Asia, Las Vegas-style

Macau—If all goes as planned, by the fall of next year this island city-state will have a Las Vegas-style casino resort with a 1.2 million square foot convention center. It will be the first of its kind in Asia, but it won't be alone for long. Nipping at its heels, in Singapore, is Harrah's Entertainment.

"Our mission is to make Macau the convention and exhibition destination of Asia," proclaimed Sheldon Adelson, chairman and CEO of Las Vegas Sands, the corporation that operates the Venetian Casino Resort and Sands Expo & Convention Center in Las Vegas, as well as the Sands Macau.

Adelson's vision is to bring tradeshows to Macau, doing for the special administrative region of China what he helped do for Las Vegas: increase the average length of stay of midweek visitors. Presently, in Macau, this is barely one day.

"What is happening here could be a pivotal point in the exhibition industry," said Sandy Angus, chairman of Montgomery Exhibitions and this year's volunteer leader of the Intl. Assn. for Exhibition Management.

Adelson's declaration, taped during a ceremony revealing plans for the new Venetian Macau resort, was part of a marketing presentation made for a delegation of show managers visiting Macau following the China Expo Forum for Intl. Trade Jan. 11–13 in Guangzhou, the closest major stop to Macau on the Chinese mainland.

The delegation included representatives from Reed Exhibitions, Montgomery Exhibitions and Fiera Milano, all of whom said they hoped to book shows at the Venetian Macau.

In fact, Las Vegas Sands last October said that these and several other major organizers were negotiating bookings for some 20 tradeshows expected to attract 5,000 to 20,000 people each. The other firms included the China Council for the Promotion of Intl. Trade, Koelnmesse, Messe Frankfurt, VNU Expositions Asia, CMP Asia and Adsale Exhibition Services.

The Venetian Macau, an oversized, modified replica of the U.S. original, is under construction now and on schedule to open in October 2007, project architects reported. In addition to features common among Las Vegas casino complexes — gambling, shopping, theaters, restaurants and bars — the Venetian Macau also will have 75,000 square meters (807,293 sq. ft.) of exhibit space and a 15,000-seat event center.

According to the Sands, it will be the anchor of the Cotai Strip, a stretch of landfill covering 1.8 square miles between the Coloane and Taipa (hence "Co-Tai") islands of Macau.

Las Vegas Sands has a controlling interest in more than half of the Cotai Strip with a 25-year concession to develop the 10.5 million sq. ft. Venetian, as well as deals in the works to manage casinos and showrooms for several other resorts developed by hotel companies and investors. The company is working with Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts, and Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts on three other hotels with a combined 2,500 rooms and suites. And it is finalizing an agreement with the Far East Consortium to build a multi-hotel complex to include hotel brands Intercontinental, Holiday Inn, Far East, Cosmopolitan and Dorsett.

Las Vegas Sands expects there to be 12,000 hotel rooms at varying price points on the Cotai Strip by mid-2008.

The company's projected Cotai budget is in the range of $6 billion, according to a spokesman Ron Reese.

Having started with a clean slate, planners are able to incorporate lessons learned in Las Vegas. According to the master plan, 7,000 rooms will be connected to the Venetian Macau Expo Center via air-conditioned elevated walkways. The two-story Expo Center will have two other points of entry, besides the walkway: a standalone entrance opposite that of the hotel and casino, and a corridor that passes by meeting rooms and gives onto the hotel and casino.

Each floor of the columned expo center will have its own loading dock and freight staging area, and land adjacent to the freight entrance has been set aside for a marshaling yard.

Las Vegas Sands last spring named Wolfram Diener vice president of conventions and exhibitions for the Venetian Macau. Diener — who moved to Macau from a similar position at the Shanghai New Intl. Expo Centre, and whose resume also includes executive positions at Messe Frankfurt in Shanghai and Singapore — said the Venetian Macau's sales strategy focuses on its status as the first fully integrated resort in Asia.

"There's nothing else that even comes close to this," he said.

Current convention center bookings, Diener added, are about 40 percent from overseas organizers, 40 percent from Asian organizers and 20 percent from Chinese organizers.

Asian consultant Steve Sind, president and CEO of Global Event Strategies, said he believes the Cotai Strip will be more successful than some other Asian destinations at attracting North American business, "because of the familiarity with Macau and the Venetian brand."

With MGM Mirage planning resorts in both Singapore and Macau, and Wynn Resorts' Macau property rising just blocks from the existing Sands Macau, competition between U.S. casino developers is stiff in general. But, on the convention front, the rivalry is between Harrah's and Las Vegas Sands.

If Harrah's has its way, the Venetian Macau won't be able to sell itself as the only integrated resort in Asia for long. Last spring, the island republic of Singapore began soliciting bids from developers interested in building casino resorts on either the Marina Bayfront or Sentosa Island. Among those bidding are Harrah's, MGM Mirage and the Sands.

In formulating its bid, Harrah's has teamed up with U.S.-based facility management firm SMG as well as several Singapore companies: developer Keppel Land, show management firm Conference & Exhibition Management Services, and the 1 million sq. ft. Suntec Singapore Intl. Convention & Exhibition Centre. The Suntec deal calls for co-promotion between the two companies as well as consultation from the 10-year-old convention center on the development of its new casino counterpart.

Although Harrah's would not give details of its proposal, the company is working with Paris' Centre Pompidou to develop a cultural center (to be designed by architect Daniel Liebeskind, recently of World Trade Center fame), and with Anschutz Entertainment Group (which brought Celine Dion and Elton John to Caesars Palace in Las Vegas) to develop attractions.

Meanwhile, Las Vegas Sands lost its local partner in its own Singapore bid. The company last December signed a memorandum of understanding with hotel developer City Developments Ltd. to build an integrated resort that the Sands would operate. However, CDL pulled out of the project Jan. 20, about 11 weeks before the deadline for proposals. The Sands said it would go ahead without a local equity partner.