GGRAsia – Imperial Pacific pledges quick build on two hotels, casino

Imperial Pacific pledges quick build on two hotels, casino

May 27, 2015 Newsdesk Latest News, Top of the deck, World

A company that has pledged to spend as much as US$7 billion on a casino resort on the Pacific island of Saipan (pictured) says an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary will construct two hotels and a casino there within a six-month period.

The news was given in a filing on Monday by Imperial Pacific International Holdings Ltd, a firm that started life as a frozen food business before acquiring the rights to a profit stream from a Macau junket investor.

Its unit Imperial Pacific International (CNMI) LLC agreed on April 29 to a 25-year lease for a 59,000-square-metre (635,071-sq-feet) plot of land at Garapan from the Department of Public Lands in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. Pacific territory of which Saipan is part.

“It is expected that construction work for the two town hotels and a casino with a total area of approximately 130,000 square metres would commence in the third quarter of 2015 and would complete within six months,” said the filing from the parent firm.

One of the hotels would have 250 rooms certified to 5-star standard, said the document. The casino would have 2,200 square metres of space excluding back of house areas.

The parent company in March said it had entered into a written amendment to its casino licence agreement, which would allow the company to establish and operate a “temporary casino” in Garapan.

The first year’s rental cost of the land, payable in advance, is US$250,000, according to the document.