Merlin Entertainments Group, owners of the Legoland parks, Madame Tussaud’s wax museums and the London Eye has purchased Cypress Gardens.
A spokeswoman for Merlin said Friday the purchase includes the current Cypress Gardens theme park, the Splash Island water park and the adjacent botanical gardens.
The sale closed Jan. 7. The price was not immediately disclosed.
Details are expected to be unveiled at press conference Merlin has scheduled for Thursday.
The acquisition expands the presence of The Blackstone Group in Central Florida’s theme-park industry. Blackstone, which last fall purchased SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment for roughly $2.5 billion and co-owns Universal Orlando with General Electric Co., holds a majority stake in Merlin.
For more information visit Orlando Sentinel.
Tags: Blackstone Group, cypress gardens, madame tussard, Merlin Entertainment
We'll wait and see how and if Starliner and Triple Hurricane fits into their plans. I lack any Legoland parks and Starliner.
Well, thanks to Land South not fixing Starliner properly when they had any issues, it gained a reputation as a maintinance queen. If Merlin was smart, they wouldn't make any decisions on Starliner right away, hire an expert to inspect it and tell them what needs work, and NOT skimp by on the cheapest repairs possible to fix it. Then give it a season or two to determine if its service record is caused by the coaster, or bad maintenance. From what I've heard, Starliner's fate is still uncertain.
It certainly wasn't a maintenance queen back at MSAP. It had a reputation for being quite reliable the 40+ years it operated there.