The Kansai region of Western Japan is known for its entrepreneurial spirit and commercial culture. It is, then, apt that Osaka, Kansai’s biggest city, will be the home of the country’s first integrated resort (IR), which is a group of facilities integrating international convention and conference facilities, exhibition facilities, accommodations, entertainment venues, and casino facilities.
As Japan’s first IR to include a casino, the project is attracting interest both inside the country and around the world and has the potential to boost domestic as well as regional tourism across Asia and generate strong returns for the resort’s principal developers: ORIX Group and MGM, the US casino operator.
“This is Japan’s first IR resort and we believe it will attract many visitors and tourists to Osaka, both from the rest of Japan and from overseas”, says Toyonori Takahashi, ORIX’s Group Kansai Representative.
The IR will be built on Yumeshima, an artificial island in Osaka Bay, that is also the site of Expo 2025 Osaka, which is being held there next spring. The resort is scheduled to open around fall of 2030, and it is hoped it will be a driver of inbound visitors to the area looking to experience Japanese and, specifically, Kansai culture and the world’s latest entertainment complex.
Regional focus, international appeal
The project has strong backing from Osaka’s prefectural and municipal governments as well as local businesses, some of whom have become shareholders alongside ORIX and MGM, which hold equal stakes.
There is unlikely to be any national competition in the short term: while the national government originally considered approving three IRs across the country, development of the other two projects has been put on hold for now.
Regionally, meanwhile, Yumeshima will have to compete with the established IRs in Asia, particularly in Macau and Singapore. However, Mr. Takahashi believes that Japan’s other attractions, from food to culture to nature for visitors to explore and enjoy, give it strong advantages over these smaller cities.
While this makes the IR an attractive investment for ORIX Group on its own terms, it also contributes to ORIX’s overall Kansai strategy of attracting and serving tourists and travelers to the region via the airports it operates, the hotels and entertainment facilities it manages, as well as the giant redevelopment of the Umekita district in central Osaka.
“I believe projects like Yumeshima and Umekita contribute both to our company and to Kansai as a whole”, says Mr. Takahashi. “I am confident to the success of Japan’s first integrated resort development.” The world is eager to see what such a complex will look like in a country with strong inbound visitor interest.
This pioneering project is just another example of how ORIX is “Finding Paths. Making Impact.” in new business areas and local communities in Japan and across the world, and it makes it only more impactful that it is located in the city in which ORIX has its roots.
