Asian casino operator Genting Bhd. has promised to break out the novelty-sized checkbook to boost its facilities both at home and abroad. Genting has pledged between $3b and $4b to develop its Resorts World Las Vegas project, assuming Nevada regulators approve Genting’s pursuit of a state gaming license. Genting acquired the 87-acre property – the site of Boyd Gaming’s aborted Echelon development, on which the fabled Stardust Casino used to stand – in March for $350m. Having a Vegas footprint would complement Genting’s highly profitable Resorts World New York slot parlor.
This summer, Genting said it would spend $950m upgrading its flagship Genting Highlands resort/casino/theme park in its home market of Malaysia. On Tuesday, Genting boss Lim Kok Thay said the revamp’s budget could now cost up to $1.5b and would include a new six-star hotel, luxury retail shops, a 10k-seat arena and a 100-gondola cable car station capable of ferrying 4k customers per hour up the hilltop on which the resort sits. Lim suggested it was highly likely that the company “may end up spending more” but insisted that the project would not require external funding.
Genting is getting help from the project’s new partner, Twentieth Century Fox Inc., The Malaysian project will be the first gaming-related investment for the US entertainment conglomerate, which will incorporate many of its iconic intellectual property figures – including the Alien franchise for the adults and the Ice Age flicks for the kids – into 25 new cinema-themed rides and attractions. The reconfigured theme park will also get a new tourism-friendly name – Twentieth Century Fox World – when it opens in 2016.
BERJAYA WANTS IN ON THE ACTION
A little further south, Malaysian property firm Berjaya Assets, part of the Berjaya Group conglomerate, is also looking at a Malaysian resort property that may include a casino. Berjaya, whose operations include retail betting outfit Sports Toto Malaysia, is looking at an 18-acre site in Johor Baru near the Malaysia-Singapore causeway. A source told Reuters that the project, which would compete with the two resort casinos just over the border in Singapore (including Genting’s Resorts World Sentosa), could face objections from Malaysia’s federal government. Genting has held the country’s sole casino license since the 1960s.
