The organizer of Jeju Dream Tower, a new resort with foreigner-only casinos under construction in the Korean resort of Jeju, changed his words when explaining the progress of the project.
“At this stage, we are trying to complete construction by the end of 2019,” Lawrence Theo, vice president and chief operating officer of Lotte Tour Development Inc., the initiative’s leader, said in an email to GGRAsia.
In August, the company said in a presentation on related rights issues that the Jeju Dream Tower will open by October this year.
Construction of the Jeju Dream Tower began in May 2016. With 38 stories, it will be the tallest building in Jeju. The complex site (file photo) is intended to accommodate Grand Hyatt-branded hotels, casinos, and other leisure facilities, according to a previous announcement.
Lotte Tour will own and operate these facilities on 59 percent of the total floor area of Jeju Dream Tower. Lotte Tour will have 750 hotel rooms, 11 restaurants and bars, shops, an observatory, and casino facilities. The second part of the project will be to create 850 apartment-hotel rooms.
Jeju’s subtropical climate and proximity to China have made it a popular destination for mainland Chinese tourists. Such tourists are thought to make up a large portion of Jeju’s inbound visitors every year.
Data from the first half of 2018 released by the Jeju Self-Governing Province Tourism Association citing research papers in July of that year showed that 257,177 people, or 52.6% of all inbound tourists, visited Jeju during the period.
Chinese consumers are a key target group for casino resort developers in the Asia-Pacific region and around the world.
Investments in casinos on Jeju Island have greatly expanded in recent years, all of which are open only to foreigners, including Jeju Shinhwa World, under Korean law. The casino portion of the project opened in Jeju in late February last year after the game license of another Jeju Island property controlled by the organizing Hong Kong-listed Landing International Development Limited was transferred to a new location.
In September last year, it was reported that the Jeju government, a semi-autonomous organization that can regulate games on the island, was considering banning the transfer of licenses from existing casino properties under a new plan.
BY: 릴게임