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Cirque du Soleil planning another three shows in Macau
News ASIA & OCEANIA
Melco Crown in talks over $1bn Manila Bay development
With four operators already named for its Entertainment City Manila, Pagcor Entertainment City Manila has
confirmed it is in talks with a fifth operator; Melco Crown. The state-owned entity wants to secure one tenth of the global casino market.
fifthelement PHILIPPINES
Macau operator Melco Crown Entertainment has been strongly linked with a possible US$1bn investment in a new development in Manila Bay in The Philippines, joining properties such as Genting’s Resorts World Manila. State-owned Philippine Amuse- ment & Gaming Corporation has confirmed that the company, which owns the Altira and City of Dreams casino resorts in Macau, is in ‘ongoing discussions’ over the new project, the fifth earmarked for Manila Bay in the last three years. Melco’s owners, Australian billionaire James Packer and Lawrence Ho, son of Macau gaming guru Stanley Ho, have so far remained tight lipped on the spec- ulation, but PAGCOR chairman Cristino Naguiat commented: “I think they’re serious. Pagcor is committed to creating a multifac- eted leisure and entertainment centre that is internationally benchmarked. This way, the Philip- pines can compete with the best in the world and attract the lion’s share of tourists.” Of the four licences so far
awarded by the Philippines’ gov- ernment, one has gone to a venture between Genting Malaysia and Alliance Global Group; one has been given to Belle Corp, one to Bloombury Investments Holding and one to Aruze. Each of the four has promised to invest at least $1bn within five years of their licence being granted. Belle and Bloom- bury have already begun construc- tion work with the other developers set to start by the first quarter of 2012. Naguiat added: “Pagcor recently imposed strict development guide- lines on Travellers International Hotel Group, Inc., the developer of
Cirque du Soleil celebrated the third anniversary of its first local show, Zaia, at Venetian Macau, but the company wants to host three permanents shows. Cirque du Soleil president Daniel Lamarre is confident that Macau will succeed in emulating the Las Vegas model in becoming an entertainment destination. According to Lamarre, Zaia had a difficult start but the addition of local elements, including a lion dance performance and a flying dragon, should increase ticket sales.
Resorts World Manila, SM Group, Bloomberry and Aruze, the four licensees in the project, an inte- grated tourism estate located on reclaimed land along the coast of Manila Bay.
One of the key commitments
required from each of the four licensees is to have at least 800 hotel rooms in operation prior to the opening of any casino. The total minimum of 3,200 hotel rooms to be put up by the licensees is expected to increase once tourist numbers grow.” Another key requirement of
PAGCOR is that the licensees build a total of 250,000 square meters of leisure place,
dedicating a
maximum of 7.5 percent of the floor area for gaming. This ensures that tourists enjoy access to not only a casino but also a variety of resort amenities and attractions. Vice president Francis Hernando
of PAGCOR’s Licensed Casino Development Department added: “We want to make sure that all four players put in the appropriate investment to make Entertainment City Manila internationally com- petitive. With the licensees meeting
14 October 2011 • asia&oceanianews
stringent compliance standards, we can guarantee the quality of the developments and infrastructure in the project.” By developing its tourism indus-
try, Pagcor aims to make the Philip- pines one of the premier tourist destinations in the region and the world, and grow the country’s gaming revenue, currently about US$800m per year. “A 10 per cent share in the US$115bn global gaming pie will give the Philippines US$11.5bn in revenue, making the country an even bigger destination than Las Vegas in terms of earnings,” said Naguiat. “If we succeed, we will generate an additional one million jobs and bring in a million more tourists,” he said. The redevelopment of Manila
Bay as a casino destination was first mooted in 2007 when congress voted to extend PAGCOR’s licence for a further 25 years with the vision being to split licences with inter- national investors to form a 1,976- acre casino entertainment destination, capable of attracting tourism to the region. Last year it only attracted 6m
tourists, compared to Thailand’s 16m.
Belle Corp has delayed the soft opening of its planned US$1bn integrated casino and resort facility Belle Grande Manila Bay to the second quarter of 2012. In a disclosure to the Philippine
Stock Exchange, Belle said it will invest $750m in the development of the casino, hotel, condotel and theater complex while its partner Leisure and Resorts World Corp. would contribute $200m for the casino side of the project. Belle vice chairman Willy Ocier revealed that phase 1 of the project would take longer than originally planned after it increased the size of the development by 35 per cent to accommodate more facilities and amenities to support the integrated resort and casino project. “We want to open with more amenities. Thus, the target is second quarter of 2012,” Ocier said. The casino will offer 19,626
square meters of gaming space with the first floor devoted to the mass market while 6,000 square meters will be reserved for VIP cus- tomers. It will have 350 tables and
1,900 slot machines. The facility shall also include six hotel towers with 1,000 rooms by the fourth quarter of 2013, including 86 luxury suites, accord- ing to Belle’s project briefer given to the PSE.
Alliance Global and Genting’s
project, which already houses Manila’s biggest casino, fulfilling its promise in 2008 to spend about $1.1bn to develop 91 acres in Pagcor City into a complex of hotels and a theme park. The project, occupying part of a
former military camp near Manila’s airport, boasts three hotels with 1,574 rooms, a 30,000 square metre (323,000 square feet) casino with 300 tables and more than 1,000 slot machines, and a 30,000 square metre shopping mall. Leo Venezuela, a Manila-based
analyst at CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets said the key to the whole project was creating a ‘critical mass’ by attracting more than two opera- tors, providing ‘variety’ and creat- ing a ‘dynamic industry.’ A name such as Melco Crown
would be a huge boost for the overall project.
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