Chinese billionaire Wang Jianlin: Ambition to build a global empire

(Baonghean) - “Real estate tycoon”, “super billionaire”, “richest man in China” are the titles given to China’s number 1 billionaire Wang Jianlin, who has just entered the Top 20 richest people on the planet. From building luxury hotels, buying world-famous football teams, to ambitious plans to dominate the entertainment industry, it seems that Wang Jianlin wants to build his own empire across the globe.

Vuong Kien Lam (far right) - the eldest of five brothers, once served in the army. Photo: DailyMail.

From soldier to businessman

Wang Jianlin was born in 1954, the eldest brother in a traditional military family in western Sichuan, bordering Tibet. His father joined the Red Army in the Long March in the 1930s, and then fought against Japanese fascism in World War II. In 1970, when Wang Jianlin was 16 years old and had just graduated from junior high school, his father decided to send him to the army for training. At the age of 32, he retired from military life. The 16 years of military service left a deep impression on him. Later, when he became a businessman, he mentioned this period many times. "Without those years, I probably wouldn't have been able to have today," Wang Jianlin shared.

In 1988, Mr. Wang went to work for the Wanda Construction Company under the Northern Port of Dalian City, specializing in the exploitation and development of housing in the area. The company was on the verge of bankruptcy and owed 1,490,000 yuan. At that time, real estate was still a strange field for him, but he quickly chose a project that even his predecessors did not dare or were afraid to do: renovating old houses. The initial success helped him boldly consider renovation as his main profession. When other companies jumped in, Wanda became the "professional old house renovator" in Dalian.

Since 1991, the Chinese government has planned to pilot the equitization of enterprises in Dalian. Many people were afraid, but he actively applied to participate. Thanks to that, Van Dat was one step ahead in reforming the operating mechanism of enterprises compared to the entire Northeast region. A few years later, the Company was equitized, Mr. Lam gradually bought back and owned shares of Van Dat, becoming a true businessman.

Wanda got rich thanks to real estate, but became famous thanks to football. Wang Jianlin said that in 1994, the Chairman of Dalian City came to him and said that he wanted to organize a domestic football tournament. He was also a football fan, so he founded the Wanda Football Club. After that, the domestic football tournament became more exciting and Wanda became the club that always won first place, setting a record of 55 consecutive wins. The Wanda Group - Dalian also began to become famous from then on. Doing business in the sports field continues to be the direction that Wang Jianlin pursues. He has successfully acquired the Swiss sports marketing group Infront. In early 2015, this billionaire also spent a lot of money to buy back 20% of the shares of the Spanish football team Atletico Madrid.

Portrait of China's richest billionaire Wang Jianlin. Photo: Bloomberg.

Ambition to become a movie "boss"

Another thing worth mentioning about Wang Jianlin is his ambition to dominate the world entertainment industry. This “super billionaire” owns thousands of cinemas around the world and got rich partly thanks to the entertainment business. He officially entered the film industry in 2012 after buying the AMC Entertainment cinema chain for 2.6 billion USD. This is the largest cinema system in the US. In June 2015, Mr. Wang continued to spend a large amount of money to buy back the largest cinema chain in Australia.

In early 2016, the Wanda Group signed a contract to buy a controlling stake in the famous American film studio Legendary Entertainment for $3.5 billion. Legendary Entertainment is a famous company in Hollywood with many blockbuster movies. “The acquisition of Legendary will help the parent company of Wanda become the film company with the highest revenue in the world,” billionaire Wang affirmed. This deal shows the determination of Wanda Group of Wang Jianlin to penetrate the world entertainment industry. Currently, his group is negotiating to buy a controlling stake in Lions Gate Entertainment Corp, and is keen to invest in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. Mr. Wang is also looking for opportunities to buy film studios in Europe but has not done so because the current prices are still high.

Billionaire Wang Jianlin spent a lot of money to buy back 20% of shares of Spanish football team Atletico Madrid. Photo: Xinhua.

Hollywood on the Yellow Sea

"The Chinese film industry will be at the top of the world in 2018, I am sure of it. China's box office revenue will surpass North America in 2018 and double by 2023," said Mr. Wang at the groundbreaking ceremony of Chollywood studio in Qingdao, northern China, in September 2013. On September 22, 2013, Mr. Wang decided to launch the project to build Chollywood (China + Hollywood) into the world's largest studio complex. When completed, this art complex will be called Oriental Movie Metropolis (Oriental Cinema Capital) and will include 20 studios, including an underwater studio and more than 100,000 m²land, large enough to recreate the entire Ming and Qing dynasties. The project is strongly supported by the government with an investment of 30 million yuan (more than 105 billion VND), aiming to let the Chinese dominate the film market. This film capital is expected to be completed in June 2017 with a total area of ​​3,760,000 m². At that time, this place will be compared to Hollywood on the Yellow Sea. In addition to being a film studio, Chollywood will also have a cinema, research lab, and museum. Chollywood will have its own international film festival and is expected to produce an average of 130 films per year, including 30 foreign films (not produced by China).

Mr. Vuong predicts that in five years, the Chinese film market will be the world's largest, and at that time, China will be like a big cake that every foreign film company wants a piece of. "I firmly believe that China will be the center of the global film industry," he asserted.

Thanh Huyen