It’s building a huge mall, another theme park and a resort across the Causeway to add to Resorts World Sentosa buzz
AS it prepares to launch Resorts World Sentosa (RWS) sans its casino and theme park today, Genting Group is already looking to build another resort, a huge mall and an even ‘more interactive theme park’ just across the Causeway in Iskandar Malaysia.
‘We want visitors to Sentosa to come to our Malaysian resorts as well,’ chief executive officer Lim Kok Thay told reporters in Kuala Lumpur yesterday at the company’s 45th anniversary celebration.
The upcoming development, which expects to attract millions of visitors from Singapore when it gets off the ground in two years, will be located near the mid-point of the group’s operations in Pahang and Singapore.
Genting, Asia’s largest publicly traded casino operator, and its joint-venture partner US-based Simon Property Group have already invested an initial RM200 million (S$83 million) in the Chelsea designer discount shopping complex in Iskandar Malaysia, Johor’s special economic development zone.
The 60 high-end brand shops in the Kulai mall – the first of its kind in the region – have already been fully taken up, and Genting is in the midst of planning a larger-scale development to capitalise on the expected surge in tourists from Singapore and locally, who they anticipate will be drawn to the 25-65 per cent discounts offered on designer labels.
Its proposed theme park and resort development will be centred around the mall, Mr Lim said, adding that Genting has set aside an estimated 4,050 hectares for the project.
‘We can make Iskandar a hub and offer tourists a complete holiday package,’ Mr Lim said, adding that the development may attract ‘millions of visitors’ each year when it is completed in two years’ time.
Three times the size of Singapore, the special economic zone has seen billions of ringgit ploughed in by the government and is envisioned to be a future engine of growth.
Genting hopes many of the visitors will then travel on to its hilltop gambling resort in Genting Highlands, near Kuala Lumpur, which the company hopes will attract as many as 30 million visitors a year in five years’ time, Mr Lim said.
During the celebrations, Genting revealed that it lists the opening of the US$4.4 billion RWS as its latest and 45th significant milestone since the incorporation of Genting Highlands Bhd in 1965.
Mr Lim dismissed the notion that RWS would cannibalise its Malaysian operations. ‘It will grow the pie and if the two resorts work hand-in-hand, we will offer a more complete holiday (destination) for tourists from Asia.’
Media speculation has been rife that the Singapore government will issue RWS a casino licence before Chinese New Year. Though no concrete news has been forthcoming with regard to that, Mr Lim yesterday confirmed that the RWS Universal Studios theme park will be opened next week.
He was also confident that the hotels in RWS (1,400 rooms in the first phase and another 400 rooms planned in the second phase) would in time enjoy a high occupancy of some 80 per cent – ‘otherwise we’ll be in trouble’.
The conglomerate – whose interests range from gaming to power, plantations and property – is sitting on a cash pile estimated at RM5 billion.
And Genting’s interests are not stopping within the narrow confines of the peninsula either.
Last year, Genting invested US$200 million in Las Vegas gaming company MGM Mirage – half in its bonds and half in a 3.2 per cent equity stake – and now it may be looking to venture further.
‘If there are opportunities in the US, I am sure we will look at that. We do have great financial strength, so we can take on a large project,’ Mr Lim said, adding that the group aimed to become a global player.
The Genting Group comprises four listed companies, namely Genting Bhd, Genting Malaysia Bhd, Genting Plantations Bhd and Genting Singapore PLC, with a combined market capitalisation of about RM85.4 billion at the end of December last year.
Source: Business Times, 20 Jan 2010
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