Genting Hong Kong is planning on building a series of Endeavor-class and Universal-class ships customized for luxury hotel brands, to be managed by Crystal Cruises.
On the occasion of the christening of its first luxury expedition ship, the Crystal Endeavor, Colin Au, Genting Hong Kong Group president and deputy CEO, said that starting in 2023, the same shipyard will be building Endeavor-class ships - customized for luxury hotel brands such as Waldorf Astoria.
“We will be operating these ships by using Crystal Cruises as the management [company] in order to achieve economies of scale in ship and shore operations,” Au said.
In 2019, Genting HK announced plans for a new mid-sized series of ships, the Universal class, which it said would be operated by hotel brands, but provided no details beyond size or a planned 2022 delivery. Au has said that these 2,000-passenger, 90,000 GT new builds would also be managed by Crystal. The first ship is now planned for 2025.
Crystal says they will be branded mainly by global hotel companies with instant name recognition, direct distribution, and huge loyalty programs, with the largest hotel companies each having more than 100m loyalty members, including those such as Marriott, Accor, Hyatt and Hilton, to fill the ships
This comes as Marriott International Inc. also plans to launch its luxury hotel-branded Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection with its first cruise ship, Evrima, next month. in JUL 2021.
