Japan’s exceedingly high development and operational costs, ongoing concerns over the feasibility of potential IR sites in Hokkaido and Aichi and questions over whether respected international operators can be lured back loom as serious threats to the country’s plans to run a second round of IR bidding in 2027.
However, a lack of regional development alternatives and the opportunity to observe how the local market responds to MGM’s first-mover Osaka IR could be enough to encourage a reasonable level of participation, according to an analysis by Convergence Strategy Group Co-Founder, Scott Fisher.
