Wales Millennium Centre - Corporate Financing and Rebranding

Corporate Financing and Rebranding

The total cost of phase 1 of the project was £106.2 million. The National Lottery Millennium Fund provided £31.7 million, a further £37 million came from The National Assembly for Wales and £10.4 million was donated by the Arts Council of Wales. In addition a private investor, South African businessman Donald Gordon donated £20 million to be shared equally between the Royal Opera House and the Wales Millennium Centre. The Centre also received a £13.5 million loan from HSBC. The remaining funds for the project came from a major sponsorship deal with the Principality Building Society. Today the Centre has many corporations and public bodies who provide sponsorship to the Centre.

The National Assembly for Wales announced on 6 November 2007 that it was to pay off the outstanding loan of £13.5 million from HSBC and also increase the annual funding. From April 2008, the National Assembly for Wales have given a grant to the Wales Millennium Centre with £3.5 million per annum for 3 years. This would only repay the capital debt and not any ongoing operating loss as the Centre remains profitable. The money used to pay the debt came from unallocated funds from the Assembly's previous budget and it was said by the Minister for Heritage, Rhodri Glyn Thomas, that the new money allocation would not come at the expense of other art projects from other parts of Wales.

The cost of phase 2 of the project was approximately £18 million, however the BBC does not own the building, they have leased it for 25 years from the Lime Property Fund, which is a subsidiary of Aviva Investors. The building was built by Concert Bay Ltd, which is a subsidiary of Sir Robert McAlpine Enterprises Ltd who co-funded the scheme along with Lime Property Fund.

In November 2006, Wales Millennium Centre announced that they would begin a two phase rebranding project. The project was won by a local Cardiff company, Sweet. The first phase of the project involved a new corporate logo, the second phase included the complete redesign of other marketing tools, such as brochures and advertisements.