What’s behind the acquisition of A-league club Newcastle Jets by Ledman---Martin Lee is about to build a “Football Empire”

Mr.Martin Lee (L) shakes hands with Football Federation Australia (FFA) CEO David Gallop(R)

It is widely spreaded among football fans lately that Mr. Martin Lee became the first Chinese to own 100% share of a football club from foreign top football league.
On June 14, Lee, the main shareholder of Ledman Optoelectronic Co., Ltd, (Stock Code:300162) has successfully acquired 100% share of Newcastle Jets in Australia A-League through the subsidiary called Ledman Investment Shenzhen Co., Ltd. This is the first Chinese investment in the A-League.
And this news strongly attracted full attentions from both football sports field and LED industry.Actually this is not the first footprint in international sports field for Ledman. In 2015, Ledman had placed assets of Infront Sports & Media AG,world's second major sports media company. At the beginning of this year, Ledman became the title sponsor of Segunda Liga of Portugal,started“Chinese Players Development Project” for football skills training.

The ambition of Lee in football industry is far away from this, he is always eager for a football empire deeply.

Acquisition of A-league club Newcastle Jets: To qualify AFC champions league
Newcastle Jets is an Australian professional football club based in Newcastle.Hunter Stadium is the home ground of the Newcastle Jets. It has a capacity of 26,000.The Jets became A-League Champion in the 2007-08 A-League Grand Final. The famous“Griffiths brothers”(Joel,Adam and Ryan Griffiths) were all come from Jets.

This is the first Chinese investment for the A-League and it could catch the attentions from 1.2 million Chinese in 24 million Australian,and over 1.3 billion people in China.The business value is incredibly high .”Lee said.

In the press conference,Lee pointed“Newcastle Jets has a long history, and it will always belong to the local community and the community’s fans. I have confidence Jets will qualify ACL in 3 years.” And Lawrie Mckinna,former head coach of Central Coast Mariners and Mayor of Gosford,revealed to be the CEO of Newcastle Jets.

Step in football field: Chinese Football is Booming
With the support from government policy called China football reform and development of the overall program,there will be a huge development in football industry.It is booming now.At present, Ledman operates its business about Chinese Football Super League and China League while explores its business layout of sports by naming Segunda Liga, acquiring Vision China Media, investing the 12th Man----App for football fans, operating Shenzhen Renren Football Club and establishing investment funds.Ledman will firmly accelerate its internationalization development with an inclusive attitude and consummate its layout of global sports in future.

“Players Development Project”:Here comes Christiano Ronaldo’s talent scout

“Football is a dream,support to me.A positive and ambitious football team could bring happiness,victory and good memories to a city. Ledman aims to spread its positive spirits to the society.”Lee said.

Ledman will dispatch 10 players and 3 assistant coaches to the football clubs in Segunda Liga in Portugual every year to promote Chinese players’ football skill.
Lee thought highly of it,so he hired Paulo R Cardozo, Christiano Ronaldo’s talent scout ,who is an experienced football scout and coach in Portugal. He was engaged in players training and coaching in football academy of Portuguese Super League club Sporting Lisbon before. At 1998 Paulo found the potential of Christiano Ronaldo,and sent him from a Portugal second league club in the island of Madeira to Sporting Lisbon football academy for further training.
“Paulo has rich experience in selection and we all trust him. I believe this project will boost chinese football industry. Foreign clubs have rich experience in operation and football professionalization, we need to learn that and adjust it to chinese football, so as to promote the realization of the dream of Chinese football" Lee said.