MGM China has gone all in on its bet for a new casino resort in Macau’s Cotai Strip. The company, part of MGM Resorts International, recently signed a $161.4 million deal for 17.7 acres of prime Cotai real estate — and that’s before the costs of the planned 1,600-room hotel, 500 gambling tables and 2,500 slot machines that will sit on top of it.
Expected to open in 2015, the new luxury casino resort will feature towers configured to look like piles of patterned Chinese jewelry boxes, according to The Wall Street Journal. The design will be a departure from the company’s current Macau property; the Forbes Travel Guide Four-Star MGM Macau is an extremely modern, 35-story structure whose glass façade sports thick waves of gold, silver and copper.
MGM is the latest licensed gaming operator to gain approval to expand in Macau, the only place in China that allows casinos. Wynn has already broken ground on its massive 51-acre Cotai resort, which will include 2,000 rooms, about 10 restaurants, several theaters and a nightclub when it opens in 2016. Megacomplex Galaxy Macau is doubling its size to include notable new additions like The Ritz-Carlton’s first all-suite hotel, the world’s largest JW Marriott and more than 45 new restaurants and bars. Melco Crown Entertainment, the group behind Five-Star Altira Macau, is on track to open casino resort Studio City in 2015. Although it recently opened Sands Cotai Central, Sands China isn’t stopping for a break; the company is surging ahead with a themed hotel that will debut in 2016. Not to be outdone, SMJ — which owns 20 of Macau’s 35 casinos — paid $269 million for Cotai land to get an even bigger stake in the world’s largest gambling market.
Photo Courtesy of MGM Macau
