Busch Entertainment likely to sell to Blackstone for $3 billion

ridemcoaster said:
Lets be specific. Track is standing.. Trains...Not so much..

True, but the trains would be the eaiser part to replace once removed and torn apart. The ride still stands.

My personaly thoughts are (and I had this *hope* during the entire time Drachen Fire stood) as long as it's still standing, there is still a chance it could run again. Will it? more than likely not, but it has a chance even if ever so slight. "glass half full" outlook here...

Glass half-unrealistic, more like. ;)

::giggles::

Jeff said:
I think there may be a twist to all of this that people aren't expecting.

and yet, this quote didnt' get any response?

I think you're correct Jeff.

Is this where, in a three party deal, Comcast gets GE/Universal, with the caveat that they sell their interest in the parks to Blackstone/Merlin. That immediately helps Comcast shed "non-core assets" (a la InBev), and gives B/M control of every other outlet in Orlando?

Thus at the end of the day, Merlin gets 100% of Universal, combined with Sea World AND Aquatica? Thus the impending loss of Wet & Wild becomes no big deal?

That's of course a very big twist, and pure hyperbole. But surely someone has pieced together that strategy. Is it feasible/possible/probable? who knows, I'm just throwing it out there.

Danny Biggerstaff CoAsTeRDaN said:
The ride still stands.

If by standing you mean erect with holes in it, OK.

Not the twist I was going for, actually, but to inject that there may be a third party involved is what I hear, yes.

Jeff said:

Danny Biggerstaff CoAsTeRDaN said:
The ride still stands.

If by standing you mean erect with holes in it, OK.

Not the twist I was going for, actually, but to inject that there may be a third party involved is what I hear, yes.

I didn't see Kevin38's similar guess/comment in the Comcast thread, so he thought of it before I did.

Thus interesting to think about who that might be, and what their angle is. The potential group of players is quite small, many with enough baggage to make them seem unlikely. Hard to see a viable combination of other entities with parts of the Busch parks carved out, so unless it's a pure investment arrangement, (i.e no sale of some parks to other players) nothing jumps out as a clear win (in my admittedly uninformed mind).

A business plan sewing up all of the Non-Disney parks in the Orlando/Tampa market makes some sense, but then you get excess baggage in the deal (Tampa itself, and San Antonio for example).

Even the Orlando thing is somewhat imperfect due to the lack of a cohesive resort area between the two groups (Busch/Universal). Again, nothing we haven't all discussed before, but certainly interesting to ponder