Today, the Casino operator Melco Resorts announced that it gives up all the efforts aimed at winning all the required licensure in Osaka, Japan and shifts into building an integrated resort in Yokohama, Japan. The CEO of Melco Resorts Lawrence Ho strongly believes that there are considerably more favourable conditions for building an integrated resort in Yokohama rather than winning winning licensure in Osaka.
Melco is among Macau’s six licensed casino operators, therefore, it has quite high chances of winning a casino licensure in Japan, which is basically one of the three forthcoming gambling licenses in the state. Melco’s founder and CEO a billionaire Lawrence Ho is now focused on shifting his gambling business to Japanese second-largest city by population, Yokohama, which has become the preferred destination for Melco’s CEO. Lawrence Ho explains that Yokohama is conveniently located, has decent communication links and vibrancy as well as a truly pioneering spirit which definitely makes the city a perfect location for attracting premium international tourists. Melco’s founder believes it’s a great premise for the integrated resort potential large-scale development.
Similarly to the “Osaka First” policy by MGM Resorts, Melco Resorts announced the “Yokohama First” strategy that lies in the company’s goal to create the best integrated resort in the world that would be located in Yokohama. This goal is planned to be achieved by assembling the incredible team of talented people and real experts in their field. Lawrence Ho promises the upcoming Yokohama’s integrated resort will make quite a splash globally.
Along with this announcement, Melco refuses to take part in a request for proposals (RFP) anywhere, but in Yokohama.
Japanese Gambling Market
The world’s leading and largest casinos are looking forward to Japan’s finalization of its regulatory conditions for them to be aware of the state’s peculiarities of monitoring of the gaming industry.
There are objective premises to predict that three Japanese casinos may well take second place after China’s Macau in the gambling industry by becoming the world’s second-largest gaming market. However, some analysts are quite sure that Nevada and Las Vegas will manage to retain their second place as the second-largest gaming market in the world. So, there’s still some kind of intrigue as for the unspoken competition between the USA and Japan for second place on the global gaming market. As the formal licensing process is closing, the major players in the world’s gambling industry are becoming unveiled.
The consensus frontrunners who used to be focused on Osaka are Las Vegas Sands and MGM. However, last month Las Vegas Sands gave up their dedication to winning licensure in Osaka shifting to Tokyo or Yokohama. Owing to Melco Resorts and Las Vegas Sands departure from Osaka’s gaming market, the odds for MGM have substantially increased. Because of the 2025 World Expo, Japanese regional prefecture and federal lawmakers are interested in having the casino resort, so the MGM Resorts’ CEO Jim Murren expects that the first integrated resort license will be issued in Osaka.
Another company that pledges to build the largest integrated resort in the world is Wynn Resorts, who is also interested in locating the resort in one of the following Japanese cities: Tokyo, Osaka, and Yokohama. The President of Wynn Resorts, Chris Gordon, claims that the most preferable of these three cities is evidently Osaka as “the most active city”. Thus, the competition between the key casino operators is getting tight, which is quite intriguing to observe and find out who will end up the winner in the end.
Along with Melco, MGM, Las Vegas Sands, and Wynn, there are a few other gambling operators who are competing to obtain one of Japanese licenses. Among those casino operators, there definitely can be mentioned Genting, Galaxy Entertainment, and Hard Rock.
Japan Casino Administration Committee
The proposals will be accepted by the candidate cities and their host prefectures only from those interested gambling operators who have partnerships with Japanese companies by way of consortiums. As soon as the winning scheme is more or less identified, the federal government will be petitioned by the prefecture for one of the gaming concessions.
There’s Japan Casino Administration Committee whose staff consists of 100 federal workers as well as the board of four people who will be in charge of licensing casinos and overseeing casino operators. Japan Casino Administration Committee’s will make licensing decisions based on the casino Fundamental Policy developed by the National Diet.
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