Chinese billionaire Wang Jianlin has expressed desire to build the leading sports company in the world, as Wanda Group set up Wanda Sports company, an integration of sports marketing company Infront Sports and Media and World Triathlon Corporation (WTC), China Daily reported.
On Wednesday, Nov. 25, Wanda Group, China's real estate giant, announced the appointment of Philippe Blatter, FIFA president Sepp Blatter's nephew, as president and CEO of Wanda Sports.
"The significance of establishing Wanda Sports is not only to integrate Wanda's interests in sports, but also to truly expand and strengthen Wanda's businesses in the industry," Wang said after the announcement.
The setting up of the company is Wang's latest move aimed at getting a big share of China's sports industry sector, which has become potentially lucrative as Beijing won the right to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.
Last year, the Chinese government outlined a plan which aims to boost the development of the sports sector into a 5-trillion-yuan ($813 billion) industry by 2025.
The prospects have drawn huge investment into the sector as Wanda bought stake in La Liga champions Atletico Madrid, merged Infront, and then in August bought WTC, spending about 11.6 billion yuan ($1.85 billion) in this area.
E-commerce titan Alibaba also made its investment, paying 1.2 billion yuan ($192 million) for 50-percent stake in Guangzhou Evergrande, China's most successful soccer club and two-time Asian Champions League winner.
Alibaba also sealed business cooperations with German champions Bayern Munich, Spanish giants Real Madrid and NBA star Kobe Bryant. In September, it launched its own sports company that focuses on professional sports.
LeTV and Tencent also established their respective sports companies, the report said.
Two weeks ago, Wang explained investors' enthusiasm at a summit of Chinese-listed companies.
"China's sports industry is still in its cradle but the government has launched a plan to promote it and set a goal of 5 trillion yuan in scale. If the goal is realized, sports really is a very promising industry," Wang said.
"We plan to keep merging and add new content into our sports branch. Wanda Sports aim to become the world's first sports company with an annual income of more than 10 billion U.S. dollars," he said.
The report said, however, that Wang is underestimating the potential gain from the sector as Chinese sports minister Liu Peng said last month that the sports industry may reach 7 trillion yuan by 2025.