Wanda Group

Wanda Group (simplified Chinese: 万达集团; traditional Chinese: 萬達集團; pinyin: Wàndá Jítuán), or Dalian Wanda (Chinese: 大连万达), is a Chinese conglomerate and China’s "biggest private property developer" and the world's largest cinema chain operator, owning Wanda Cinemas, AMC Entertainment and the Hoyts Group.

The company operates in four major industries—commercial property, luxury hotels, culture and tourism, and department stores. It was established in Dalian, Liaoning Province and is now headquartered in Beijing. Founder and CEO Wang Jianlin has said that he seeks to make Wanda "a brand known by everyone in the world".

History

The company was founded in Dalian, Liaoning Province, in 1988 as a residential real estate company by Wang Jianlin. Incorporated in 1992, the company was "one of the first shareholding companies in Communist China".

Diversification push

Since 2005, recent years Chinese property developers like Dalian Wanda and Evergrande have made forays into "alternative, income-generating businesses away from the property market". The Financial Times noted that Dalian Wanda was the "most aggressive" in pursuing this strategy, pointing to its 2012 acquisition of U.S. cinema chain AMC Theatres and 2013 purchase of British yachtmaker Sunseeker. It noted that it was also "building theme parks across China, and has a joint venture with Tencent and Baidu to set up an ecommerce platform". Additionally, Dalian Wanda is developing a Chinese version of Hollywood in the coastal city of Qingdao, Oriental Movie Metropolis, where it is building a "mega-entertainment center that will include a theme park, a film museum, a wax museum and a massive film studio, which [founder Wang Jianlin] promises will be the world's largest".

Dalian

Dalian is a major city and seaport in the south of Liaoning Province, China. It is the southernmost city of Northeast China and China's northernmost warm water port, at the tip of the Liaodong Peninsula. Dalian is the province's second largest city and has sub-provincial administrative status; only the provincial capital (Shenyang) is larger. The Shandong Peninsula lies southwest across the Bohai Sea; Korea lies across the Yellow Sea to the east.

Today, a financial, shipping and logistics center for Northeast Asia, Dalian has a significant history of being used by foreign powers for its ports. Dalian was previously known as both Dalniy (Russian: Дальний; Dal'nii) and Dairen (Japanese: 大連). However the city was better known as Port Arthur (Russian: Порт-Артур; Port-Artur) and Ryojun (Japanese: 旅順) from the original Port Arthur, now the Lüshunkou district.

In 2015, Dalian ranks 41st in the Global Financial Centres Index published by the Z/Yen Group and Qatar Financial Centre Authority, the other Chinese cities on the list being Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Beijing. In 2012, Dalian ranked 82nd in the Global City Competitiveness Index, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit (The Economist Group). In 2006, Dalian was named China's most livable city by China Daily.

List of minor planets: 3001–4000

See also