It is official; as of Tuesday, November 18th, Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc. is now Anheuser-Busch InBev, as the company has been purchased by Belgian beer maker InBev for $52 billion dollars. Shareholders of Anheuser-Busch approved the deal on Wednesday, making Anheuser-Busch InBev the world’s largest beer manufacturer and holder of a 49% share of US Beer sales.

Anheuser-Busch (AB) will now be a subsidiary of Anheuser-Busch InBev, retaining its headquarters in St. Louis, which also will become the North American office for the new company. Taking over as President will be Dave Peacock, AB’s vice-president of marketing, while the former president and CEO of AB, August Busch IV, will become a director on the board of AB InBev along with InBev’s current board members.

Based in Leuven, Belgium, InBev produces Stella Artois and Beck, among others. It will now extend its beer portfolio to include American brands Budweiser, Bud Light, Busch, and Michelob, and it will take over AB’s 50% share in Mexico’s leading brewer Grupo Modelo and 27% share in China brewer Tsingtao. InBev has announced that it will not be closing down any American breweries and will be retaining most of AB’s executives.

Though the merger of Anheuser-Busch and InBev is certainly newsworthy enough in itself, theme park fans are most interested in what the merger will mean for Busch Entertainment’s several theme parks. Busch Entertainment Corp., which is a subsidiary of Anheuser-Busch, is one of the largest theme park operators in the US. With the merger becoming official, what will happen to the company and its parks is now ultimately up to InBev, and since the parks are “non-core assets,” it seems likely that InBev will decide to sell them.

Rumors have been swirling that several companies, including the Anheuser family themselves, are preparing to make bids for Busch Entertainment and its parks, which include SeaWorld in Orlando, San Antonio, and San Diego, Aquatica, Discovery Cove, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay and Williamsburg, Sesame Place, Adventure Island, and Water Country USA. Some of the suitors interested in Busch Entertainment include US private equity firm Blackstone, which is a co-owner of Universal Studios and a major shareholder of England-based Merlin Entertainment, and Spain-based Parques Reunidos.

There have also been unconfirmed reports and speculation that Disney will make an offer, as the company is supposedly very interested in the SeaWorld parks. Disney, who has never bought a separate theme park before, has not confirmed any plans to purchase Busch Entertainment, and some suggest that this rumor is being spread by InBev to heighten interest and start a bidding war. Analysts predict that a Disney purchase is unlikely, as Disney does not typically try to grow by purchasing other companies, and it already owns several parks and properties in Orlando.

Since InBev has made no official announcement of its plans with Busch Entertainment, everything is purely speculative at this point. Even animal rights group PETA has announced that it has a secret donor who wanted to buy SeaWorld and release all its animals into the wild. No one, however, expects this to actually occur. Ultimately, we’ll have to wait and see what happens to Busch Entertainment’s beloved theme parks. We’ll continue to keep you posted on this developing and important story, and in the meantime, you can still enjoy the parks with discount Orlando theme park tickets from OrlandoFunTickets.com.