Concept map of Evergrande's football stadium under construction. (Photo: People's Daily)

Chinese property developer Evergrande Group, a Fortune global 500 company, will build the world's largest soccer stadium that can accommodate 100,000 fans, which is scheduled to be completed by 2022 in Guanghzou, South China's Guangdong Province.

Construction started on Thursday, right after the commercial and sports land in Guangzhou was sold to a subsidiary of Evergrande Group in the morning, at a price tag of of 6.8 billion yuan ($960 million).

The stadium is designed by Hasan. A. Syed, in the shape of a blooming lotus instead of a traditional oval-shaped stadium.

According to Evergrande President Xia Haijun, the company invested 12 billion yuan to build the stadium, which covers an area of about 150,000 square meters, and the total building area reaches 300,000 square meters.

Xia revealed at a press conference on Thursday that Evergrande will build another three to five world-class soccer stadiums with 80,000 to 100,000 seats.

"Evergrande's investment in the stadium will help it develop in the football industry. Upon completion, the football stadium will be a driving force to surrounding businesses," Yan Yuejin, research director at E-house China R&D Institute, told the Global Times on Thursday.

Evergrande has displayed its vow to the football industry, including investments in football clubs and schools.

Evergrande Group took over the Guangzhou Football Club (FC) in 2010, for a fee of 100 million yuan and the name of the club was officially changed to Guangzhou Evergrande FC. Then in 2014, Alibaba Group became another shareholder of the club by investing 1.2 billion yuan, and thus the club got its current name of Guangzhou Evergrande Taobao Football Club, as Taobao is an online retail platform of Alibaba.