History
The theme park division of Village Roadshow was originally a joint venture between Time Warner and Village Roadshow until Village took full ownership of the group in 2006. Time Warner continues to provide a licence to the Warner Bros. brand.
The group also owns the Sea World Resort, located next to the Sea World theme park. Previously known as Sea World Nara Resort (opened in 1988 as a joint venture between the then-owners of Sea World and the Japan-based Nara Group, Village also moved to take full ownership of the resort in 2006, resulting in the name change.
In April 2008, Village Roadshow Theme Parks proposed African Safari World, an amusement park and zoo to replace the Werribee Open Range Zoo, 32 kilometres (20 mi) southwest of Melbourne, Australia. This was followed by the proposal to acquire and redevelop Aussie World into Wet'n'Wild Aussie World. In June 2008, the proposal for African Safari World was rejected by the Victorian Government for a variety of reasons. In September 2009, the plans for Wet'n'Wild Aussie World were cancelled.
In late 2008, Sydney Attractions Group was purchased by Village Roadshow after months of discussions. This included the acquisition of Sydney Aquarium, Sydney Tower and Sydney Wildlife World.
In 2009, the company expanded by purchasing Oceanworld Manly in Australia and Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World in New Zealand. The company also purchased two water parks in the United States. Hawaiian Waters was renamed to Wet'n'Wild Hawaii and WaterWorld Safari was renamed to Wet'n'Wild Phoenix.
In September 2010, Village Roadshow announced that they would be expanding the Wet'n'Wild chain by opening a water park in Sydney.
In December 2010, they announced that they would sell approximately $115 million worth of assets to Merlin Entertainments. On 3 March 2011, the deal was finalised with Sydney Aquarium, Sydney Wildlife World, Oceanworld Manly, Sydney Tower, Hamilton Island Wildlife Park and Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World all being sold off.
On 4 October 2012, it was announced that Village Roadshow Theme Parks would be opening Wet'n'Wild Las Vegas in May 2013.
On 17 October 2012, it was announced that the company had struck a deal with Guangzhou R&F Properties to assist in the design, construction and operation of two parks in China. The two parks would be based on the Sea World and Wet'n'Wild parks on the Gold Coast and would be named Hainan R&F Ocean Paradise and Hainan Wet'n'Wild.
Read more about this topic: Village Roadshow Theme Parks
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