Operator News

South Korea’s Kangwon Land to address competition from Japan with US$1.9bn revamp

By Phil - 5 April 2024

With the looming competition of a casino in the Japanese prefecture of Osaka, South Korea’s Kangwon Land is to spend US$1.9bn revamping its casino into a luxurious integrated resort with a bigger gaming floor, more hotels, a sky bridge as well as a host of additional leisure facilities.

A massive US$1.34bn will be spent on a new gaming floor and a cultural complex with another US$201m on a new hotel. The gaming floor will be expanded from 15,486 square meters to 49,500 square meters ‘addressing the current chronic shortage of seats in the venue,’ according to CEO Choi Cheol-Gyu.

Alongside its cultural complex, the operator is looking to enhance its walking trails around the casino , open a wellness center and develope a luxury pool villa.

Known as the K-HIT Project 1.0, the plan is to strengthen the future competitiveness of Kangwon Land, with the K standing for Koren, H standing for High1, I standing for Integrated, T standing for Tourism, and 1.0 standing for a new beginning.

The presentation unveiling the plan was attended by more than 700 people, including National Assembly member Lee Cheol-kyu and related organisations, local governments and parliaments, social groups, local residents, and executives and employees.

The operator formed a Special Committee on Strengthening the Competitiveness of Kangwon Land Integrated Resorts in January and collected opinions from stakeholders, industry experts, local residents, internal employees, and visiting customers for the past three months.

It has set a goal of ‘revitalising the economy of abandoned mine areas and becoming a global K-integrated resort that leads Korea’s tourism industry’ by 2032. It has set quantitative goals such as increasing the proportion of non-casino sales from the current 13 per cent to 30 per cent, increasing the number of visitors from the current 6.8m to 12m, hiring 3,400 new employees, and increasing the number of foreign tourists by more than 1,000 per cent.

Acting CEO Choi Cheol-kyu said that current problems faced by Kangwon Land included an unclear resort identity, a lack of food and entertainment, and attracting foreign tourists. It wants to develop a sky bridge that will become a landmark attraction.

The operator said: “We plan to promote wellness forest tourism in connection with the surrounding forest resources, develop tourism products in connection with the coal mine cultural heritage, and create a four-season complex cultural space, thereby differentiating ourselves from domestic and foreign competitors behind the big city and equipping it with essential facilities and contents as an integrated resort.”

“In order to expand the area of the casino and make regulation a reality, the first step is to build a new casino that is about three times the size of the previous one. However, since it takes a long time to build a new building, there is also a plan to create a temporary business site first using the former theme park space, which is an idle space nearby.

“In the casino sector, in order to revitalise the foreigner-only gaming zone, operating standards such as betting limits will be adjusted to the level of other foreign casinos, and in the non-casino sector,
we plan to develop exclusive products and events targeting foreigners, such as K-culture seasonal schools, attracting large-scale international events, and medical tourism in connection with health checkups.”

“Finally, the plan is to connect the mountain condominium (resort) and the Grand Hotel (casino), where the largest number of guests stay in the resort, through the construction of a sky bridge. Through this, it will solve the inconvenience of customers’ movement at once and create a representative landmark for Kangwon Land.”

Mr. Choi added: “Kangwon Land, which has holds a monopoly on the domestic market, will see this monopoly virtually broken with the opening of an integrated resort in Osaka, Japan, which is only 1 hour and 30 minutes away from Korea. We will concentrate all of our capabilities to become an integrated resort that can compete in the global market through intensive investment at the second start-up level, thereby revitalizing the economy of abandoned mine areas and leading the Korean tourism industry.”