Genting Group Chairman and CEO Lim Kok Thay has dipped his toe back into Genting Hong Kong’s cruise ship waters to acquire certain trademarks and intellectual property rights from a subsidiary of Star Cruises Asia.
Genting Hong Kong, the former giant cruise ship currently under the control of liquidators after failing to meet debt covenants earlier this year, announced overnight that its Star Cruises Asia arm had reached an agreement to sell its wholly-owned subsidiary Star Market to Resorts World for US$3.5 million.
Resorts World is 50% owned by Lim and 50% by Genting Berhad – the ultimate parent company of the Genting Group and of which Lim also holds better than 30% deemed interest.
The sale of Star Market, which jointly owns trademarks and intellectual property rights alongside an affiliate of Resorts World, is driven by “a commercial objective to consolidate the ownership of such trademarks and intellectual property rights and to realize an asset of the Group for the benefit of its creditors,” Genting Hong Kong said.
“At the same time, it generates a considerable recovery to the Group without compromising the Group’s right to use such trademark and intellectual property rights in accordance with the terms of the License Agreement.”
Genting Hong Kong’s liquidators have previously outlined their intention to sell off the company’ assets in order to settle debts, including its 50% stake in Philippines IR, Resorts World Manila.
Banking syndicates have also taken enforcement action in relation to some of the company’s former cruise ship assets – a handful of which have already been arrested and sold by third parties.
Genting HK, with debts totaling around US$2.8 billion, first announced the appointment of liquidators in January after defaulting on loans when it was unable to drawdown a US$88 million backstop facility from the State of Mecklenburg Vorpommern for the continued operation of its Germany shipbuilding subsidiary, MV Werften Holdings Ltd (MVWH).
