Palamon Capital Partners has sold Movie Park in Germany, the one remaining asset in its Star Park group, to the Spanish operator Parques Reunidos. The purchase price is undisclosed.
Located near the town of Bottrop, about an hour from Düsseldorf, Movie Park is Germany’s third largest theme park. Palamon acquired the property from Six Flags in 2004 when it acquired the American operator’s European portfolio of attractions and formed Star Parks. Most of the other parks, including several Walibi-branded properties, have since been sold to Compagnie des Alpes.
At Movie Park, Star Parks’ management team embarked on an aggressive plan to make the park more family focused, introducing the Nick Land branded children’s area among other investments. The result was a 40% increase in attendance, and an almost 50% leap in revenue. The sale of the park delivers an overall return on Palamon’s investment in Star Parks to 2.3x.
“It has been an exciting time working in partnership with Palamon to implement a family-oriented theme park strategy and very rewarding to see Movie Park Germany come into its own,” comments Star Parks CEO, Bill Muirhead.
Once known as Warner Bros Movie World, Movie Park is now part of the same group as Parque Warner Madrid.
