Update | Wang Jianlin’s AMC pays US$930 million for Nordic Cinema
Latest purchase adds 118 cinemas across six Nordic countries to AMC’s portfolio, giving the chain 12 per cent of global market share
Chinese property and film mogul Wang Jianlin, fresh from his Davos speech urging the removal of barriers against China’s Hollywood investments, has added the biggest cinema chain in the Nordic and Baltic regions to his empire of worldwide movie theatres.
AMC Entertainment Holdings, the US theatre chain under Wang’s Dalian Wanda Group, has announced a US$930 million purchase of Stockholm-based Nordic Cinema Group, according to a statement.
The purchase gives AMC control of 664 screens in 118 cinemas in Sweden, Finland, Norway, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, according to the Chinese company’s statement.
“This will further strengthen AMC’s position as the world’s largest single cinema chain,” it said.
Even before buying Nordic Cinema, Wanda already controlled an estimated 12 per cent of the world’s cinema screens. Wang’s aim is to eventually control 20 per cent of the world’s cinema screens by 2020, with 10 billion yuan (US$1.46 billion) in annual net profit, Wang said during his company’s annual meeting this month.
The purchase from private equity firm Bridgepoint and Swedish media group Bonnier Holdings gives AMC a total of 11,000 screens in 1,000 cinemas in 15 North American and European countries, Wanda said. AMC paid US$1.1 billion for Carmike Cinemas, and recently bought Europe’s largest cinema chain Odeon & IUCI Cinemas Group for £921 million.