictures Entertainment in the hopes of getting access to popular franchises such as Spiderman and Men in Black. However, the partnership was not renewed the year after.
At the end of 2016, Wanda was in talks to acquire Dick Clark Productions, which holds broadcasting rights to live TV events such as the Golden Globe Awards, the Billboard Music Awards, and the New Year’s countdown celebrations in New York. However, the deal fell through after Wanda failed to honour contractual obligations.
But Wanda did not give up. Armed with 8 billion dollars, it built the world’s largest movie production facility, Oriental Movie Metropolis. The facility is actually a mixed-use development that includes a convention center, a shopping mall, six resort hotels, four theme parks, a marina, a hospital and Asia’s largest cinema. Wanda even offered massive discounts to film at its studios. However, it sold the Metropolis to Sunac in 2017.
Wanda’s rapid debt-fueled expansion has caught the eyes of Chinese regulators who have restricted Wanda’s borrowing capacity. Since then, Wanda has been selling off its assets to reduce its debt levels. It sold a stake in Wanda Commercial Properties to the likes of Tencent and JD.Com. In addition, it sold a piece of Wanda Film to Alibaba and Beijing Cultural Investment.
It also sold a partial stake in AMC to Silver Lake and a stake in Aeon Life Insurance to Greentown China. Wanda has also been selling its foreign real estate buildings and currently owns only one overseas property, the Vista Tower in Chicago. It is the third-tallest building in the Chicago skyline, one spot behind the Trump International hotel.
Wanda definitely tried to go big in the real estate and entertainment industry. Did you know that it owned all of these broadcast licensing rights, movie operators and movie production companies? What do you think about Wanda’s involvement in the American economy?
