Shanghai Disneyland's Design Outsourced: A New Model for WDI

If you want clear insight into the business of Disney theme parks, you should be perusing the Laughingplace Discussion Boards. You have to wade through the garbage, but there's some fascinating stuff.

Commenter leemac in Post 16:

Bob Weis is outsourcing everything [for Shanghai Disneyland]. There is very little creative involvement from WDI hence why none of the director-level or senior folks that are recognizable names are working on the project. Bob has been given the blessing to do this all with consultants. This will be the model going forward if deemed successful. WDI won't exist in its current form if Bob delivers on his Shanghai brief.

This is the model most of Disney's competitors in the theme park space use, including Universal Creative. I've long held that the current way of doing business at Walt Disney Imagineering is bloated, slow and overly-expensive.

What has the WDI model created in recent years that competes with The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man or The Wizarding World of Harry Potter for innovation and pure "wow" factor? It's a change that is long past due.