Inside Asian Gaming

inside asian gaming January 2015 42 Crown, Echo Unveil Lavish Plans for Brisbane Australian rivals Crown Resorts and Echo Entertainment have unveiled their competing plans for the much anticipated new super- resort headed for downtown Brisbane. The Queensland government has released the final “integrated resort development” designs from the two consortiums fighting it out for the casino license slated to be awarded at Queen’s Wharf in the heart of the state’s capital city. Melbourne-based Crown and Chinese property development giant Greenland Group are proposing three luxury hotels, an entertainment complex including a theater and cinema, a Neil Perry restaurant and outdoor attractions highlighted by a water park and a bridge across the Brisbane River to the cultural and recreational precinct known as South Bank that will feature a suspended waterfall. The Destination Brisbane consortiumcomprised of Sydney-based Echo and Hong Kong conglomerates Chow Tai Fook Enterprises and the Far East consortium have designed a core resort shaped in an arc complete with five luxury hotels (including a Rosewood and Ritz- Carlton), an underground shopping mall and a “river arena” the size of “12 football fields” outfitted with cinemas and other attractions. Echo says its existing Treasury Casino in the city would be turned into a boutique department store. The casino license, one of three the government is offering statewide, is the key to both projects, which are expected to transform the state’s tourism economy by creating magnets for well-heeled spenders across the Asia-Pacific region. “The point was very strongly made to us by international tourist operators that this sort of integrated resort development is the emerging product in the tourism market,” Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney said. Bidding rules, however, forbid both ventures at this point from disclosing gaming plans and certain other integrated features, such as their residential components. LVS’ New President Has His Hands Full In the midst of what is arguably the most challenging business climate ever for Las Vegas Sands’ massive investment in Macau, the company’s “bullish” new president says expansion will be a priority under his regime. Industry veteran Robert Goldstein, 59, who took over last month from the retiring Michael Leven, said, “I’m focused on continuing to execute Sheldon’s vision and the strategic objectives laid out by our board and management team”— marching orders that include “pursuing new development opportunities”. “There is much work to do, but I couldn’t be more excited about the opportunities ahead of us.” The Las Vegas resident has made a career of seeing new resort casinos rise from concept to completion, spending 15 years working with new projects in the Caribbean and the United States prior to joining LVS in 1995, four years before founder, chairman, CEO and controlling shareholder Sheldon Adelson—“one of the world’s greatest entrepreneurs,” in Mr Goldstein’s view—first made his mark on the industry with the elaborately themed Venetian on the Las Vegas Strip. As president of The Venetian and Palazzo and later as head of global operations, Mr Goldstein specialized in developing much of the non-gaming elements that make up the integrated resort strategy that has been central to LVS’ success. Notably, he is credited with expanding and refining the retail offering that has proven so lucrative for the company on the Cotai Strip in Macau and in Singapore at Marina Bay Sands. But in succeeding Mr Leven as chief operating officer he will have big shoes to fill. The latter, a veteran hotelier, now 77, has been on the board of directors since LVS’ launch as a public company and is one of Mr Adelson’s most trusted advisors. Mr Leven took the helm in 2009 after the exit of the company’s first president, William Weidner, who left in the depths of the Great Recession, a time when credit had frozen up worldwide, the company’s share price had plummeted in the space of a year from more than $100 to under $2, and its sizable debt load engendered doubts about its viability as a going concern. Mr Leven exerted a stabilizing influence, and in that capacity was instrumental in righting the ship, shepherding REGIONAL BRIEFS Rendering of Crown and Greenland’s planned development Artist’s impression of the Destination Brisbane consortium’s proposed resort Robert Goldstein