The countdown is on ahead of the country's largest indoor arena opening its doors in east Manchester. The 23,500-capacity Co-op Live arena is set to open its doors near to Manchester City's Etihad Stadium in December.
Now, the full list of investors for the £365m project has been revealed - with some very famous connections. Grammy and BRIT award-winning singer Harry Styles, who grew up in Cheshire, was announced as an investor for the project back in October 2020.
But the scale of his involvement has now been made public for the first time, Business Live reports. Newly-filed documents with Companies House give the full details on who is behind the development.
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It is a joint venture between City Football Group - the holding group which manages football clubs including Manchester City, under the majority ownership of Sheikh Mansour's Abu Dhabi United Group - and Oak View Group (OVG). Each party has 7,865 shares in Co-op Live's holding company.
OVG is behind a range of entertainment venues in the US. The next largest shareholder is Harry Styles' Erekine Records, whose only other director is Emma Spring.
Erekine Records, which is the label launched by the pop star in 2016, holds 365 shares in the holding company. The new documents also confirms the involvement of concert promoter Simon Moran - who has worked with acts such as Take That, Spice Girls, Foo Fighters and Stormzy.
SJM Holdings, which is the holding company of both SJM Concerts and rugby league club Warrington Wolves, has 182 shares. It is the same total as Gaiety Investments UK, the business run by Irish concerns promotor Denis Desmond.
Speaking to the Manchester Evening News last year, OVG chief executive Tim Leiweke described the former One Direction star as a 'passionate' investor in the project. He added: “One thing I absolutely guarantee you is it will be one of the three or four busiest arenas in the world on day one. Right off the bat.
"And I’m talking the [Madison Square] Garden, Forum [in California], O2, Co-op Live. Those four buildings will be the four most important music buildings in the world.
"Manchester deserves one of the great, great music venues. The arena we’re building here, it’s going to be the greatest music arena ever built.”
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