ChinaTravelNews - Wanda Group’s chairman and second richest man in China, Jianlin Wang, has hinted he would make a major announcement within a week. In a recent speech on Xinhua Online titled “Transition and Challenge for Wanda”, he identified a couple of industries worth keeping an eye on without going into details of the his next major move.
Mr. Wang said in the speech that Wanda would continue its focus on the tourism industry and had recently acquired a major travel website, details of which would be announced soon. He pointed out that Wanda’s biggest advantage was its offline platform and bolstering its offline advantage while integrating with new technology and future trends was the key to the group’s transition.
ChinaTravelNews analyzed the financing of all the major OTAs and deduced it’s highly likely that LY.com is the travel website that Wanda acquired. LY’s financing has been ongoing and Wanda’s investment could be worth US$300-400 million, which would increase LY.com’s estimated value to US$2 billion.
If Wanda invests in LY.com, it would join Ctrip and Tencent as major shareholders of LY.com and this may boost its LY.com’s local listing.
On the other hand, it’s worth keeping an eye on how Wanda will rationalize this investment with its recent buying frenzy in the tour operating segment, and how LY.com will integrate into Wanda’s tour operator network.
ChinaTravelNews has also just learned that LY.com has launched an A share IPO on June 25 2015. “LY.com’s rapid development has attracted the attention of a large number of investors including Wanda Group, Tencent who have expressed their desire to participate in the first financing round. All our investors will also fully support LY.com’s Chinese IPO,” LY.com said in a recent update. This latest statement confirms Wanda’s intention to invest in LY.com.(Translation by David)
