As the Japanese Diet gets ready to discuss how its new casino regulations will be formed, the expectation is that it will follow the model adopted in Singapore, which has two Integrated Resorts and where several prominent Japanese politicians have visited over the past few months on fact finding trips.
Analyzing the future of casinos in Japan, Eugene Christiansen wrote: "Singapore is a notable success in that it has established a statutory and regulatory environment for two very large integrated resorts. The policy goal Singapore sought to realise with its casino law was to create diversified integrated resorts that would attract tourists for extended stays, not just gamblers. Casino gaming and nothing else is too narrow a franchise today to support a competitive tourist industry.”
He also advised that any tender should probably take into account experience in designing, building and operating these large scale enterprises. He explained: ""Integrated resorts are not for amateurs. Anyone can build a casino. But true IRs are the most complicated leisure entertainment products ever brought to market.
"If Japanese resorts are going to attract affluent tourists and keep attracting them after the novelty of gaming has worn off, they must be competitive with the best IRs in the world, meaning the best properties along the Las Vegas Strip, in Singapore, in Macau, and wherever else in the world such world-class international resorts are built in the next 25 or 30 years.”
Source: GMB / Totallygaming.com
