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According to China Daily, the Walt Disney Company and Shanghai's municipal government have finally signed a project proposal to build a Disneyland theme park on the Chinese mainland. Assuming the newspaper hasn't jumped the gun, this would put a stopper on the will they won't they drama that's shadowed the deal since it was a glint in Mickey Mouse's eye.
Under the proposal, Disney will take a minority stake of 43 percent in Shanghai Disneyland. The other 57 percent will be owned by a joint-venture holding company under the control of the Shanghai government.
The first phase of the project, which will cost both partners a total of RMB 24 billion, will include the park, a hotel and a shopping center over a 1.5 square kilometer spread near the Pudong airport. It'll open in 2014, hopefully bypassing the worst years of the world economic slowdown.
One interesting, but somewhat unexplored angle to this whole kit-n-kaboodle is what effect a real Disneyland will have on the fake Disneyland in Beijing, Shijingshan Amusement Park. Most of the most blatant copyright violations have been scrubbed, after it received a ton of unwanted international publicity last year, but some stains of its shanzhai Disneyland past still remain.
The video is a Japanese news report on fake Disneyland. The man at the end is a China expert talking about how a real Disneyland on the mainland will probably generate more crackdowns on copyright violations. Tough break, Shijingshan!
Photo by Heather Garland
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