In this regular feature in IAG to celebrate 20 years covering the Asian gaming and leisure industry, we look back at our cover story from exactly 10 years ago, “The Asian Gaming Power 50”, to rediscover what was making the news in September 2015!
IAG’s September 2015 edition was all about the Asian Gaming Power 50, coming as it did a few years before we settled on November as the regular issue in which to feature our annual list of the most influential people in Asia’s gaming industry.
That year’s list featured an array of important names that remain key powerbrokers to this day, and many that have fallen by the wayside, but top of the pops was none other than Sheldon Adelson – the founder and at that time Chairman and CEO of Las Vegas Sands Corp.
The influence of Adelson, who passed away in 2021, will likely never be matched. Notwithstanding the MICE model he established in Las Vegas, Adelson was the man who took a risk by building on a swamp in Macau. The Venetian Macao, opened in 2007, was the first of Macau’s mega-integrated resorts and laid the foundation for what would become one of the world’s richest slices of real estate: the Cotai Strip.
Likewise, he helped transform Singapore into a global tourism giant via Marina Bay Sands – an international architectural icon that just happens to be the most profitable casino on earth. Little wonder he topped the Asian Gaming Power 50 a total of seven times, including six years in a row from 2013 to 2018.
Ranking just behind Adelson in 2015 were names that remain central to the industry today: Galaxy Entertainment Group’s Francis Lui – who has also finished in top spot on seven occasions – at No.2, Genting’s Lim Kok Thay at No.3 and Melco’s Lawrence Ho at No.4.
But the rest of the top 10 highlights just how fast our Asian Gaming Power 50 evolves. Steve Wynn, since having fallen foul of the industry, was at No.5 that year, followed by the now retired Ambrose So of SJM, Suncity Group’s Alvin Chau, Crown’s James Packer, MGM’s Jim Murren and Japanese mogul Kazuo Okada. Of those, only Murren retains any genuine links to the industry via his dual roles as Chairman of Resorts World Las Vegas and of the UAE’s General Commercial Gaming Regulatory Authority.
Who else featured on the 2015 Power 50 list? Plenty of notables, that’s for sure. Las Vegas Sands’ Rob Goldstein, who has since become a mainstay in the top 5, ranked 11th that year, with Wynn Macau’s Linda Chen in 16th and Bloomberry Resorts Corp Chairman and CEO Enrique Razon Jr in 19th.
Sri Lankan casino kingpin Dhammika Perera ranked a surprisingly high 29th, followed one spot behind by the Honorary Chairman of Hong Kong jewelry giant Chow Tai Fook Enterprises Cheng Yu Tung. Cheng’s connection to the industry came via his close friendship with Stanley Ho, which led to him purchasing a 10% stake in STDM – now the parent company of Macau concessionaire SJM – for HK$400 million (US$51 million) in 1982. Cheng passed away in 2016, however, under the leadership of his son Henry Cheng, Chow Tai Fook has expanded its casino interests far and wide – to the Bahamas, Australia and most recently Vietnam.
There were also a handful of appearances in 2015 whose time in the industry would later come to an ignoble end. Donaco’s Joey Lim, who ranked 37th, lost control of that company in 2019; The 13 Hotel founder Stephen Hung at No.43 ran out of cash to finish the property’s construction; Mark Brown at 44 finished up his career trying to realize the ambitious Imperial Pacific project in Saipan; and Tony Fung never realized an ambitious plan to develop an AU$8 billion mega-resort in Cairns, northern Australia. He also sold off his stake in Casino Canberra a few years back. Then, of course, there is Landing International’s Yang Zhihui. Coming in at No.49 in 2014, Yang oversaw development of Korea’s Jeju Shinhwa World – an expansive integrated resort development which mysteriously keeps on keeping on despite financial records showing many years of substantial losses. He retired from the company’s board in 2023 after seeing an attempt to build an IR in Manila collapse, having also famously disappeared for three months in 2018. It was later revealed that he had been “relocated” from Cambodia to mainland China to “assist the relevant department of the People’s Republic of China with its investigation” into his business links to China’s state-owned Huarong International Financial Holdings Ltd, whose former head was being investigated in a graft probe.
It’s certainly been an eventful decade since IAG published our 2015 Asian Gaming Power 50!
