Village in $40m deal
Spanish concern buys Sydney water park
VILLAGE Roadshow has sold one of its Wet’n’Wild water parks to Spanish leisure park operator Parques Reunidos for an upfront purchase price of $40 million.
Village will use the proceeds to cut its debt, it said yesterday.
The theme park and cinema operator said it was selling the Wet’n’Wild park in Western Sydney to focus on its key assets on the Gold Coast.
These include Warner Bros. Movie World, Sea World and a Wet’n’Wild park.
“It will free up cash to reinvest and just focus our efforts here on the Gold Coast and for our Top Golf expansion,” Village Roadshow theme parks boss Clark Kirby told Business Daily.
“We really found the difficulties of managing remotely the Sydney park too much for our team,” he said.
“We can get better value out of focusing on our Gold Coast assets.”
Australian theme parks have suffered lower patronage since a fatal accident claimed four lives at the Dreamworld theme park on the Gold Coast in October, 2016.
Dreamworld is owned by Village rival Ardent Leisure.
Ardent overhauled Dreamworld’s management team at the weekend (see below right).
Parques Reunidos’s acquisition of Wet’n’Wild Sydney is the group’s first foray into Australia.
The purchase adds to the Spanish group’s stable of 60 theme parks, water parks, zoos and indoor entertainment Village Roadshow theme parks boss Clark Kirby on the sale of one of its Wet’n’Wild water parks centres across Europe, the US, Argentina, Dubai and Vietnam.
“This investment provides Parques Reunidos an entry into the Australian market and with its extensive experience of operating 20 water parks around the world, Parques will be able to add value and enhance Wet‘n’Wild Sydney’s performance over the coming years,” Village said in a statement lodged with the local bourse yesterday.
In addition to the $40 million sale price, Village will receive payment that will depend on the park’s revenue performance up to the middle of 2020.
The sale will result in a pretax loss of about $25 million for the 2018 financial year, it said.
The loss will be recorded as an exceptional item in its upcoming full-year results.