Developers Offer a Peek at Shanghai’s Dream Center; Big projects like the Dream Center have been more heavily scrutinized lately amid concerns about over building and tightened credit in China
March 29, 2014 Leave a comment
Developers Offer a Peek at Shanghai’s Dream Center
ESTHER FUNG
March 20, 2014 9:48 a.m. ET
SHANGHAI— DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc. DWA +0.22% and its Chinese partners say they plan to build live performance theaters and concert halls in a 15 billion yuan ($2.4 billion) Shanghai project that will open in 2017 or early 2018.
“The size and scale [of the project] has gotten bigger and bigger,” said Jeffrey Katzenberg, DreamWorks Animation’s chief executive. “Securing the necessary approvals and getting financing took a longer time than expected.”
He spoke to The Wall Street Journal on the sidelines of a press event at a dome-shaped performance hall that was once a cement factory. The hall will eventually be part of the larger project, which is called the Dream Center.
Plans for the Dream Center were first unveiled in 2012 and the project had an opening date in 2016.
Li Ruigang, chairman of investment fund CMC Capital Partners, the riverside project’s lead partner, said the Dream Center “faces many hurdles and challenges,” adding that the partners “supported and tortured one another” along the way.
Dream Center will be jointly developed by Shanghai Media Group’s CMC, Hong Kong-based developer Lan Kwai Fong Group, and DreamWorks. It is partly funded by China Development Bank. The partners didn’t reveal the breakdown of the funding structure.
Big projects like the Dream Center have been more heavily scrutinized lately amid concerns about over building and tightened credit in China. But Mr. Katzenberg noted that the progress wasn’t affected by the slowing economy.
The project has a total gross floor area of 463,000 square meters and will include offices, black box theaters and restaurants.
Lan Kwai Fong Group Chairman Allan Zeman said that the group worked with 15 international and local architects to come up with designs for the T-shaped site and added that the design plan isn’t complete.
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