This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on January 13, 2016.

BEIJING: Chinese conglomerate Wanda Group signed a US$3.5 billion (RM15.47 billion) deal yesterday to buy Hollywood studio Legendary Entertainment, the maker of blockbusters Jurassic World and Godzilla, dubbing it China’s biggest-ever cultural takeover.

Legendary’s film productions have grossed more than US$12 billion worldwide at the box office, according to a Wanda statement.

The company’s projects — which have also included Pacific Rim and the latest Batman trilogy — are mostly the big-budget action spectaculars popular with Chinese audiences.

The agreement was “China’s largest cross-border cultural acquisition to date”, said the Chinese firm, which is headed by the country’s richest man Wang Jianlin.
“American movie companies have the commanding heights of the movie industry in the world,” Wang told reporters at the signing ceremony in Beijing, adding the acquisition will “change this situation”.

The takeover has echoes of Japanese electronics group Sony’s acquisition of Columbia Pictures in 1989, which epitomised the then-booming Asian country’s purchases of trophy US assets.

But Wang denied that the deal — which comes weeks after Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba bought Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post newspaper — was intended to increase Beijing’s cultural influence.

“Government soft power belongs to another sphere,” he said at the briefing, where he and Legendary chairman and chief executive officer Thomas Tull watched lawyers sign the agreement. “I mainly focus on business interests.”

Wanda, founded by Wang, has its origins in commercial property but is diversifying into areas ranging from entertainment to e-commerce as the world’s second-largest economy matures and growth slows. — AFP