Inside Asian Gaming

inside asian gaming November 2015 18 MGS: Will it live up to the hype? Over the last few months our inboxes have been bombarded (some might even say spammed) with almost daily emails from the Macao Gaming Show — countdowns, announcements of new attractions, references to Beijing’s One Belt One Road concept and an array of newsletters in various formats. There’s no doubt we all know MGS will take place from November 17 to 19 — but will it live up to the hype? T his month sees the third annual instalment of the Macao Gaming Show at the Venetian Macao. No longer does MGS have the excuse of being the new kid on the block, it now needs to deliver value for exhibitors and attendees alike – and take a stand in the red corner in the ongoing “show war” with G2E Asia. But can MGS 2015 cut the mustard in the “new normal” of Macau? Let’s take a look at what MGS will be offering in 2015. SUMMIT Notably MGS has renamed its conference, moving away from the “Macao Gaming Summit” moniker to re-invent itself as “The Macau Tourism and Culture Summit with Gaming Topics.” Quite the mouthful! No doubt this represents compliance with the combined push by Macau and Beijing away from gaming and toward diversification, but does this muddy the brand? There’s a couple of keynote talks on the arguably vague OBOR concept but then it’s straight back into the usual litany of academics, lawyers and journalists talking about gaming markets outside Macau. EXHIBITION MGS claimed a head count of 11,987 last year – which is a number that actually eclipses the foot traffic of G2E Asia. But this was not borne out by the anecdotes IAG heard from exhibitors and visitors alike. In fact low traffic on the floor of the exhibition has been MGS’ Achilles heel in its first two years. Feature