Thursday 28 Mar 2024
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BY the look of things, locals and tourists alike will be spoilt for choice of amusement and theme parks to visit as Malaysia takes its place along side amusement capitals Orlando, Florida, and the Gold Coast.

Projections have it that by 2020, Malaysia will be home to 50 such parks.

The Edge Malaysia weekly took a snapshot of this burgeoning component of the leisure industry —the players, the plans, and the prospects - in its latest issue out Saturday.

For over two decades the sector has been the domain of the Sunway Group with its Sunway Lagoon theme park and the Genting group with its integrated leisure and entertainment complex perched in the Genting peaks.

They have now been joined by Khazanah Nasional Bhd’s Themed Attractions and Resorts Sdn Bhd (TAR) with its Legoland, opened for operation in late 2012 in Johore,  and I-Bhd with its Leisure Park@i-City theme park that boasts four attractions — City of Digital Lights, Snowalk, WaterWorld and FunWorld.

Then, there is Sentoria Group Bhd’s increasingly popular Bukit Gambang Resort City in Pahang.

Reportedly, Malaysian Resources Corp Bhd was said to be keen to include an indoor theme park at the Kwasa Land development in Sungai Buloh, just outside Kuala Lumpur.

Not long before that, Singapore’s Oxley Holdings Ltd had told The Edge it planned to introduce a theme park in the vicinity of the iconic Kuala Lumpur City Centre.

The surge in investors’ interest is believed to be driven by the industry’s multi-billion ringgit potential.

A tabulation of 10 popular theme park operators in Malaysia puts the revenue of the players at close to RM800 million in 2013 (see chart).

According to Darren McLean, Sanderson Group International Pty Ltd’s executive director, Malaysia has the potential to develop a cluster of world-class amusement parks.

He sees this happening as more international brand theme parks and licensed intellectual properties (IPs) make their way to Malaysia such as DreamWorks Animation, 20th Century Fox World and Merlin Entertainment Group’s Legoland.

Sanderson is an Australian-based themed-attraction specialist which has been in the theme park business for the past 25 years.

“In the next three to four years, we will have another two to three major theme parks in Malaysia,” he says of the upcoming offerings, which includes Sanderson’s Malaysian joint venture with Perak Corp Bhd, which has tied up with DreamWorks for the  theme park in Ipoh.

Mark Germyn, Legoland Malaysia Resort’s general manager, believes Southeast Asia holds a lot of potential to become a major destination for theme parks and other amusement parks.

He thinks Malaysia can take the surge in the number of theme parks provided they are quality experiences.

“Each must be tailored appropriately for its respective markets and meet the expectations of the guests.

“There is great connectivity and efforts being invested and from Merlin’s perspective, this area is developing to position itself as Orlando of the East,” he said.

Tunku Ahmad Burhanuddin, managing director and CEO of Khazanah’s TAR, says he takes a long term view of developments shaping the tourism landscape.

“… we will refine and enhance by monitoring market trends, market growth and customer feedback,” he said.

He points to the growing middle class in Asia  with an increasing inclination to travel abroad and sees Malaysia well positioned to leverage on it.

Still, the theme park business is no child’s play.

Besides being seasonal, it is capital intensive and requires regular rejuvenation and upgrading to continuously lure traffic.

Stanley Toh, property valuer and consultant at Laurelcap Sdn Bhd says to be truly successful, theme parks should be part of an integrated development, incorporate foreign IPs and have deep pockets for reinvestment.

Another industry player tells the Edge that established theme parks, in places such as Orlando in the US, do not rely on ticket sales to make money, but on merchandise and food and beverage sales.

Sunway Bhd’s CEO of shopping malls and theme parks H C Chan who has 21 years experience in the field says return on investment can be from five years to 15 years depending on many factors.

Themed attractions focus on the long-term economic development of Malaysia’s leisure and tourism industry to deliver a multiplier effect across several sectors, such as retail, food and beverage, and hotels.

They also complement the surrounding commercial and residential developments,  TAR’s Tunku Ahmad said.

TAR, in the mean time, has staggered the opening of two planned parks — Ocean Splash Water Park and Ocean Quest Marine Park — to within the next four years from its initial target of this year.

“A heightened demand for construction expertise in Johor has in some ways contributed to the escalation in the development work costs. As a result, we needed to relook and review certain components in the effort to maintain the project intent, design and quality while evaluating the most cost-effective method of delivery.

“We also wanted to review our need to increase capacity and align our value engineering to meet with the market trends, our customers’ expectations and demands.

“This will allow us to look at Desaru as an overall destination and strengthen our competitive edge to fulfil our project intent,” he said.

The weekly also carries a special report on why Malaysians should be worried about 1MDB’s debts. The publication is available at newstands and on subscription at http://www.theedgemarkets.com/my

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P/S: The Edge is also available on Apple's AppStore and Androids' Google Play.

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