Update | Wanda eyes sports and cultural empire Infront deal; World Cup in cross hairs
The deal is seen as the opening shot in a campaign for China to host the soccer World Cup as Wanda's Wang cited President Xi Jinping's three-step plan to develop football in the country - "to qualify for a World Cup, to host a World Cup and to win a World Cup"
Wang Jianlin, the chairman of Dalian Wanda Group, vowed to speed up overseas expansion to build a 100 billion yuan (HK$126 billion) cultural and leisure business after taking control of the world's second-largest sports marketing company, Infront Sports & Media.
"The acquisition of Infront will significantly increase Wanda's impact on the global culture and entertainment industry," said Wang, who was ranked second in Hurun's list of the mainland's richest tycoons last week.
Wanda said yesterday that it had agreed to buy Infront with a group of investors for €1.05 billion (HK$9.2 billion) from European private equity firm Bridgepoint. The group will take a controlling stake of 68.2 per cent in the Swiss company.
The deal is seen as the opening shot in a campaign for China to host the soccer World Cup.
"The acquisition of Infront would be helpful in shortening the time to achieve these three goals," said Wang, an ardent football fan.
Infront holds part of the World Cup broadcasting rights for the 2018 and 2022 tournaments.