The New Hard Rock Theme Park Myrtle Beach
....Coming in April 2008
Hard Rock Park is billionaire's next step in U.S.
Israel-based firm has ties to Africa, Russia, New York
By David Wren - The Sun News, Posted on Sun, Jul. 29, 2007
Lev Leviev
The billionaire behind the Hard Rock Park being built in Horry County is a tough - some might say cutthroat - businessman who was born in Russia, emigrated to Israel as a teenager and made a fortune in the diamond mines of war-torn Africa before turning his sights on the United States.
Lev Leviev, who will turn 51 years old Monday, is chairman and majority owner of Israel-based Africa Israel Investments Ltd.
That company is a majority shareholder in Hard Rock Park, the $400 million rock-and-roll-themed park scheduled to open next spring near the former Waccamaw Pottery and Fantasy Harbour sites off U.S. 501.
Rock and roll might seem a far cry from diamond mines, but Hard Rock Park fits perfectly with Leviev's strategy of diversifying into the American tourism and real estate sectors.
Leviev "identifies places with a lot of upscale potential, and he believes Myrtle Beach is one of the places to develop in the near future," Rotem Rosen, chief executive of Africa Israel's U.S. operations, said during the theme park's groundbreaking ceremony a year ago.
Rosen did not return telephone calls to The Sun News, and Leviev, who lives in Israel, did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment.
It is likely Leviev has never been to Myrtle Beach. Steven Goodwin, chief executive of Hard Rock Park, said he has never met the man and said he deals instead with Rosen.
However, Africa Israel's investment here has given the Grand Strand exposure to the world's financial markets in a way the mom-and-pops who built this area decades ago never could.
"It has raised the profile of Myrtle Beach within the international investment community," said Goodwin, who compares this area to Orlando, Fla., just before its Disney-inspired boom.
Before Hard Rock Park and Africa Israel's investment, Goodwin said, Myrtle Beach "was not on the big financial radar screen."
It is now big enough that many pension funds and investment firms have bought the $255 million worth of bonds Hard Rock Park sold last year to help finance construction.
"If you have a 401(k) [retirement plan], you probably have a piece of this park," Goodwin said.
Brad Dean, president of the Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce, said the effect of Hard Rock Park and Africa Israel's investment here will rival what German automobile manufacturer BMW did for the Upstate when it built a $300 million plant there in the 1990s.
"These investors are very selective, not only about the projects they choose but the markets where those projects are located," Dean said. "They obviously see a bright future for the Grand Strand."
Far-reaching connections
Leviev's net worth of $4.1 billion makes him the world's 210th-wealthiest man, according to Forbes magazine.
The company he runs, Africa Israel, is the world's second-largest diamond seller, behind De Beers, with annual sales of $2.5 billion.
According to reports in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, New York magazine and other publications:
Africa Israel in recent years has diversified beyond diamonds, acquiring swimwear maker Gottex, dozens of 7-11 convenience stores in Texas and New Mexico and 1,700 Fina gas stations in the Southwest United States.
Leviev's latest obsession is pricey real estate. Africa Israel has purchased more than $1 billion worth of high-profile buildings in Manhattan this year and is building a casino hotel and shopping mall in Las Vegas.
Leviev is a devout Jew who donates at least $30 million a year to the Chabad movement and has founded more than 62 Jewish schools and summer camps worldwide.
He is the father of nine children and his wife, Olga, operates a matchmaking service for Bukharian Jews called Lev Ehad, or One Heart.
Leviev has sold condominiums to actresses Gwyneth Paltrow and Meryl Streep, and he counts actor Robert DeNiro as a business partner.
The London-based retail store that bears his name offers ultra-upscale jewelry costing $15,000 or more per carat. A second retail store is scheduled to open this fall in New York.
There has been plenty of controversy on Leviev's road to success.
His right-wing political views have drawn criticism from moderate Jews, many of whom are suspicious of Leviev's close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to a report by the National Conference on Soviet Jewry.
He has been criticized by Middle East newspapers for building a 5,800-unit apartment complex in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and Leviev is believed to have helped Russian leaders sell off their diamond stockpile after the fall of communism - a charge by Forbes magazine that Leviev denies.
More recently, lawyers in Israel have filed petitions trying to block Leviev from building and operating that country's first private prison. Leviev's opponents say the power to jail, punish and rehabilitate prisoners should not be left up to business tycoons.
Most controversial, however, has been Africa Israel's presence in Angola.
Africa Israel has held the exclusive marketing rights since 2001 for Angolan diamonds, and the company has been accused by human rights groups and a BBC report of helping to finance rebels waging a civil war in that country with profits from so-called "blood diamonds." Leviev has denied the accusations, telling interviewers his diamonds are "conflict free."
This year, a security company contracted by Leviev was accused of human rights violations in Angola, including torture, sexual abuse and assassinations, according to a report in New York magazine.
Leviev's formal response to the report did not directly address the abuses, the magazine stated, but touted his charitable work in Angola.
"Basically, he does good work," Joel Golovensky, the former director of the Israel office of the Jewish Anti-Defamation League, said of Leviev in a 2002 interview.
"But a lot of people are impacted by his power - sometimes in ways they don't like," Golovensky said.
Entrance to U.S. markets
Leviev was relatively unknown in the United States until this spring, when he paid $525 million for the New York Times Co.'s headquarters building in Manhattan.
The Wall Street Journal and other New York media jumped on the Leviev story after that purchase, with more than a dozen articles detailing the billionaire's storied past and Africa Israel's real estate binge.
Leviev made another high-profile purchase this year when his company acquired New York's Apthorp apartment building for $430 million.
The Apthorp is a favorite among television and film celebrities, who spend as much as $25,000 per month to rent a single unit, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Africa Israel also recently spent $200 million for the Clock Tower building on Madison Avenue.
Those three purchases capped a spending spree that started when Leviev bought the JPMorgan building and several other Manhattan landmarks in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
"Mr. Leviev had in his mind the idea that we, the Israeli people, have to help the U.S. in the days of crisis the same way the U.S. supports Israel," Rosen told New York magazine this year.
That help, Rosen told the publication, includes "buying these huge gigantic buildings very, very cheap."
New York real estate deals also brought Africa Israel to Myrtle Beach. Goodwin said Hard Rock Park initially had a small group of New York-based investors, including Amnon Bar-Tur, who is managing member of SafeHarbor Holdings LLC, and real estate developer Ziel Feldman.
Feldman also is controlling shareholder of Polar Investments Ltd., one of Israel's largest publicly traded investment and holding companies.
"Polar and Africa Israel had talked about working together on a project for some time," Goodwin said.
Hard Rock Park became that project, and the two companies announced their investment in the theme park in December 2005.
"Ziel brought them [Africa Israel] in," Goodwin said.
Feldman said during the park's groundbreaking ceremony last year that the Hard Rock brand and this area's 14 million annual visitors "seemed to us a winning combination."
Birth of a mogul
Leviev got his start in the diamond business at age 16 as a diamond polisher in Israel, according to a profile of the billionaire by Professional Jeweler magazine.
He later worked for De Beers and was named that company's exporter of the year for Israel in 1986. Even so, Leviev was not happy working for the De Beers syndicate, according to a 2003 article in Forbes magazine.
"Those who have watched [Leviev's] rise over the last three decades say it was his intense hatred of De Beers that fueled him," Forbes reported. "He bristled under the syndicate's high-handed treatment of buyers, who were given boxes of rough diamonds at take-it-or-leave-it prices and risked being permanently cut off if they balked."
Leviev's turning point came in 1992, according to Professional Jeweler, when he stood in line with other Jews waiting to ask Russian Rabbi Lubavitsch for advice.
"Leviev overheard a man in front of him ask for a blessing to return to Russia and start a business," the magazine states. "The timing seemed right; Russia was quickly shedding its mantle of communism in favor of capitalism. Leviev's heart sank when he heard the rabbi counsel the man not to go."
Undaunted, Leviev decided to ask the rabbi for the same blessing and was surprised to hear different advice.
"Go," the rabbi said, according to Professional Jeweler. "The opportunities for you are great; the horizon for business is limitless."
By 1996, Leviev had bought controlling interest in Africa Israel and soon was challenging De Beers on its home turfs of Russia and Africa.
Leviev told Forbes magazine he has never been intimidated by competitors, regardless of their size and power. "I'm not going to let anyone else tell me how to run my business," he told the magazine in 2003.
"I grew up in the Soviet Union," Leviev said. "I knew what it was to be afraid. I can remember being beaten regularly by the bullies at school, and I said to myself I would never be afraid of anybody or anything again."
That kind of chutzpah bodes well for the Grand Strand, business leaders say.
"Investment money tends to follow other successful investment money, and I think you'll see more foreign and domestic investments in Myrtle Beach if the Hard Rock Park is successful," said Jim Pattison, chairman of The Pattison Group, an Orlando, Fla., company that owns Ripley's attractions worldwide, including in Myrtle Beach.
Pattison said companies that invest in prestige properties, such as Africa Israel's purchase of The New York Times Co. building, boost the profile of the places where they spend money. "Other investors take notice of those kinds of things," he said.
For Dean, the chamber of commerce president, Africa Israel's presence here is an indisputable sign that Myrtle Beach has arrived on the national tourism map.
"This project and the money that backs it could have gone to any major market, including Las Vegas and Orlando," Dean said. "The fact that they're here speaks volumes about their confidence in this market's strength and potential."
About Hard Rock Park
The $400 million, rock-and-roll-themed park is under construction on 140 acres west of U.S. 501 between the Intracoastal Waterway and George Bishop Parkway. The park will feature six music-themed zones: All Access Entry Plaza; Rock & Roll Heaven; British Invasion; Lost in the '70s; Born in the USA; and Cool Country.
It also will feature a Jamaican-themed water play area, a 10,000-seat amphitheater, a hotel, restaurants and a live comedy show featuring acrobatics and pyrotechnics.
Led Zeppelin: The Ride, one of the park's signature roller coasters, is under construction on property along George Bishop Parkway. The coaster will reach a top height of 155 feet and will spiral over a lagoon.
Hard Rock Park will be the first major theme park to be built in the United States in the past decade. When it opens in May, the theme park is expected to draw 30,000 visitors a day during the summer and employ 2,500 people.
By David Wren - The Sun News
Hard Rock Park - Myrtle Beach SC© Copyright 2006 Seaton Womble Real Estate | Designed by Real Estate Webmasters
