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Imax China and China Media Capital take next steps for $50 Million China film fund
MUMBAI: Imax Corporation and Imax China (HK.1970) today announced the completion of the formative agreements to establish the IMAX China Film Fund with partner China Media Capital (“CMC”). The China Film Fund, which will initially be capitalized with $50 million, will co-finance approximately 15 Mandarin-language tent pole films over three years. The Fund will target productions that can leverage the IMAX® brand, technology, relationships, and release windows.
The China Film Fund will take advantage of favorable trends in the Chinese market, strengthening the IMAX brand and capitalizing on relationships with studio, exhibitor and local distribution partners, as well as content creators. The Fund will enhance an already successful IMAX slate of Chinese DMR films and leverage CMC’s experience within China’s content creation industry.
The Fund will target contributions of between $3 million and $7 million per film, and will operate under an IMAX-CMC greenlight committee. IMAX and CMC may potentially bring in other investors to increase the size of the Fund.
“Our strong relationships with China’s most acclaimed studios and filmmakers mirror those we’ve established in Hollywood, thanks to the support of our valued partner CMC,” said IMAX CEO Richard L. Gelfond. “The Fund will further deepen our ties in the China film industry and allow us to generate the highest-quality Mandarin content for Chinese and international audiences alike. Our commitment to the success of our business in China and its filmmaking community is unwavering. Together, we are excited to launch a new and exciting chapter of filmmaking in China.”
“The appetite for premium Chinese content among the nation’s moviegoers continues to grow. The Fund is an outgrowth of CMC’s privileged capability and extensive connections in the Chinese film industry and IMAX’s beloved brand and differentiated cinematic experience. We hope this will support the creation of more tentpole Mandarin-language films,” said CMC ChairmanRuigang Li. “Together we are thrilled to play a strategic role in shaping the future of filmed entertainment in China.”
“Our early involvement in the Chinese cinema industry has afforded us tremendous brand value and has helped cement IMAX as the go-to format for blockbuster movies,” added Jiande Chen, CEO, IMAX China. “The Fund is a part of our continued growth and evolution within China that coincides with the nation’s growing cinema industry and trend toward locally-produced blockbuster content, which along with CMC we will now help to finance.”
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Tessolve lands a semiconductor veteran to drive its next big push
Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, who started his career at ISRO and has spent 35 years building chips and companies, joins the Bengaluru-based firm as president and chief operating officer
BENGALURU: Tessolve has never been shy about its ambitions. The Bengaluru-based engineering services firm already counts 18 of the world’s top 20 semiconductor companies among its clients, employs more than 3,500 engineers across 12 countries, and last year pocketed a $150m investment from TPG. Now it has hired the executive it believes can turn those assets into something bigger. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, a 35-year semiconductor veteran who once built satellite payloads for ISRO and has since scaled engineering organisations across three continents, joins as president and chief operating officer, effective immediately.
THE MAN AND THE MANDATE
The appointment is, by any measure, a serious hire. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu comes to Tessolve after senior leadership stints at HCL Technologies, Altran and Wipro, where he managed large profit-and-loss portfolios and oversaw cross-regional teams. Over the course of his career, he has been instrumental in bringing more than 1,000 new products to market across the high-tech, energy and manufacturing verticals. Before the private sector claimed him, he began his working life as a scientist at the Indian Space Research Organisation, contributing to research and development in charge-coupled device technology and satellite payloads, a foundation that shaped everything that followed.
In his new role, he will lead Tessolve’s global growth strategy: expanding its engineering capabilities, deepening customer relationships and accelerating innovation across semiconductor and high-performance computing domains. The brief is broad, but the context is specific. Tessolve operates in the $550 billion global semiconductor market, and its recent moves, the acquisition of Germany’s Dream Chip Technologies and the TPG funding round, have sharpened both its reach and its expectations.
Srini Chinamilli, co-founder and chief executive of Tessolve, is characteristically direct about why Ravi Kumar Chirugudu was the choice:
“As we scale our global semiconductor and system engineering capabilities, Ravi’s appointment marks an important step forward. As global semiconductor demand continues to accelerate across industries, it is creating significant opportunities across the semiconductor lifecycle, from design, packaging, validation and systems integration. Ravi’s deep knowledge and leadership in this ecosystem brings the right mix of industry expertise, customer connect and execution capability, which will play a key role in strengthening our position as a trusted global engineering partner and reinforcing our market leadership.”
THE NEW ARRIVAL SPEAKS
Ravi Kumar Chirugudu, for his part, frames the move in terms of timing and culture, two factors that veteran executives tend to weigh as heavily as title or compensation:
“I am happy to join Tessolve at a time when the industry is rapidly evolving towards more complex, AI-driven systems. What stands out to me is its strong people-first culture and its commitment to bringing value to its customers. The strength of its global team, combined with its deep expertise in semiconductor innovation and next-generation product engineering, creates a solid foundation to build differentiated, scalable solutions. I look forward to working closely with the team to drive strategic growth and strengthen its role in shaping the global semiconductor ecosystem.”
The reference to AI-driven systems is not incidental. The semiconductor industry is in the midst of a structural reshaping, driven by the insatiable compute demands of artificial intelligence. For engineering services firms like Tessolve, which offers end-to-end capabilities from silicon design to packaged parts and invests in high-performance computing, high-speed interfaces, photonics and 5G, the moment is both an opportunity and a test. The company says it is well positioned to capture the next wave of industry growth. Ravi Kumar Chirugudu is now the person who has to prove it.
He came in from outer space, literally, and spent three decades learning how the semiconductor industry works from the inside out. Now Tessolve is betting that accumulated knowledge can help it cross the next frontier. In the $550 billion global chip market, the gap between ambition and execution is measured in engineering hours and leadership quality. Tessolve has just gone shopping for both.
