Vekoma files for bankruptcy protection (updated)

For those who don't not know about business, read this. 

If you own a small park,let say only get attendance in the 500,000 or less each yr.  And you wanted to increase your attendence by 3%.  I don't think it would be wise to invest in a $12mill coaster,  it may be risky but i would'nt suggest it.  Vekoma provides a wide area of coaster's for you budgeted needs.  From a thrilling family ride to the loops,shouts,twist of a boomer,SLC, others. 

Vekoma provides great thrilling rides for tight spaces, which parks are starting to get.

Fun for all family now what coaster company can provide that, not B&M, so now show some respect for Vekoma they do there best on providing new attractions, not every ride is prefect after all "It's mechanics".
But i am more of a B&M fan myself, but i know what is needed at parks....small or big. Vekoma provides it
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"Fly like the American Eagle" *** This post was edited by Apollo15 on 8/23/2001. ***

yep yep yep...thats all I can say! I agree Apollo!
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"Past this point of no return your only choice is freeze or burn." -Merlin

What is the mentality of the people that are happy of the possiblilty of Vekoma going under? If they do, that just means less coasters for you.

What does this mean for the Verkoma's allready planned for next year like the Odyssey?
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Montu, God Of Coasters

Of course I never like to see a company go bankrupt.  But come on people, it's Vekoma the #3 most hated coaster company (behind Togo and Premier).  I have personal beef with Vekoma, not only with the Deja Vu delays, but also that I flew 3,000 miles away from home and Batwing was tripping so I didn't get to ride it.  Let's not forget the countless number of painful rides on Boomerang at Knott's.  They'll come back though. 

To paraphrase Ian in JP : The lack of humility astounds me.

I find it very disturbing that anybody would actually be looking forward for any company that has provided so much to the amusemnt industry going out of business.

As the business majors in the group have already said they probably won't go out of business, but they will have to develop a new business strategy, and will be a little worse for wear. As someone said, the money hurts but the companies image has been tarnished. A tarnished image makes it harder to sell new product and thus gnerate new revenue.

Where I think Vekoma went wrong:

I'm not against new developments and R&D, a company can't sell the exact same thing for very long before they dry out their customer base. Amusement Rides aren't consumable items, once a park has one of a particular model, thats it.

Vekoma realizing this tried to take a succesfull product and use it to break into the 'high' coasters arena. (Deja Vu is only 196' so I can't quite call it getting into the hypercoaster arena). I'm confident this product line was researched and developed in good faith, with solid engineering behind it. What worries me, is that given Vekoma's reputation for selling "pre--boxed" coasters, that they did not set one up in their back lot, fire it up, and thouroughly test and debug it before pouring the first footer at their client's site. I don't blame them for not starting construction until they had a client onboard, but consider, Vekoma sold three units of a product that while extensively tested in the laboratory, had never had a full dry run "real world" test. Vekoma signed 3 contracts and promised them all at the same time. This was their fatal mistake.

It may have been quite expensive to build one in their backlot, but consider they could have recouped the money by offering it, say in 2002 to a non-US market park as a used 'floor' model. This would have given them 'home turf' to fully debug and test it before setting them up at their clients. Instead they started building 3 of them at their clients parks, discovered that there was an "Ooopps" in the design of the ride, and has been playing defense ever since. Playing defense to save their own face and good name, as well as the good name of their clients.

Yes they embarased their clients, a cardinal sin in the world of business. Perhaps the client should not have promoted the new coaster until they knew it was working but thats not how business works. In their eyes they had a contract saying their new product would be ready by a certain date, and had their marketing arm start working on the promotion and advertisement.

Then when the rides didn't open, the client suffered the embarrasement of having to tell the media, their customers and their peers that their new product isn't quite ready. Advertising campaigns have to be suspended or cancelled, perhaps at a loss, guest/public relations have to be dealt with, the media is a strong force that has to be rekoned with. Just recall how the media roasted PKI about Son of Beast's constant closings and delays.

The client took the most obvious course of remedy: nonpayment. This action was predictable and appropriate. Again I am shocked at how many people are pointing fingers at the client for non-payment. If you had bought a big ticket item (and I'lll let you decide what you consider to be a big ticket item), the company came, delivered it, installed it, then when you went to use this product it didn't function at all, or didn't function up to the specifications in the operators manual, would you have paid for the product? If you had would you be complaining to the company, the BBB,, and threatening legal action to get your money back? I thought so.

In short Vekoma invested a lot of time, money and resurces into new proptotype projects, without securing enough contracts for tried and true gravy train projects. (Boomerangs for example) to ensure they would have sufficient revenue to stay solvent in a worst case scenario. R&D is great, R&D can put you lightyears ahead of the nearest competitor, just don't bet the farm on it, use the adage of not risking more than your compnay can safely loose in a worst case scenario and still stay solvent.

Again with IAAPA and other industry trade shows coming up soon, and contracts being signed, I'd say that the damage to their reuptation may be even worse than the damage to their back accounts.

Imagine at IAAPA:

Vekoma Rep: "May I interest you in a rollercoaster?"
Park Rep: "Aren't you the company that had to file bankruptcy because your new rides concepts didn't work right?"
Vekoma Rep: "Uh, Ah, Uhm, There were some minor difficuites with a prototype project, however we have several product lines which are very reliable"
Park Rep: Ah-Ha, Don't call us we'll call you.

I took a little tour of the Vekoma website last night. As of 2000 there were 41 Boomerangs, 53 Rollerskaters (including customs), and 29 SLC's (including customs) in the world, in succesfull operation. I realize some of those arfe at the same park, but still thats 123 coasters that have brought revenue and people to several different parks of all sizes. Add to this Vekomas custom coaster projects, the Haunted Swings, the flat rides (Like Waikiki Wave), Giant Wheels, Carousels. A good number of parks have something that came from Vekoma in it. Enough parks where Vekoma has to be considered a major industry player. Their loss would be devestating to the industry.

Ok this is from Fright-time AKA Cobraroll.....

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Right time to clear something up. No matter what the press says Vekoma WILL still be building coasters. Heres a quote from a good friend of mine who works at Vekoma.

"The article isn't fully correct.  What's happening is Vekoma Holland has over-extended itself in new innovative ride developments for the past two years, in concert with the slow down of this market, resulted in a financial restructuring process.  This process will take about 2 weeks, after which we will be back in business.  We WILL continue to produce roller coasters!  Don't let the media tell you otherwise.

We, at Vekoma Asia, is continuing with its business operations.  At the same time, Vekoma Holland continues to honor existing contractual obligations, quotations, and commitments to projects under discussions.  We look to all your continual supports, and we look forward to serving you "in the very best tradition of Vekoma" (by President, Vekoma International)."

Hope this clears up all the confusion.

As he said, i hope this clears up all the confusing....... :)

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You know... the Dutchmen *do* work. I would think they could sue for payment on those two.

Bubye VEKOMA...

 

NEVER EVER liked the Boomerangs..rode X-Flight and didn't care for that either. 

 

Only decent coaster they built was Disney's Rock and Roller Coaster.

I think Vekoma went on the coaster equivalent of a sugar rush this year.They did and promised too much at once and now are paying for it.

I was very suprised (in a good way) when I found out that Rock 'N Rollercoaster was a Vekoma. It was smooth fast and indoors plus great theming.

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Assistant Webmaster
Kennywood Park Unlimited
www.kpunlimited.com

The  fact  that  Batwing  has only  operated  with  only  one  train  is  a  management  and  staffing  problem  at  SFA  not  with  Vekoma's  design  of  the  ride.That  is  a problem  that  can  be  blamed  on  SFA's poor  operations  and  not  on  Vekoma.

I have a question if Vekomas files for bankruptcy protection what will happen to all Vekoma coasters at the parks will they still be in operation or will they go defunct? I did ride Mind Eraser at Six Flags Worlds Of Adventure they are not fun at all samething as any old corkscrew. Dont forget to ride V2 Vertical Velocity!

Well Batwing Fan, what would you do to solve SFA's staffing problem? It's a little hard to staff a ride when people aren't even showing up for work. You can talk until your blue in the face about how to run the park, but unless you have people, you're powerless.

By the way, I feel everyone is forgetting about the greatest Vekoma ride-The Mad House. Houdini's Great Escape is brilliant.

To many CLONES- Booomerangs, SLC's unnecssary.

Why are you talking to the clones, can they hear you? Clones are great for parks that need a boost without spending too much cash.

Hey everyone, I don't know but I would *hate* to see Vekoma go bankrupt.  I mean, they opened so many doors in the amusement industry that perhaps other companies would dare not to go.  Not only that, but they make more then just coasters.   I personally like the company, and know they have lots of potential.  Clone rides are ideal for smaller parks financially, plus they give what the general public sometimes wants...another coaster to ride at their favorite park. So I personally hope Vekoma is here to stay for a while.    

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You gotta love the signs "HUSS Maschinenfabrik, BREMEN, W. Germany" and "Made By Zamperla"

And some of you call yourselves roller coaster fanatics. When you happen to like one companies rides better than anothers you act as though the company that you don't care for should vanish. If you like something(like roller coasters) you like them all not this one is better than that one. Or at least that is the way I look at it. And I hope that Vekoma builds many more rides in the future.

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"Roller Coaster favorite ride , let me kiss you one last time" Blink 182

Ummm, CoasterBuzz censorship. That's a nice touch.

Regardless, Vekoma isn't as good as B&M or Intamin at this moment in time. The Boomerang was nice in it's day but, really, do we need anymore? I am more interested in S&S looking to expand thier franchise. I love space shots and can't wait to go on Hypersonic.

But ya, ok, went ont Boomerang at LaRonde this week. My neck still hurts. Gimme a B&M anyday.

Amusement park rides a tough biz. Produce or go away.

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You guys can slam Boomerangs all you want, don't forget that the Boomerang design itself is about 22 years old. Vekoma's newer stuff that I have ridden (Stealth & Deja Vu) are HUGE leaps forward for Vekoma. If they are a benchmark for what else is to come, I say bring it on!

I really hope that since SFMM's DV is now up and running Six Flags will pay up. I do not fault Six Flags for nonpayment so far, but now that the ride works, it's time to pay! DV may well be the "sleeper hit" (no pun intended) of 2001. So far almost all reviews are positave. This ain't your daddy's Boomerang, not by a longshot!

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"X" marks the spot in 2001!

Coasterbuzz, where have you gone?  Four days of huge events without a single update?  Say it ain't so! Has anyone heard any rumors of X's opening date?  They had to have said something at Deja Vu's launch!