Operator News
Macau – Green light for Studio City casino licence
By Lewis - 23 July 2013
According to sources in Macau, Melco Crown has won its casino licence for its upcoming Studio City project. The news follows Melco Crown Entertainment’s inking of a deal to buy a 60 per cent stake in the long-delayed Macau Studio City project from eSun Holdings for US$260m in June last year.
Melco’s revamped Studio City project is planning to offer 400 gaming tables, 1,200 slot machines and 2,000 hotel rooms as part of a total investment of US$1.7bn to create a resort that Melco Crown Entertainment’s CEO, Lawrence Ho Yau Lung, plans to open in 2015. The original Studio City project in Cotai was proposed before 2008, along with Galaxy Phase Two, MGM Macau, SJM and Wynn Macau. Authorities are expected to grant Melco a volume of gaming tables based on the non-gaming facilities the location offers. Each of the five Cotai locations referenced will be reviewed as a whole when the government allocates the remaining 2,000 gaming tables over the next 10 years.
The government adopted a table cap of three percent growth per year starting from 2013 for the next 10 years. The maximum number of gaming tables the government could allocated before 2013 was 5,500.
