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Aug. 31st, 2006 11:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
desertvixenhttp://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14535931/site/newsweek/
A Vegas-Size Bet On China
Steve Wynn's moving into Asia, and his casino competitors think that he's got the right idea.
By Steve Friess
Newsweek
Sept. 4, 2006 issue - Casino mogul Steve Wynn has just come from his daily two-hour Chinese lesson. In addition to learning the basics, he says he's studying phrases he might need for his new venture: "Welcome to our hotel" and "I hope this is the beginning of a long friendship."
A long and profitable friendship, that is. The man who invented the Las Vegas megaresort will open the first one next week on the southern Chinese peninsula of Macau. As usual, Wynn's leading the pack: Las Vegas gaming companies plan to invest about $20 billion in the province by 2010. This spring, the Las Vegas Sands Corp. will open the $2.3 billion Venetian Macau, with a façade three times the size of the Vegas version, to complement the Sands Macao, a casino-only property that opened in 2004. By the end of 2007, Wynn's resort (the $1.2 billion Wynn Macau, which NEWSWEEK has toured exclusively) will be neighbors with the $1.1 billion MGM Grand Macau.
Macau's potential customer base is staggering. Las Vegas is within a five-hour flight for 450 million people; Macau, a former Portuguese colony returned to China in 1999, is the same distance for 3 billion. The existing casinos—dark and cramped, but still successful—attract day-trippers who take hydrofoil rides from Hong Kong. But Sands chairman Sheldon Adelson says China's growing middle class and the middle classes of Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea represent a pool of travelers interested in fancy hotels with shows, convention space, fine dining and high-end shopping. "We could build 10 Las Vegas Strips over here, there's so much demand," he says. Between the Wynn, Sands and MGM projects, and the easing of travel restrictions in some parts of China, Wall Street analysts predict Macau's gambling take could exceed the Las Vegas Strip's next year.
The Americans have put uniquely Asian twists on the Las Vegas esthetic. Slot players win if they line up lucky eights, not sevens, per local superstitions. Instead of craps tables, which hold little appeal, baccarat dominates. There's no buffet at the Wynn; the one at the Sands Macao is a healthy affair far removed from the fried-food frenzies in Las Vegas. Still, from the outside, the Wynn Macau mirrors the Wynn Las Vegas. The room furnishings are the same, too. He's even reimagined the dancing fountains at the Bellagio (which he sold in 2000).
Wynn and his competitors hope Macau becomes a breeding ground for "whales," gamblers who bet as much as $1 million per session. (A disproportionate number of whales at Las Vegas casinos fly in from Asia.) The Wynn Macau will serve as a local base for Las Vegas-style luxury and, he hopes, encourage trips to the gambling mecca. "Las Vegas represents unlimited choice," says Wynn, "and there won't be that critical mass in Macau" right away. So that's why he's asked his Chinese instructor to teach him another valuable phrase: "I hope one day you will visit us in Las Vegas."
And this is what my best friend from HS is up to, working IT for the Wynn in Macau.
DV
A Vegas-Size Bet On China
Steve Wynn's moving into Asia, and his casino competitors think that he's got the right idea.
By Steve Friess
Newsweek
Sept. 4, 2006 issue - Casino mogul Steve Wynn has just come from his daily two-hour Chinese lesson. In addition to learning the basics, he says he's studying phrases he might need for his new venture: "Welcome to our hotel" and "I hope this is the beginning of a long friendship."
A long and profitable friendship, that is. The man who invented the Las Vegas megaresort will open the first one next week on the southern Chinese peninsula of Macau. As usual, Wynn's leading the pack: Las Vegas gaming companies plan to invest about $20 billion in the province by 2010. This spring, the Las Vegas Sands Corp. will open the $2.3 billion Venetian Macau, with a façade three times the size of the Vegas version, to complement the Sands Macao, a casino-only property that opened in 2004. By the end of 2007, Wynn's resort (the $1.2 billion Wynn Macau, which NEWSWEEK has toured exclusively) will be neighbors with the $1.1 billion MGM Grand Macau.
Macau's potential customer base is staggering. Las Vegas is within a five-hour flight for 450 million people; Macau, a former Portuguese colony returned to China in 1999, is the same distance for 3 billion. The existing casinos—dark and cramped, but still successful—attract day-trippers who take hydrofoil rides from Hong Kong. But Sands chairman Sheldon Adelson says China's growing middle class and the middle classes of Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea represent a pool of travelers interested in fancy hotels with shows, convention space, fine dining and high-end shopping. "We could build 10 Las Vegas Strips over here, there's so much demand," he says. Between the Wynn, Sands and MGM projects, and the easing of travel restrictions in some parts of China, Wall Street analysts predict Macau's gambling take could exceed the Las Vegas Strip's next year.
The Americans have put uniquely Asian twists on the Las Vegas esthetic. Slot players win if they line up lucky eights, not sevens, per local superstitions. Instead of craps tables, which hold little appeal, baccarat dominates. There's no buffet at the Wynn; the one at the Sands Macao is a healthy affair far removed from the fried-food frenzies in Las Vegas. Still, from the outside, the Wynn Macau mirrors the Wynn Las Vegas. The room furnishings are the same, too. He's even reimagined the dancing fountains at the Bellagio (which he sold in 2000).
Wynn and his competitors hope Macau becomes a breeding ground for "whales," gamblers who bet as much as $1 million per session. (A disproportionate number of whales at Las Vegas casinos fly in from Asia.) The Wynn Macau will serve as a local base for Las Vegas-style luxury and, he hopes, encourage trips to the gambling mecca. "Las Vegas represents unlimited choice," says Wynn, "and there won't be that critical mass in Macau" right away. So that's why he's asked his Chinese instructor to teach him another valuable phrase: "I hope one day you will visit us in Las Vegas."
And this is what my best friend from HS is up to, working IT for the Wynn in Macau.
DV
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no subject
Date: 2006-09-01 05:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-09-01 01:35 pm (UTC)IT, yes.
Spiffy part-overseas gig, no.
He may be staying there on a more permanent basis, but for now he comes home in September.
DV