Wanda Group theme parks
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More news on the potential Europe Wanda development.

the name announced for this theme park "Europa City" may indicate that Europa Corp director and producer Luc Besson might be part of the project, specially considering that the supposed location of the theme park would be at 10km north of Paris, more or less where Luc Besson already have his movie studios. This is a point which remain to be confirmed, though.

Source: http://disneyandmore.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/breaking-news-chinese-billionaire-wang.html

An interesting rumour this morning about Wanda potentially moving into Europe.

The development, being built by property company Immochan, will include a theme park, shopping center, water and snow parks, sports fields, performance spaces and hotels, according to the site.

Wang’s film, tourism and sports operations all fall under Wanda’s fast-growing Cultural Industry Group, which saw revenue climb 46 percent last year and is forecast to climb 30 percent in 2016.

Source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-24/china-s-richest-man-said-to-be-planning-france-retail-project

New images from the Wanda Hefei Park.




Source: http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1666857

Second one from VHCoasters is Wanda City Hefei.
Again the quality of pictures on the main page is pretty low but it covers a lot of ground and gives a good idea of what to expect from the park.

If you click through to each photo and click through again you get much higher resolution images.

These images came from the following news site http://365jia.cn/ however I cannot find the source article, mainly due to Google's (and mine) limited translation skills. If anyone can find the original article it would be good to see if there were any more images.

This park is due to open around September/October this year.

Source: http://www.vhcoasters.com/?p=5076

There have been two great updates on Wanda Theme Parks from VHCoasters this week. Whilst obviously they are mainly concerned with the coasters being installed and the photo's aren't amazing quality you can see how construction and themeing is coming along.

First one is Wanda City Nanchang.

The park also has a massive Intamin hyper and an interesting custom SLC. The park is due to open later this year but clearly still needs a lot of work done on it.

Source: http://www.vhcoasters.com/?p=5092

It would seem being a majority shareholder was not enough for Wanda. They have bought Legendary Entertainment outright for $3.5 billion (USD). Looks like they will be using those IP licenses and making more "monster" films to add to their parks in the future.

The deal announced Tuesday in Beijing significantly expands Wanda’s presence in the global entertainment business, as it now owns one of the largest independent movie companies in Hollywood.

some of its films, including “Godzilla” and “Pacific Rim,” have done particularly well in China, and the company is focused more on such monster movies going forward.

Source: http://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-dalian-wanda-buys-legendary-entertainment-for-3-5-billion-1452567251

Wanda Group, as they are currently chasing a majority share of Legendary Entertainment, is rumored to be planning a Jurassic theme park on the Gold Coast.

The Wanda group has invested significantly on the Gold Coast, launching direct flights to Wuhan last year and financing the $970 million Jewel project in Surfers Paradise.

Wanda Group general manager Xie Hong last year exclusively revealed plans to the Bulletin to build a new theme park on the Gold Coast.

Source:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/business/billionaire-plans-to-open-jurassic-theme-park-on-the-gold-coast/story-fnkltfm0-1227701645543

Wanda Group has made deals to acquire a majority stake in "Legendary Entertainment", the company who produced Godzilla, Jurassic World, Pacific Rim, and more. It should be noted that Universal Pictures and Legendary Entertainment are partners together as they entered the partnership 2 years ago.

(...) and we are also excited about what opportunities this will bring to our theme parks around the world," Universal Studios COO Ron Meyer said in a statement.

That statement brings up a question in my opinion. With Wanda acquiring a majority stake in Legendary, could this mean new theme park attractions based off of their properties?

The main article doesn't specifically mention theme parks, but that the Wanda Group company has a stake in them.

MAIN ARTICLE: http://en.yibada.com/articles/99474/20160107/dalian-wanda-group-acquire-majority-stake-legendary-entertainment-big-step.htm

Your thoughts?

How is this knock-off company thinking it can make so many parks?

Like many of the theme park operators of modern times they make their money in one entertainment industry and then use the money from that sale to buy in theme park talent to run physical parks. Like a Warner Bros or a Universal you simply run it as a separate business with talent bought from other operators. If you have enough money you can simply get other people to do the leg work for you - you want a Disney style park, just buy some Imagineers and pay them more than Disney will.

There was an interesting piece recently about how their planned park on the gold coast may damage the Gold Coast existing parks even if it improves the overall tourist attraction of the area. I have linked below to a piece in the Financial Review about their finances and how they could dramatically change the face of current park operations in areas they operate.

Whether there is longevity in building so many in a short space of time will be the interesting part and if they can produce the quality the markets expect whilst maintaining a profit long term is questionable.

Source: http://www.afr.com/lifestyle/arts-and-entertainment/film-and-tv/could-chinas-dalian-wanda-bring-jurassic-park-to-australia-20160105-gm02x6

How is this knock-off company thinking it can make so many parks?