Goodbye, LeSports Arena; hello, Huaxi Live! Beijing's go-to facility for hosting sporting events and music concerts has quietly abandoned its former name for a new sponsor.
The Wukesong Arena, itself formerly known as the MasterCard Center, has been hosting events under this new name since the middle of May as former sponsor LeTV has been embroiled by a stockbroker meltdown.
As far as we can tell, all events that were scheduled for the former LeSports Arena will still go on as planned with the only major change being that the venue's name is different.
Soon to host Coco Lee and Arianna Grande, Huaxi Live (华熙LIVE) has spent the last month promoting a basketball tournament in its facility as well as a William Wei concert.
The changeover has been so sudden that we're not even sure of its official English name. A visit to their official website reveals a URL called "Bloomage Live," but we'll hold off a bit to see if this is actually the English name we're supposed to use. All the same, judging by the geometrically-shaped logo on the outside of the Wukesong Arena, there's no mistaking to which corporation the Wukesong Arena now belongs.
As we mentioned before, Wukesong Arena's name change comes as a massive financial scandal embroils LeTV.
LeTV's fortunes hit a new low this weekend as it was revealed parent company LeEco incurred a USD 92 million deficit in the first half of this year. A shareholder meeting held Monday was disrupted by mobile phone suppliers demanding the return of 33.3 million yuan while shareholders continue to lose confidence as former LeEco chairman Jia Yueting failed to show up, remaining at large outside China.
Despite Jia's promise to "undertake all responsibility" for company debts after having USD 183 million of his assets frozen, creditors wanting their money back began protesting at LeTV's Beijing offices as far back as two weeks ago.
So, with all things considered regarding the sudden demise of LeSports Center, we think we'll stick to calling our beloved local major sports/music performance facility the "Wukesong Arena."
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Twitter: @Sinopath