Soaring costs, delays and a will-they-won’t-they relationship with Hollywood’s Paramount Pictures caused many to view the beleaguered, multi-billion pound London Resort entertainment park as something of a Mission: Impossible.
But with charismatic entrepreneur, former ice hockey player and self-styled “little fat Frenchman” PY Gerbeau livening up the boardroom of London Resort Company Holdings as its newly appointed chief executive, the script could finally be coming together for a happy Hollywood ending.
Despite its designation as a nationally significant infrastructure project by the government in 2014, the London Resort has been largely stuck in limbo since it was first announced in 2012.
By 2019 – its initial completion date – the 535-acre site was meant to house a water park, rides, an open-air arena, hotels, dining and events spaces themed around films and TV shows.
Estimated costs for the scheme, located at Swanscombe Peninsula in Kent, spiralled from £3.5bn to £5bn, although Gerbeau says these have since been brought back down to £3bn.
Having exited the project, Paramount is back on board as a partner, alongside the BBC and ITV. But the future of the scheme remains unclear. So it is back to the drawing board, with Gerbeau taking the lead.
“When I arrived, we had to reset,” Gerbeau says. “Within a few weeks we will hopefully say, ‘OK, we know where we are now – let’s go’.”
Predicting the future of leisure
Gerbeau’s track record stands him in good stead for what could be his toughest challenge to date. He gained widespread credit for helping turn around the fortunes of Disneyland Paris in the 1990s. He salvaged the Millennium Dome’s tattered reputation before its closure in 2000, and built investment vehicle X-Leisure’s £600m portfolio, including West India Quay in London’s Docklands.
Predicting how consumer demand in the leisure sector will shift in the run-up to the resort’s 2024 launch date – and beyond – will be crucial in determining the London Resort’s offer.
“The late 1980s was all about ‘Surprise me – I am paying at the entrance for a show, I just want to be impressed’,” says Gerbeau. “It was a passive experience, if positive. Then, this moved to being a part of the action, by interfacing with actors.
“The next stage for us is: ‘I want to be part of it [as] an actor’. This is Westworld [a novel and TV show in which theme park guests interact with androids]: who do you want to be this week?”
Gerbeau is tight-lipped on precisely what the resort’s interactive attractions could entail but he says they will “push the boundaries” on how an entertainment destination is perceived.
To give a flavour of what events at the London Resort could involve, Paramount’s blockbuster franchises include Star Trek, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and, of course, Mission: Impossible.
Providing new ways of interacting with technology will be a fundamental aspect. “What is relevant today might not be in four years’ time,” says Gerbeau. “But take virtual reality, where you have Lewis Hamilton live on track in his Mercedes Formula One [car], and 15 guys in a simulator, racing with him. It only takes a few cameras, and you put it online. It’s a simple concept that is taking over.”
Space for e-sports will also likely form a core part of the London Resort offer. Gerbeau argues that the niche, competitive videogaming market is far from a fad. “The market is maturing now, and the amount of money being thrown at it is ridiculous,” he says.
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Gerbeau should know. As an avid gamer, who singles out EA Sports’ hockey games, League of Legends, Lords Mobile and racing game Asphalt 9 among his favourites, Gerbeau planned to move into the e-sports industry before he was approached to head up the London Resort.
“The customers of tomorrow will want e-sports, e-gaming, Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Google,” he says. Gerbeau also plans to discuss partnerships with such brands on testing new technology with the resort’s 50,000 potential daily visitors. “It is not about product placement or marketing, but about creating and testing that content which would be the USP.”
Lessons from Merlin
London Resort Company Holdings aims to submit planning documents for the attraction during the first half of 2020, flanked by advisers including Savills; engineering consultancy BuroHappold; WSP, advising on traffic impact; Chris Blandford Associates on environmental planning; and law firm BDB Pitmans. A launch date of April 2024 is being targeted.
The Kuwaiti European Holding Company Group – the investment vehicle of Kuwait’s Al-Humaidi family, which has backed the resort since 2013 – will continue to fund the project until the planning stages.
After planning documents are submitted, the company aims to secure debt finance, as well as around £600m in an equity raising. Discussions on this are already under way.
A listing might offer a route for quick access to funding, but for now, this is not on the cards.
Gerbeau points to the struggles of Merlin Entertainments, which operates the Alton Towers theme park, which floated on the London Stock Exchange in 2013 and was taken private this June.
“Every single entertainment, leisure or theme park company has had difficulties because they have trophy assets,” says Gerbeau. “People get very enthused, and then you sell [at] a share price that cannot be sustainable.
“Merlin is a sound business but at the end of the day, the hype was so big that it was never going to be a £7- or £8-per-share company.”
The disclosure requirements that come with life as a publicly traded company would also add to the burden. “We [would] need to stand up every quarter to tell [investors] exactly what and how we are doing,” Gerbeau says. “You are basically undressing, completely, to your competition every quarter. Not useful.”
‘More than just a theme park’
Although the resort is regularly referred to as the UK’s potential answer to Disneyland, Gerbeau seems keen to avoid the comparison.
“There is no point trying to redo what Disney has done very well, which is a theme park,” he says. “Disneyland [Paris] is coming out with the most phenomenal attraction [with a new section based] on Star Wars. It is going to be to die for, honestly. We can’t compete with that. That land is going to cost [millions]; we are a private company trying to deliver a return to shareholders.”
Rather, the London Resort will have a “much wider offer” than a traditional theme park, he says. It will vie against shopping centre giants such as Westfield in luring families on the premise of an afternoon out, as well as longer-stay visitors.
“If a family is going to Westfield for the afternoon for shopping and a movie, it is our competition, because they have spent a Saturday afternoon doing that when they could be [visiting the resort],” he says.
While the park is likely to include three or four roller-coasters, it will largely be anchored by shows and events that will change regularly to create a “rarity factor”.
Frequently renewing the offer in this way is also more cost efficient – changing a roller-coaster would cost around $27m-$30m (£22m-£24.5m), Gerbeau says, but hiring a show director, revising sets and employing and retraining a cast can be achieved for “around $4m”.
Going for gold
Ultimately, the ambition for Gerbeau as he settles into the chief executive chair is to capture the camaraderie and inclusiveness of the London 2012 Olympic Games. “Humbly – and I don’t do humble, I’m French – we would like to have the same quality and impact on morale as the London Olympics had, because they were the best in the business,” Gerbeau says.
He cites the emotions he experienced while witnessing historic sporting moments, such as Usain Bolt running the 100m final from the eighth row of the Olympic Stadium in 2012.
“These are defining moments,” he says. “What we’re trying to do is to create a little bit of that excitement and uniqueness, and say that if you’re don’t see this show, it’s never going to happen again.”
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