Inside Asian Gaming

49 August 2013 | INSIDE ASIAN GAMING INTERNATIONAL BRIEFS “Megaresorts are nothing new except in Europe,” said Ivar Yuste, a partner at Madrid-based consulting firm PHG Hotels & Resorts.“The idea is to create a destination where there is nothing and where land is cheap. BCN World is in a great location. Disney was considering that same area in the region of Catalonia for its European theme park before deciding on Paris.” Partners in BCN World along with Meliá include Spanish investment group Veremonte, upscale shopping developer Value Retail and Melco Crown, which is working with Veremonte on an agreement to manage the casino portion. “BCN World is primarily aimed at the Chinese, Russian and Latin American markets, followed by Europe, which of course includes Spain,” said Meliá’s Senior Vice President of Business Development Jose Dalmau. “We are very focused on the potential in the Chinese market, given the fact that the Chinese have shown great enthusiasm for similar casino-hotel projects in other parts of the world.” LVS officially registered plans for EuroVegas last month, but the project is on hold while the central government works to win support for a controversial exemption to Spain’s ban on indoor smoking. Aristocrat Debuts First Game on Facebook Slot giant Aristocrat has launched its first social gaming app for Facebook, and the first game on the platform, Heart of Vegas, has already reached 500,000 installations. Craig Billings, managing director for Strategy and Business Development, said the company is “absolutely thrilled”with the response. The launch follows Aristocrat’s 2012 acquisition of Product Madness, a leading developer of casino-style games in the free-play online space. “Social gaming is an important pillar in Aristocrat’s online strategy, so it’s very exciting to see our first game with the Product Madness team achieve such success,”Mr Billings said. Heart of Vegas was crafted by Product Madness to combine free- to-play versions of several of Aristocrat’s slots with various rewards, bonuses and access to personalized promotions. The company said more branded content will be released at “regular intervals”. “Our vision was to combine Aristocrat’s popular game library with our powerful social technologies and expertise,” Product Madness co-founders Lior Shiff and Jose Brotons said. “That vision is already coming to fruition, and we expect even better results in the near future.” LVS 2Q Profits Buoyed by Macau Las Vegas Sands Corp.’s success continued in Macau, helping it more than double its net income in the second quarter, the Associated Press reported. But growth was tepid in Las Vegas, and Wall Street expected stronger results overall. Revenue rose 40% at Sands China, the company’s Macau division, while profit more than tripled. Speaking with analysts and investors in the wake of the company’s results announcement, billionaire CEO Sheldon Adelson brushed off concerns that the Macau juggernaut might one day peter out as economic growth slows in China. “Consumer behavior is going in the right direction, as far as we’re concerned. We have more people coming in spending more money,” he said. Revenue at Sands’ flagship Asian casino, the Venetian Macao, rose 38%, helped by a 43% growth in gambling revenue. Spring and summer visitors to the company’s five Macau properties grew 40% compared with a year ago. But revenue per available room, known as revpar, a key industry metric, fell 1% at the Venetian Macao from a year ago. Mr Adelson, whose success in Macau has made him the ninth- richest person in America, according to Forbes , said he expects far more visitors in the years to come. “It’s the infrastructure that is holding up a tremendous increase in potential attendance,” he said. “The further out the tentacles reach with high speed rails, the more visitation.” LVS, the largest US casino company, has other problems in Macau aside from worries about economic growth slowing. The company is under investigation by the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission. The inquiries stem from a pending wrongful-termination case brought by a former Sands executive who claims that Sands’China subsidiary did business with known organized crime figures, tacitly condoned prostitution and made inappropriate payments to an attorney who was also a Macau lawmaker. Sands has denied all the claims, but recently said in a regulatory filing that an examination of its books had turned up possible breaches of a federal anti-corruption act. In the US, LVS’ sales rose less than 6% at the company’s two Las Vegas casinos, the Venetian and the Palazzo. The company said spending on food and drinks in its Las Vegas Strip properties fell 2%, while gambling revenue, buoyed by the Asian favorite baccarat, rose by 11%. Revpar rose 7%. The US gambling industry has struggled to bounce back from the recession, with casinos regaining strength more slowly than the rest of the economy. As the US industry has faltered, China has become a larger portion of Sands’ business. The company also operates Sands Bethlehem in Pennsylvania and Marina Bay Sands in Singapore. The company’s 2Q revenue in Singapore was adversely affected by a low hold percentage, but company executives said they expected the players’ good luck would dissipate over the long run. Aristocrat’s Heart of Vegas Sheldon Adelson