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EFA Partners Advises WP Ventures to Arrange Growth Capital for Typhoon Texas Houston Waterpark
September 20, 2022
New York, NY (September 20, 2022) – EFA Partners, a financial advisory firm that arranges capital and provides strategic consulting services for entertainment and media companies, today announced that it arranged growth capital for WP Ventures, the owner of Typhoon Texas Houston, a very profitable waterpark located in Katy, Texas, a suburb of Houston. The financing provided funding for new attractions and working capital in addition to refinancing existing debt.
Typhoon Texas Houston opened in 2016. It is situated on 25 acres adjacent to the popular Katy Mills Mall. The park features many attractions including the Typhoon halfpipe family raft ride, the Snake Pit single and double tube slides, the Loan Star Race Track for eight-lane matt racing, Dueling Daltons seven-story free fall drop slides, Tidal Wave Bay with three-foot waves, the Gully Washer four-story children’s play structure, the Lazy-T River that is five football fields long, and other attractions. In addition, there are many private cabanas throughout the venue and several food & beverage areas.
The financing arranged by EFA provided capital for a new water slide attraction and other venue upgrades that are anticipated to be ready for the 2023 season.
“It has been a pleasure working with the WP Ventures team to arrange their growth capital,” said Ralph Willis, Managing Partner and founding principal of EFA Partners. “Typhoon Texas Houston has been an excellent part of the Katy community for the past several years and this new financing will assist them with the continued growth of the waterpark."
EFA’s principals have over 70 years of collective experience in providing financing solutions for leisure, entertainment, and media companies. They have deep relationships with banks, equipment lessors, construction lenders, specialty finance groups, REITs, and private equity groups. The team prides itself on handling its clients’ financing processes from start to finish. For Typhoon Texas Houston, EFA approached a targeted list of prospective financiers, completed comprehensive materials to highlight the attractiveness of the venue and the leisure sector, introduced many financial groups to the WP Venture team, procured several competing proposals, and led the negotiations with all of the financiers.
“It was great working with Ralph Willis and the EFA team as they led our process to arrange financing,” said Terry Hlavinka, a Partner at WP Ventures. “Their many years of experience in the leisure sector, plus their extensive relationships with financiers, allowed them to convey the highlights of our park and garnered interest from several financial groups. That provided for a competitive process to negotiate favorable financing terms to meet our financing needs.”
About EFA Partners
EFA Partners is a boutique financial advisory firm with offices in New York and Atlanta focused on the entertainment, media, and technology sectors. It provides investment banking services focused on arranging growth capital, mergers and acquisitions, and financial consulting. In entertainment, its targeted sectors include theme parks, water parks, family entertainment centers, movie theaters, concert venues, hotels, casinos, observation wheels, sports, and others. In media and technology, EFA focuses on companies in film/television post-production and distribution services, communications services, SaaS, recorded music, music publishing, and others. Since its inception in 2009, EFA has been retained by over 180 clients, have arranged over $1.5 billion of capital and have advised on over $3 billion of additional capital.
