Wanda, a local tycoon, has strategically invested in Shiguang. com and is competing with Ali?

Wanda announced on the 31st that it had strategically invested a 20% stake in Mtime Holdings,Ltd on the 30th, with the hope that "both parties will fully launch the O2O business of film e-commerce and use the mobile Internet to integrate film derivatives, film promotion and offline theaters. Seamless connection

I believe everyone has already seen that Jack Ma and Wang Jianlin have been competing for not only the throne of the richest man in China, but also the seat of the number one boss in the film industry.

Last week, after Alibaba Pictures 'Yueke Software just released a smart cinema computer ticketing system-Phoenix Jiaying "Movie Cloud", Wanda couldn't help but announce on the 31st that it had strategically invested in a 20% stake in Mtime Holdings, Ltd. on the 30th, in order to "fully launch the film e-commerce O2O business, use the mobile Internet to seamlessly connect film derivatives, film promotion and offline theaters, and create a new film e-commerce model. Better serve film dealers, theaters and the movie-watching public."

A familiar set of sayings, a familiar taste.

That's right, Wang Jianlin, who has just fought in the battle for the throne of the richest Chinese man, has begun to compete with Jack Ma in the layout of movie theaters!

In the time when the left-hand micro-votes and the right-hand, Wanda Films fully embraces the Internet

Wanda Pictures, which has been turned from a real estate developer, has always been criticized by netizens: it seriously lacks Internet genes. As a result, Wanda began the post-packaging of its Internet genes by participating in the era of lithography, an online seat selection platform. It also hopes to introduce people into the movie-watching group through the drainage function of large social platforms such as WeChat; at the same time, it can also use the big data mastered in the lithography era to conduct in-depth cooperation with the films invested, produced and distributed by Wanda. Achieve precise marketing of films and boost box office.

In this regard, we can only apply the old saying: ideals are full, but reality is very bony.

Because, although the main business of Wanda's investment in the lithography era is online ticketing, unlike other platforms, the main products of the lithography era are "movie tickets" based on WeChat wallet and QQ wallet. The ticket purchase entrance is set up on a large social platform to connect a large number of users to movies. In other words, the platform and environment for serving users are still limited.

This may also be the real purpose of Wanda's strategic investment in Shiguang. com.

It is reported that Shiguang. com is the platform with the richest film Internet content, the most comprehensive film promotion business, and the leading derivative research and development platform in China. It integrates film database, film community, film promotion, online film ticketing, film derivatives and film content platforms. It has the world's largest Chinese film and television database, the largest original film review media in China, the largest movie mobile application APP with the largest downloads in China, and the top online movie ticketing platform in China. It is a leading domestic online sales platform for film derivatives and many international film derivative authorizations.

Although it is insufficient to fight against Alibaba Pictures, which has just released Phoenix Jiaying's "Film Cloud", it is at least commendable in spirit.

At the same time, after the semi-annual reports of major film and television companies were released one after another, Wanda Cinema also released their semi-annual reports today.

Wanda Cinema's semi-annual report shows that in the first half of the year, it achieved operating income of 3.486 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 40.82%; net profit attributable to shareholders of listed companies was 628 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 50.49%; it is worth noting that in the first half of the year, Wanda Cinema achieved box office revenue of 2.85 billion yuan, of which online box office revenue alone exceeded 1.55 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 300%. Wanda Cinema said that this was because "in the first half of the year, it increased marketing efforts, actively developed the number of members, expanded its profit model, and achieved steady growth in revenue and profits."

However, there is a "abusive" relationship between Wanda Theater Line itself and online e-commerce companies. Just a month ago, the news that "Wanda blocked cat's eyes" was widely circulated on the Internet. Although this news has now been confirmed to be a rumor, there is indeed a conflict of interest between the two parties. The main conflict comes from the threat posed by low-cost e-commerce subsidies to the theater membership system.

The contradiction between online e-commerce and theater members is difficult to reconcile. In the

first half of this year, the transaction volume of Cat's Eye films exceeded 6 billion yuan, exceeding that of the whole of 2014, accounting for 70% of the market share of China's online movie ticketing market. At present, on average, for every three movie tickets sold nationwide, one comes from Cat's Eye movies. At the same time, according to semi-annual report data, Wanda's online box office revenue has also accounted for more than 50% of total box office revenue, while Wanda Cinema expects this figure to exceed 80% next year.

Although online e-commerce introduces a large amount of traffic to theaters, it may also touch the very core interests of theaters. Online seat selection with subsidies for low-cost promotions often threatens the membership system of theaters. In addition, although the online seat selection platform does not participate in the division of film parties, it may participate in the ticket compensation process, which means that theaters may sell movie tickets to online platforms at a lower price than theaters. The difference is a kind of revenue from online ticketing.

An industry insider once commented: "I, who was born in theaters and studios, advise you to stop using the tactic of making wool out of sheep on the online seat selection platform. Playing the subsidy market has made the production company disgusted..."

So Wanda Cinema tried to Strengthen its own online barriers and released the "Member +" strategy on the 29th. According to its semi-annual report, as of the end of June 2015, the company's membership has exceeded 40 million, making it the world's largest film membership system, with member consumption accounting for more than 80%. The upgraded "Member +" strategy is that Wanda will join forces with Audi, Xiaomi, Tencent, China Merchants Bank, etc. to create a film life service platform, specifically including online movie theaters, movie derivatives, games, finance and brand cross-border.

At the same time, in April this year, Wanda also appeared among the investment institutions that Microfilm Era, which is responsible for the WeChat movie ticket business, announced that it had completed US$105 million in financing.

However, as BAT has successively entered the online seat selection industry, the huge amount of money behind it has intensified the price war and made the relationship between e-commerce platforms and theaters more subtle.

Integrate global theaters and prepare for branch distribution.

Judging from the revenue composition of the semi-annual report, box office revenue accounted for 79% of revenue, occupying an absolute dominant position. Obviously, Wanda is not satisfied with this. Expanding the layout of theaters is what Wanda has been doing.

On the evening of June 26, Wanda Cinema Line announced that it planned to acquire 100% equity of film data company Muwei Fashion and 100% equity of 15 companies including Chongqing Shimao Cinema Management Co., Ltd. held by Shimao Cinema Investment and Development Co., Ltd. for a total price of 2.2 billion yuan. Equity, of which according to the announcement of Shimao Shares, the total transaction consideration for 15 theaters is tentatively set at 1 billion yuan.

However, as early as 2012, Wanda Group acquired AMC, the second largest theater line in the United States, for US$2.6 billion. The outside world once thought that this was a loss-making deal. However, with AMC's successful listing on the New York Stock Exchange one year later, Wanda Group made a lot of money. As mergers and acquisitions at home and abroad increase, Wanda's territory is getting bigger and bigger. Wang Jianlin, who has tasted the sweetness, is becoming more and more interested in mergers and acquisitions. Not long ago, Wanda Cinema Line acquired Hoyts, the second cinema company in Australia, for another sum of 2.2 billion yuan.

According to Shimao's 2014 annual report, Shimao Cinema achieved operating income of 233 million yuan, a significant increase of 57.7% year-on-year, and provided movie viewing services to more than 6.6 million people. As of the end of 2014, Shimao Theater Line had opened 17 stores and had 148 screens across the country, and the number of theater seats had also increased to 23,600. The total number of screens of the 15 theaters acquired is 114, accounting for 77% of the total screens of Shimao Theater. Based on this, it is estimated that the box office size of the 15 theaters in 2014 will be approximately 179 million yuan.

Therefore, Hu Xian said that the rapid growth of the total number of theaters and screens contrasts with the decline in movie-goers, and the continuous growth in feature film production contrasts with the weakness of domestic films (especially niche art films) in competition for screen resources. It is time for split distribution to become a new challenge for the next stage of theater competition.

The so-called split-line distribution means that it is different from the current full-line distribution. Split-line distribution is exclusive film distribution on several theaters or even one theater line. That is, a certain film is only released in some theaters. This differentiated distribution strategy on the one hand helps strengthen the theater brand, and on the other hand, for a large number of domestic films, it can also find more suitable theater partners to focus on distribution.

Zeng Maojun, CEO of Wanda Cinema, had previously made this judgment on future split distribution in an interview: "This trend is visible in 3 to 5 years, because the number of new screens every year is now 5,000 - 6,000. In another 4 years, more than 20000 new screens will be added, plus the existing 23000 at the end of this year, it will be at least between 45,000 and 50,000. By this time, the number of screens has already surpassed that of North America. Moreover, the higher the degree of integration, the more high-quality theaters can do distribution in the future. In the film era, possible distribution work was connected with studios. However, with the development of digitalization, the speed of copying and downloading films is not limited, and this issue may become simpler. Of course, mergers and acquisitions and integration of movie theaters are also the prerequisite and trend."

It can be seen that in addition to fighting online e-commerce, integrating theaters and preparing for offline distribution are the big games that Wanda Theater is planning.

Editor: yvonne