The directors behind Far East Consortium - the firm leading on the city's Northern Gateway project - have said the area is at an "incredibly exciting phase of history" as it was revealed that the scheme will be renamed 'Victoria North'.
Regional director Gavin Taylor and Tom Fenton have spoken out to explain what FEC hopes to achieve at the site - one of the most deprived parts of Manchester and an area where, over the next 15 years, it will invest millions of pounds for regeneration.
Thousands of homes are set to be built across the 50-acre area under a joint venture with Manchester City Council at the site north of Victoria train station, .
For years, the project had been known as 'Northern Gateway', but the rebranding was revealed by the Hong Kong-based company this week.
FEC has property interests in seven countries across the world, with a lot of investment tied up in hotels and car parks.
Although it now has around 25 staff in a regional office in Manchester, David Chiu, son of the firm's original founder Deacon, remains 'the driving force' behind the organisation, Mr Taylor said.
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Mr Chiu he first visited Manchester six years ago to look at potential investment.
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"He is incredibly passionate about the region," said Mr Taylor.
"He likes to personally meet people, get a feel for it, walk the streets, eat in the restaurants, and he genuinely had a passion at that time.
"He had a relationship with [former Chief Executive of Manchester city council] Sir Howard Bernstein, he had a relationship with other key individuals in the city, he had individuals within central government advising him 'Manchester is on the up, diversify from London into Manchester' so on the back of that we did a series of investigations and looked for our first site in the region which was Angel Meadows.
"We went from there, developed Meadowside and used that as a springboard into the 'Northern Gateway'."
Meadowside is a set of three multi-storey blocks of flats around the historic park next to the Co-Op headquarters in the NOMA district.
It is a major project worth more than £200m that will deliver more than 750 apartments.
But that figure is dwarfed in comparison to the long-term vision promised by FEC in its joint venture with Manchester Council that is now said to be worth £4billion.
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Over the next two decades, the aim is to build around 15,000 new homes as well as new schools, transport links, healthcare facilities and green space.
The area being looked at is huge, 390 acres in total, starting at the edge of the city centre and stretching nearly two miles to Queens Park, with Cheetham Hill and Strangeways on one side and Miles Platting and Monsall on the other.
Given the scale of the ambition and its new direction, the council and FEC have decided the project needs to be rebranded.
It will now be known as 'Victoria North'.
Within this area there will be seven districts that are set to be rebuilt; Collyhurst Village, South Collyhurst, New Cross, New Town, Red Bank, Vauxhall Gardens and Smedley Dip & Eggington Street.
"Enshrining Victoria within the name was important just to give it that anchor to the city centre," said Mr Fenton.
"That was something we debated with David, the owner, he was concerned that this was too cut adrift and there wasn't that proximity.
"We keep banding numbers around, potentially 15,000 new homes in the next 15 to 20 years, a population of somewhere around 35,000 people, it's effectively a new town, right on the periphery of the city centre.
"And in my working life in Manchester, the city centre has pushed out the inner ring road and pushed beyond it if you look what's happened in Ancoats.
"This is that natural evolution of the city centre's expansion north, through NOMA."
The name change was signed off by the city council's leader Sir Richard Leese who noted 'Northern Gateway' could be confused with other projects of the same title in the country.
"As we celebrate the first planning application for Collyhurst being submitted and with some other early progress expected on other sites soon, it is now timely to consider by what name the programme of regeneration will be known into the future," he said.
"The nomenclature of the Northern Gateway is an often-used terminology that has been adopted during the early development period of several regeneration schemes across the 海角视频 - including in other parts of Greater Manchester.
"Victoria North roots the development over the next 15 to 20 years in Manchester - representing the 155 hectares of regeneration potential from Victoria Station in the city centre into north Manchester and to up to Queens Park.
"We are at the beginning of an incredibly exciting phase of history for this part of Manchester and with some eagerness to see how this potential unfolds."
In one part of the interview with the MEN, Mr Taylor said bosses at the Hong Kong investment company keep the decision-making process as streamlined as possible by carrying out deals worth under £25m "on WhatsApp".
With an annual revenue of 7.5 billion Hong Kong dollars last year, that was perhaps an indicator of how deep FEC's pockets are.
The company, registered in the Cayman Islands, was first listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange by Deacon Chiu in 1972.
Mr Chiu, who died in 2015, was a famous figure in global business circles, having also held the position of chairman of Asia Television Limited in the 1980s.
He was said to have been a scrupulous bean counter - legend has it that employees were rationed to two pieces of toilet paper a day.
Read the full story on the MEN website .