With four mega cruise ships, Dream Cruises will offer worldwide itineraries to become “Asia’s Global Cruise Line” with the youngest fleet in the world

Genting Hong Kong marked the official start of production on Dream Cruises’ new Global Class cruise Ship during a steel cutting ceremony held on 8 March at the MV Werften shipyards in both Wismar and Rostock, Germany.

“After designing the Global Class ships for the last three years and investing over 210 million euros to make MV Werften a state-of-the-art cruise shipbuilding yard, we are very pleased to finally start construction on the first Global Class cruise ship today,” said Tan Sri Lim Kok Thay.

“These ships are not only the largest cruise ships to be built in Germany; they are also the most technologically advanced with artificial intelligence. The Global Class ships mirror the widespread use of technology and artificial intelligence by our Asians guests in their daily lives, with facial and voice recognition for most services onboard, eliminating most queues; contextual marketing to even out demand on ship facilities; automated robots to perform mundane tasks – allowing the hardworking staff to focus on service delivery – along with other artificial intelligent and digital systems. Internet, an essential service for guests to connect on social media, will be free,” he added.

The Global Class ships are designed specifically for the rapidly growing Asian cruise market with popular features such as a Cineplex, theme park, Asian spa, multiple authentic Asian dining experiences, including fast-casual food alternatives, and affordable shopping facilities in addition to luxury retail boutiques.

The Global Class ships will be 342 meters long and 46.40 meters wide with a draft of 9.50 meters. With a capacity of 204,000 gross tons (GT), the ship can accommodate about 5,000 passengers in 2,500 cabins based on a twin share basis. However, the cabins are uniquely designed for the Asian family and can comfortably sleep 2, 3 or 4 persons with split (two) bathrooms, allowing for a wider price point for the Asian market.  With total life-saving capacity of up to 9,500 passengers, the Global Class ships can cater for the extremely high peak seasonal holiday periods in Asia. In addition to the usual 28 large elevators, the Global Class will also have eight sets of escalators connecting the public areas, the first cruise ship to have public escalators.

“Dream Cruises is pleased that the Global Class ships are joining the Dream brand”, says Mr. Kent Zhu, President of Genting Cruise Lines. “While originally planned for the Star Cruises family, the benefits of giving scale to Dream Cruises with four of the youngest ships in the world will bolster the Dream Cruises’ expansion plans and global aspirations. However, we are commencing our design for a new class of ships for Star Cruises which will rejuvenate the Star Cruises brand in the coming years.”

“This is a very proud moment for Dream Cruises,” said Mr. Thatcher Brown, President of Dream Cruise. “Building on the successful debuts of Genting Dream in 2016 and World Dream in 2017, the addition of two Global Class ships to the fleet will allow Dream Cruises to offer our partners and guests more itineraries worldwide. Our plans are to have Shanghai and Tianjin as homeports in summer and then, to offer itineraries in Australia, New Zealand, the ASEAN region, and the West coast of the United States in winter. By 2021, there will be about 8 million Asian tourists to Australia and New Zealand annually and Dream cruises will be able to offer an attractive cruise alternative to a land vacation for these Asian visitors. Expanding the Dream Cruises brand “globally” goes hand-in-hand with an aggressive new-build program that will over double our capacity in by 2021.”

Since its launch, Dream Cruises has garnered important industry accolades including being ranked 6^th in the Top Ten Large Resort ships by the highly-revered Berlitz Cruising and Cruise Guide 2018, “Best Preferred Cruise Brand for Families” by the Global Times, “Most Popular Cruise Brand” at the 10th TVB Weekly Brand Award 2017 and “Best New Ship” for Genting Dream and “Best Cruise Line – Entertainment” in Travel Weekly Asia Reader’s Choice Awards 2017.

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