p12-14 Macau.qxd 26/6/09 12:40 Page 15
MACAU BUSINESS
I think what makes me smile now - and you’ve As you know Altira’s predominant focus is VIPs. We
known me for a long time - is that our company is definitely hope to improve our margin significantly
one of those that doesn’t have any superstars and and at the same time, of course, with the size of City
suddenly everybody is cheering for us. I saw Francis of Dreams, we certainly hope to be one of the leaders
Lui interviewed in the Chinese paper [recently] in terms of market share as well.
saying that he was hoping City of Dreams would open Having said that, we are not going to go blindly
well because if we open well they will continue the chasing market share. To us the
Galaxy development. most important thing is delivering
Likewise, Sheldon Adelson is saying that once City value to our share holders in the
of Dreams opens it is almost the completion of the form of stronger earnings.
first phase of the Cotai Strip. I guess it is in
everybody’s interest that we open well because from But you are looking at trying to
their financing stand point we are good for them, the have a regular place among the
banks will reopen themselves. top three operators in Macau?
It was such cutthroat competition on junket
commissions last year, everybody was willing to cut We hope so. There’s never a
off each others head for a little bit extra business and correlation between how much
now all of a sudden everybody is behaving. Now money you invest in a place and how
everybody is happy and united. I think something much you make out of it. If you
good has come out of this downturn. think about it, a lot of people miss
out on this point. We have actually
What would be your ideal first quarter results invested more money in Macau than
after opening City of Dreams? anybody else. City of Dreams
[investment is] US$2.1 billion,
Well, I don’t want to go into the numbers because I without the land ñ all up it’s
have had my fingers burned before. I think a lot of probably closer to US$2.5 billion if
what the gaming industry analysts say is watched very you put in the pre-opening and
closely by one of the major investment banks. I was everything, plus about US$400
tricked into answering a question about market share million for Altira, that’s US$2.9
some days ago, and don’t want to do that again. billion and we bought Steve’s license
Anyway, market share is misleading because as you for US$900 million.
know in VIP you have a very high market share but In terms of purely investing in a
there’s a tiny margin because there is so much cost in place we are actually putting in
between. I think with the City of Dreams opening the more money than LVS. I think that
philosophy is integrated results. There’s VIP but then given the amount of capital that we
the bulk of the focus is really on the mass, multi-stay have invested we certainly hope to be one of the
and premium segments. leaders.
JULY/AUGUST 2009 13
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