Inside Asian Gaming

IAG SEP 2022年9月 亞博匯 38 But I was very stubborn. I said, “No, I want Marriott. If not, I need to talk to somebody else.” And that’s how I got the Marriott brand. Even during the construction, the Marriott team came and we ran some numbers and they were not very confident that thisMarriott would perform. But a couple of months after we opened the Marriott here in 2018, we were running at about 80% occupancy. Since then, this Marriott has gone on to become one of the top five performing Marriotts in Asia. Now I have opened Hann Casino with the Swissôtel, and Swissôtel is running at 90% occupancy, and the casino; while it’s not fully packed yet, on weekends there are quite a lot of people here. BB: Do you feel vindicated that your vision from more than 15 years ago seems to have been proven right? DH: Developers like me, we need to come up with the right product for the market. There is always demand, but [without the] right product [customers] don’t know how to pamper themselves and how to enjoy themselves – which doesn’t mean that there is no market [for these products]. That’s what I see. When I talk about development, accessibility is very, very important. The run from the airport to Hann is 10 minutes, and New Clark City where I’m building the three golf courses and a Banyan Tree is also 10 minutes away from the airport. Even from Manila it is maybe one hour and 40 minutes, The Marriott has been outperforming pre- pandemic levels since April and we have been operating our hotels since March with around 90% occupancy on average. 自四月以來，萬豪酒店的表現一直優於疫前水 平。而三月以來，我們所營運的酒店，平均入住 率約為九成。 COVER STORY