WALT Disney Co. would open a theme park in Shanghai in 2012, the Hong Kong Economic Times said, without identifying the source of its information.

The company would start designing the park next year, the paper said. The construction would begin in 2008 and the park would open in 2012, the paper said.

Disney is close to finishing a US$3.5 billion theme park in Hong Kong, which is scheduled to open in September this year. The Shanghai park would be built on a 500-hectare site in Pudong East, three times bigger than the one in Hong Kong, the paper said. No hotel was planned for Shanghai, it said.

A group of officials from Shanghai visited the Hong Kong site two weeks ago, the paper said. Staff in charge of the management of Hong Kong Disneyland would be relocated to Shanghai at the end of the year, it said. Designers transferred from the United States for the Hong Kong park were also moving to Shanghai, the report said.

Incoming Disney chief executive Robert Iger had said earlier the company was planning a range of projects in China, including a theme park, according to a recent article in Time.

Editor: Wing