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LOS ANGELES (BLOOMBERG) — Genting Group will open its newest resort on Thursday (June 24), a $4.3 billion ($5.8 billion) Las Vegas extravaganza and the largest new property on the city’s famed Strip in more than ten years.
Resorts World Las Vegas features 3,500 hotel rooms, a 5,000-seat theater with Celine Dion in residence, and a 100,000-square-foot LED screen on the side of a tower. There’s a pop-up shop that sells clothes from the Kardashian family’s closets and a speakeasy called Here Kitty Kitty Vice Den.
“There’s something for everyone here, basically a city within a city,” said Mr. Scott Sibella, a former director of MGM Resorts International who now serves as president of the casino.
The new building is a bull’s eye for the American gambling capital, which was closed for three months last year due to the corona virus and where visitor numbers in April were still 27 percent lower than in the same month in 2019. It is also a milestone for Genting, the Malaysian travel and leisure giant, which has had mixed luck with some of its other casino projects in the United States.
“If they wanted to be bold and big, they didn’t have a huge success rate,” said Mr Chad Beynon, an analyst at Macquarie Securities, of Genting’s US ambitions.
It was hard to get to this week’s opening. Boyd Gaming began construction on the site in 2007 – the former Stardust Resort on the north side of the Strip. But the Great Recession and an abundance of high-end properties prompted Las Vegas-based Boyd to close the half-built project. It was sold to Genting in 2013 for $350 million.
Genting originally envisioned a resort that focused heavily on Asian gamblers. The company talked about a habitat of living pandas and a replica of the Great Wall of China. Those plans were scrapped for a broader theme, more in line with other luxury resorts on the Strip.
Fewer gimmicks
“The days of these themed properties, which peaked in the 1990s,” said Mr. Vitaly Umansky, an analyst at Sanford C Bernstein. “You don’t need those gimmicks in Las Vegas. The market isn’t there anymore.”
But Resorts World will have all the trappings of Sin City’s contemporary lavishness, including a cavernous nightclub and a shop selling Judith Leiber’s bejeweled handbags. There is a special meet-and-greet area in the theater for photos with the performers.
The resort’s marketing slogan, displayed on billboards and social media, is “Stay Fabulous”. Thursday’s opening festivities include a parade of Rolls-Royce convertibles.
“We are so excited to be part of the return of travel to Las Vegas and the US,” said Mr. Lim Keong Hui, deputy chief executive at Genting and grandson of the company’s founder.
The company partnered with Hilton Worldwide Holdings, which has three hotels in the project, including the high-end Conrad; a namesake Hilton; and a newer brand, Crockfords, which Genting already has in a resort in Malaysia. Room rates start at US$149 per night, midweek. Smoking is only allowed in the casino.
The property has five swimming pools, including one with a vanishing edge overlooking the Strip for VIPs and a children’s swimming area with flower-shaped sprinklers. The exterior is decorated with thousands of trees, some of which were salvaged from the original Stardust Resort.
Some Asian elements remain. There is no fourth floor in the hotels as it is an unlucky number in many Asian countries. And nightlife enthusiasts Andrew Li and Mr. Lim scoured Southeast Asia for new restaurant concepts to bring to the resort.
Among them is Goggle Man Char Kway Teow, the first US outpost of a popular Malaysian chef to wear goggles when frying shrimp and rice noodles in a super-hot wok. It’s part of a street food themed area just off the casino floor.
“We’re trying to find a chef who wears goggles,” Mr. Li said.
Cashless casino
The property will also feature a number of high-tech elements, including what will be billed as the first completely cashless casino. Guests who download the Resorts World app and fund their digital wallets will be able to generate a QR code that can be scanned by dealers at the blackjack tables, said Mr. Joseph Pappano, chief executive of Sightline Payments, which provides some of the technology. Instead of room service, guests can have Grubhub food delivered to the resort’s 40 restaurants.
It will connect to Mr. Elon Musk’s new Bore Tunnel, taking guests to the newly renovated Las Vegas Convention Center across the boulevard in minutes. That could convince more people to stay there. The property’s location at the far end of the Strip means guests can’t walk from casino to casino as easily as at locations operated by rivals such as MGM Resorts International and Caesars Entertainment.
The Genting empire began in the 1960s with a resort in the mountains above Kuala Lumpur and is now run by Mr. Lim Kok Thay, the founder’s 69-year-old son. He’s been trying to crack the US market for years, including an attempt to build a casino in downtown Miami that’s thwarted by state gambling limits, and a $1.2 billion resort in New York’s Catskills region. which was opened in 2018 due to disappointing traffic.
Queens Racetrack
Genting’s biggest domestic success is a slot machine parlor at New York’s Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens. Lim is trying to get New York State to allow him to build a full-fledged casino resort there, but for now such approval is a long way off.
If Genting can gain enough critical mass in the US, it could sell shares in a US subsidiary, similar to what the company has done with subsidiaries in Singapore and Malaysia, Bernstein’s Mr. Umansky said.
“Genting wants to be a global gaming company,” he said. “That’s their aim.”
A huge success in Las Vegas could also inspire other operators to build new resorts on the Strip after a decade-long drought.
“This city is recovering faster than anyone,” said Mr. Sibella. “Eventually everything will go this way and it will be the luxury side of the Strip.”
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