Inside Asian Gaming

AUGUST 2018 INSIDE ASIAN GAMING 25 What Imperial Pacific hasn’t proven very good at is collecting debts from its players and completing its casino hotel in Garapan, Saipan’s tourist and business hub. IN FOCUS in Garapan, Saipan’s tourist and business hub. “It is not clear to me that Imperial Pacific’s business plan and efforts to date will lead to profitability over the long term,” Spectrum Gaming Group Managing Director Frederic Gushin, a former CNMI gaming adviser, says. “The difficulties that Imperial Pacific has had in completing the first project in Garapan raise serious questions about the company and their ability not only to complete the first casino but also the major IR project.” Meanwhile, IPI uses villas, yachts and other hotels to house guests. Saipan tourism stakeholders cite lack of accommodations as the key constraint to tourism growth. In an interview with Inside Asian Gaming published in April 2016, Mark Brown, then president and CEO of IPI’s Best Sunshine International Saipan unit, said the 350 room luxury beachfront hotel’s casino would open in December of that year with a “full building opening” in April 2017, well ahead of the casino license’s August opening deadline. Then came Typhoon Saudelor, failed financing efforts, cement shortages, construction worker injuries and a death on the building site, allegations of illegal labor imports from China, a change in contractor and Brown’s resignation to take a non-executive chairman post, which he resigned earlier this year. NEW GAME IN TOWN As the deadline approached, the Commonwealth Casino Commission granted IPI permission to move from its 48 table, 150 machine temporary home in a shopping mall into the new site’s casino even though the hotel was not complete. Gaming relocated on 6 July last year and is currently running with approximately 70 tables and 240 gaming machines, plus a Chinese restaurant and