Month: July 2015

China is getting into the act in Hollywood. Wanda Pictures, controlled by the richest person in China, just financed the Hollywood movie “Southpaw” which opens today across the US. Wang Jianlin heads Dalian Wanda Group co, which owns the second largest US cinema chain. Last year, they bought land in Beverly Hills with the plans to erect a $1.2 billion complex.

And now they’ve invested in “Southpaw,” an R-rated Weinstein Co. drama about a boxer. “Southpaw” is generating media attention since studio co-chairman Harvey Weinstein showed a clip at the Cannes Film Festival.

The movie actually premiered at the Shanghai International Film Festival and cost more than $25 million to make.

Wang’s net worth according to the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index is approximately $41.8 billion. He recently told Bloomberg Markets magazine that buying Hollywood studios would allow him the content and distribution outlets to help him conquer the market.

Wang first started talking to the Weinstein studio about investing in “Southpaw” before Wanda’s 2012 purchase of the AMC Entertainment theater chain.

In  a bizarre move, U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has accused China of stealing commercial secrets. During a campaign event in New Hampshire, she said that they are stealing a “huge amounts of government information” and that they are trying to “hack into everything that doesn’t move in America.”

She continued, “But we also have to be fully vigilant, China’s military is growing very quickly, they’re establishing military installations that again threaten countries we have treaties with, like the Philippines because they are building on contested property.”

Asked to comment on her remarks, the White House declined.

The Obama administration has accused China of being the top suspect in the hacking of a US government agency that included the personal records of more than 4.2 million current and foreign government workers.

 

 

Telemedicine has become an area of interest in China. There are a number of applications of use and investors are looking carefully at the possibilities. One of the main issues in the Chinese healthcare system is that rural patients commute to major cities like Beijing and Shanghai for treatment instead of going to local clinics.

Of course this means that urban hospitals have become completely overcrowded and hard to manage. With these ideas in mind, the Chinese medical profession is looking to telemedicine. The idea is that urban doctors would support their rural colleagues in treatment and diagnosis with email, phone and video conferencing. This could allow rural patients to enter the health care system earlier and to receive preventative care rather than only reactionary care.

They are also hoping to use telemedicine to education the population. 33% of the world’s smokers live in China and 300 million Chinese people have high blood pressure.

Read more about the potential benefits of telemedicine in China.