By Dalian Wanda Group finalized its purchase of AMC Entertainment yesterday to the tune of $2.6 billion. Deadline notes that Wanda is China’s largest investor in entertainment activities, and that this acquisition makes them the world’s largest cinema owner.
The deal means that AMC’s corporate leadership and holdings remain intact and will operate as a subsidiary of Wanda. None of AMC’s film programming will be affected. Wanda will invest $500 million into AMC over an unspecified amount of time in order to build and expand the brand. Deadline notes that prior to the purchase, Wanda operated 94 theaters and 805 screens, while AMC operated 338 theaters and 4,865 screens. As of press time, there is no reliable information on how many theaters and screens Wanda Sykes operates.
According to a post on The New York Times‘s Media Decoder blog, Wanda’s chairman/president, Wang Jianlin, has plans to invest $10 billion in other U.S. companies in the next few years. If Wanda should somehow acquire Coca Cola, I will die from laughter.
[Via Deadline, Media Decoder/The New York Times]