It will expand its cruise line with more ships and a new home port in Singapore
MADRID, 20 Sep. (EUROPA PRESS) -
The leisure and entertainment giant The Walt Disney Company has announced that it will double the investment in its theme park activity in a period of approximately ten years, reaching 60,000 million dollars (56,172 million euros).
Through this investment, Disney wants to expand and improve its parks in the United States and abroad, visited each year by about 100 million people, as well as the capacity of its cruise lines.
The CEO of the American company, Bob Iger, and the president of Disney Parks, Experiences and Products, Josh D'Amaro, have met with Wall Street analysts and investors to explain the group's plans in relation to its entertainment business. theme parks.
"We are very aware of the financial fundamentals of the company, the need to continue growing in terms of results, the need to invest wisely to increase the return on invested capital and the need to maintain a balance sheet," said Bob Iger in a company post.
Disney's CEO has assured that the company is capable of absorbing these costs and continuing to increase results, as well as expanding the way it returns value and capital to its shareholders.
Disney has stressed that it will explore more characters and franchises, including some that it believes have not been widely exploited to date.
"We have a wealth of untapped stories to bring to life across our business," D'Amaro said. "Frozen, one of the most successful and popular animated franchises of all time, could have a presence at Disneyland Resort. Wakanda has not yet come to life. The world of Coco is waiting to be explored. There are many opportunities for storytelling," he said. added.
Currently, Disney has 12 parks spread across six locations around the world. Its most recent resort, Shanghai Disney Resort, opened in 2016. Its cruise line, Disney Cruise Line, visits 94 ports in 40 countries.
Disney's parks business is a key driver for the company. International parks, particularly those in Asia (Shanghai Disney Resort and Hong Kong Disneyland), have shown significant growth after the pandemic and "have even more growth opportunities with the expansions planned for the end of this year," the company has stressed. .
Disney has also stated that it has significant margin to continue "expanding by land and sea." In fact, the Disney parks have more than 1,000 acres of land (just over 404 hectares) for possible future development to expand the theme park space at their existing sites, the equivalent of about seven new Disneyland Parks.
As for its cruise line, Disney plans to double its capacity in the next two years, adding two ships in 2025 and another in 2026 and a new home port in Singapore starting in 2025 to expand its reach in the Asia region. -Peaceful.
Although Disney parks receive approximately 100 million visitors a year, internal company studies suggest that there is a potential market of more than 700 million people who, although they feel a great affinity for the brand, have not yet visited its parks.
"Throughout our history, we have generated tremendous growth by investing the right amount of capital in the right projects at the right time," Iger said. "We are planning to drive our growth once again with strong strategic investment in this business," she concluded.
