A Chinese company is doubling down on Ko Olina Resort &Marina with a $280 million deal to buy more beachfront land for development at the West Oahu resort eight months after spending $200 million for a similar but smaller property nearby.

China Oceanwide Holdings Ltd. has signed an agreement to buy three parcels totaling 26 acres fronting portions of two lagoons between Disney’s Aulani Resort and a luxury condominium complex named Beach Villas at Ko Olina.

Jeff Stone, Ko Olina’s master developer who orchestrated the sale, said China Oceanwide is expected to spend roughly $1.5 billion developing a hotel on the site. Stone said construction could start in mid-2017 and be finished two years later. The resort could employ 1,800 people.

The land purchase, if completed as scheduled by Sept. 15, will give China Oceanwide control over the four remaining undeveloped hotel sites fronting the master-planned resort’s four oceanfront lagoons, and possibly make the company the biggest hotel operator at Ko Olina. Details of the purchase agreement were disclosed by China Oceanwide in a regulatory filing on the Hong Kong stock exchange this month.

China Oceanwide in December bought about 17 acres between a Marriott time-share property and the Beach Villas condo complex with intentions to build up to two luxury hotels and one luxury condo. Earlier this year the company agreed to pay $98 million for about 500 acres between Ko Olina and Kapolei long envisioned for residential development.

The property in the pending Ko Olina acquisition includes two vacant sites and one occupied by the Ko Olina Chapel Place of Joy, a wedding operation that has a lease on the land expiring in April, according to the filing.

Stone said China Oceanwide may turn the property into a hotel affiliated with Kerzner International’s Atlantis Resorts brand.

Stone has been working on such a hotel development plan for more than a decade and has a preliminary agreement with Kerzner that he hopes China Oceanwide will use.

“It’s my contribution to the project,” Stone said. “I’m very excited that they are considering it.”

As part of the purchase agreement, China Oceanwide may elect to use Stone’s Atlantis conceptual designs and tentative management deal, and has a $12 million incentive to do so. If the company decides not to use the Atlantis brand, it will add $12 million to its land purchase price.

The two vacant sites at one time were slated to be developed in a $1 billion project called the Grand Ko Olina Resort Hotel &Spa, containing 1,000 rooms and an aquarium, first announced in 2005 for an adjacent site that was later sold to Disney for development of Aulani.

Kerzner has had an interest in Hawaii for more than a decade, and in the past has been a proponent of legalizing gambling in Hawaii. In 2000, the company, then known as Sun International Hotels Ltd. and based in the Bahamas, described plans for a proposed $1 billion resort and casino at Ko Olina.

Though Stone said a casino isn’t part of China Oceanwide’s plan, Kerzner remained interested in operating a water-themed resort at Ko Olina as an addition to a portfolio that includes projects in Dubai, the Bahamas and one planned in China.

Kerzner officials could not be reached for comment.

China Oceanwide is a company formerly known as Hutchison Harbour Ring Ltd. that was acquired in 2014 by China-based Oceanwide Holdings Co., a conglomerate engaged in real estate, finance and investing, primarily in China. Last year, the company adopted an overseas real estate development strategy and acquired property in Los Angeles and New York for development of commercial and residential projects. The company also bought a power plant in Indonesia.