Companies have started to move staff, and inventory to the Philippines and Singapore due to China\u2019s ongoing Covid Zero policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Macau.- China’s decision to continue with its Covid-19 Zero policy has caused several companies dedicated to the sale of casino gaming equipment to\u00a0relocate manpower and resources to other jurisdictions<\/strong>\u00a0in Asia like the Philippines and Singapore. <\/p>\n\n\n\n According to Bloomberg,\u00a0Light & Wonder Inc<\/strong>, has opened a new office in the Philippines, which has become its most important market in Asia, and is relocating its overseas staff there due to the drop in demand in Macau caused by low tourist numbers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ken Jolly, vice president and general manager of Asia for Light & Wonder, said Macau casinos won’t buy new equipment\u00a0until they get a licence to continue operating<\/a>\u00a0in the licence retender. Without new sales, the company is receiving only limited revenue from maintenance and technical support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bloomberg reports that an equipment maker from Japan is also relocating up to 30 per cent of its workforce and pulling more than half of its inventory out of Macau due to supply chain issues and a 90-per cent plunge in revenue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jay Chun<\/strong>, president of the Macau Gaming Equipment Manufacturers Association, said he was aware of at least four multinational casino operators that were moving labour and resources overseas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Chun noted that Macau is also revising standards for electronic slot machines<\/strong>, forcing manufacturers to develop new software, which can be particularly expensive and challenging for smaller operators. As a result, some may choose not to upgrade less popular machines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Daniel Cheng<\/strong>, a former executive at gaming companies such as Hard Rock International, added to get the new licence, and as part of Beijing’s efforts to reduce Macau’s reliance on gambling<\/a>, casino operators must commit to investing in non-gaming sectors such as traditional Chinese medicine and technology. That will force them to cut spending on underperforming slot machines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The trend may accelerate after the government set\u00a0the maximum number of gaming tables and slot machines<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>allowed in casinos from 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The maximum number of gaming tables across all casinos will be 6,000 while the maximum number of gaming machines has been set at 12,000. In 2019, there were already 17,000 machines on the market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In August, Macau’s gross gaming revenue<\/a> (GGR) was up 450 per cent in August, from MOP398m (US$49.2m) to MOP2.19bn (US$270.8m). However, the figure was down 50.7 per cent when compared to August 2021<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, Singapore\u2019s gaming revenue recovered to 70 per cent of its pre-Covid-19 levels <\/strong>in the second quarter, while the Philippines and South Korea both returned to around 75 per cent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Companies have started to move staff, and inventory to the Philippines and Singapore due to China\u2019s ongoing Covid Zero policy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":25801,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"China's persistent Covid-Zero policy and Macau's evolving regulatory landscape, including license retender conditions and new gaming equipment standards, are compelling B2B gaming suppliers to relocate operations and inventory to other Asian jurisdictions like the Philippines and Singapore. This shift is driven by plummeting demand in Macau, revenue declines for suppliers, and a strategic pivot by casino operators towards non-gaming investments as mandated for license renewal. The imposition of caps on gaming tables and machines further signals a contraction in Macau's gaming equipment market.","focusai_entities":"Light & Wonder Inc, Ken Jolly, Macau Gaming Equipment Manufacturers Association, Jay Chun, Hard Rock International, Daniel Cheng","focusai_location":"China, Macau, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.95), regulator (0.9), compliance_legal (0.75), operator_casino (0.95), product_ux (0.7), tech_data (0.75), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (1.0), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Macau GGR Outlook?","query":"Given the new table\/machine caps and non-gaming investment mandates, what is the projected GGR trajectory for Macau's concessionaires over the next 3-5 years, and how will this impact their capital expenditure on gaming equipment?"},{"label":"Supplier Diversification Strategy?","query":"How are B2B gaming equipment suppliers like Light & Wonder re-evaluating their Asia-Pacific market diversification strategies and product development roadmaps in response to Macau's evolving regulatory framework and the growth in other regional jurisdictions?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[157,16338,158],"tags":[23906],"class_list":["post-33302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-news","category-east-asia-news","category-slider-home","tag-macau-casinos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33302"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33302\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33313,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33302\/revisions\/33313"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}