Late last month, a report surfaced in the Japan Times that Nagasaki’s Dutch-themed amusement park, Huis Ten Bosch, may be sold, despite previous plans to build an integrated resort (IR) at the site. Travel agency H.I.S. owns about 67 percent of the park, with the remainder held by Kyushu Electric Power Co. and Kyushu Railway, among other entities.
GGRAsia and other local media identified the suitor as PAG, a Hong Kong-based private asset management firm. PAG refused to comment on the speculation, but was previously an investor in Universal Studios Japan, a theme park in Osaka.
The largest theme park in Japan peaked in 1996 with 3.8 million visitors, then hit a decline and was forced to declare bankruptcy in 2003. In April 2010, H.I.S acquired its ownership stake and made the resort profitable again. In 2019, the operator of Huis Ten Bosch and the governments of Nagasaki and Sasebo City designated 77 acres of the land for one of Japan’s first integrated resorts (IRs). Nagasaki and its operating partner, Casinos Austria International Japan, submitted their bid for an IR license to the central government in April. Osaka is the other bidder, working with MGM Resorts International and Orix Corp.
A sale may not disrupt IR plans; according to GGRAsia, the parcel earmarked for a casino resort may be accessed by public roads independent of the theme park.
