Wanda chief meets PM

Meeting comes in the backdrop of an announcement by Wanda Group in Jan to develop a $10 bn industrial park in Sonepat, Haryana

China’s Dalian Wanda Group chairman Wang Jianlin on Monday met prime minister Narendra Modi in the capital. The meeting, second in a year,  comes after the group announced in January it would develop a $10-billion industrial park at Kharkhoda in Sonepat, Haryana. An industrial park is a portion of a city that is zoned for industrial use. The company would be the lead investor in the initial infrastructure and would ask Chinese firms to take part. The construction in the first phase of the 13-square-kilometre park in Haryana would start this year, the firm had said. The group entered India through a deal with Reliance Group in December 2012 for setting up a joint venture for building integrated township projects in India.

Dalian Wanda is aggressively spending on projects and acquisitions ranging from entertainment to financial services in a bid to diversify away from its core, but slowing, domestic real estate operations.The conglomerate which posted $44 billion in revenue last year has said it wants more than a third of its revenue to come from abroad by 2020, according to an agency report.

Wang Jianlin, who with an estimated net worth of $23 billion is China's wealthiest man and ranks 29th on the Forbes billionaires list in 2015. The Dalian Wanda group is by some estimates the largest real estate developer in China.

The real estate arm of the company, Dalian Wanda Commercial Properties, is reported to own 125 shopping plazas and 68 five-star hotels. While the group began its operations in the real estate sector, it is now a diversified conglomerate with business interests spanning entertainment, sports and finance. Wang recently acquired a 20 per cent stake in Spanish football club Atletico Madrid for $52.3 million and has also purchased the US-based organiser of long-distance races, Ironman Triathlons, for $650 million.