GGRAsia – Six casino ops pay US$15mln to sponsor Macau Grand Prix

Six casino ops pay US$15mln to sponsor Macau Grand Prix

Jul 19, 2023 Newsdesk Latest News, Macau, Top of the deck

Macau’s six casino operators are sponsoring this year’s Macau Grand Prix motor-race meeting, with their aggregate contribution topping MOP120.0 million (US$14.9 million). The information was announced on Wednesday at a press conference by the organising committee (pictured).

Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd, Melco Resorts & Entertainment Ltd, MGM China Holdings Ltd, Sands China Ltd, SJM Resorts SA, and Wynn Macau Ltd are each providing MOP20.0 million in sponsorship.

The 70th Macau Grand Prix will run across two weekends in November – usually the event covers just one weekend.

A total of five races will be held between November 11 and 12. Six other races will be held from November 16 to 19. The latter weekend includes the headline events for the motor-race meeting: the Formula 3 Macau Grand Prix – FIA Formula 3 World Cup; the Macau GT Cup – FIA GT World Cup; the Macau Guia Race – TCR World Tour Final; and the Macau Motorcycle Grand Prix.

A press release jointly issued by Macau’s Sports Bureau and the Macau Grand Prix Organising Committee said “the Macau Grand Prix provides a platform for local enterprises to increase their investment in non-gaming elements”.

It added: “The Macau Grand Prix Organising Committee hopes to continue using sporting events as a platform, and hosting sports tourism projects with the industry operators to attract international visitors [to Macau].”

The release labelled the six casino operators as “major sponsors” for this year’s Macau Grand Prix.

Last year’s race meeting – still impacted by travel restrictions applied locally and linked to the Covid-19 pandemic – had already been heavily supported by the city’s six casino licensees: at the time, they sponsored six out of the seven races, with their aggregate contribution totalling MOP28.5 million.

Development of sports tourism and cultural activities have been identified by the city’s government as important elements in Macau’s effort at economic diversification. They were also considerations for the local authorities when assessing the applications of gaming companies for the new 10-year Macau gaming concessions that were awarded last year, and started in January.

The six Macau operators have as a whole pledged to the government to spend in aggregate a minimum of MOP108.7 billion on non-gaming and exploring overseas-customer markets during the fresh concessions. Collectively they will have to increase their pledged concession-related investment for the next decade by as much as 20 percent if citywide annual gross gaming revenue reaches MOP180 billion.