foreign I am Stephanie with gaming America and I am here with Ray pinepo the CEO of Mohican gaming hello Stephanie how are you I'm well thank you how are you um excellent well we're getting some nice weather here in east coast of the United States so uh it's fantastic and we're heading into holiday weekend so even better absolutely good to hear um that ties in well with our first question actually to race day and see what you think your most successful event has been with bringing people back into the properties and if you've reached pre-pandemic levels of visitors yet again you know listen you know one of the driving forces behind all of our properties whether it's here in Connecticut whether it's in Canada Pennsylvania Washington New Jersey is is events right holding events driving you know large amounts of crowds uh it can range from having a a concert uh it could be uh you know a Wine Fest which we've uh been running successfully in Connecticut for for uh over a decade now um and a very successful event uh we run barbecue fest we have hot summer fun we run events throughout the the year at all of our properties and it helps Drive traffic it helps create Buzz around the property it helps create you know masses around the property and real brings people out to uh have a good time and enjoyment and find various things that people like to do you know uh you know wine food fast uh whiskey fast uh you know all kinds of things that can drive different forms of crowds uh cigar events so some are private vents some are large events some are celebrity events and it's uh looking to appeal to uh masses of different people I wouldn't say any one event is our favorite event over the others I think it's just important to continue to um to run these events to continue to drive guest engagement to continue to provide things that guests want to have and enjoy um and we want to make sure that each year that we run event we continue to grow uh the number of people that uh that visit them uh so that we know that it's a successful event and people want to uh enjoy them so so I'm very proud of the events that our team runs they do a lot of work and put in a lot of time to make sure the rents events run smoothly uh that they come off seamlessly that uh any um issues that occur because if that issues always occur or in the background and are not guest facing and it goes off seamlessly for the guests so our team works very very hard on these events and and I'm proud of of the work that they put in to put them on so really it's just about filling the calendar for every type of you really want to appeal to a wide spectrum of people um you know everybody has different likes and different tastes and different activities that they want to engage in and we want to attract as wide of a crowd and as broad of a spectrum of Interest as we possibly can so we try to be creative in our events we try to create new events as we go along um and look for areas where we can attract new guests that may have it not to visit our properties that we think is an opportunity to bring in new guests and enjoy our facilities great uh the next question was about a particular type of guest and that would be the sports fan and with the popularity of sports betting particularly in New York nearby we wondered if that's affected how many people come to Mohegan Sun in Connecticut you know sports betting is really a localized activity um in the United States uh over 90 percent of sports wagering is actually done online most people aren't changing their their entertainment activities because of sports wagering um if they were going to watch a a local game whether it's the Celtics or the Knicks or the Bruins or the Patriots you know they were going to watch that event anyway and now they have the opportunity to wager on that event I think having Sports waging ourselves has allowed us to attract new guests and and get new signups to uh engage in our property whether they're from Massachusetts or New York or Rhode Island and come here and enjoy a game because we have a spectacular Sportsbook here in Connecticut we also have one in Pennsylvania and and in Las Vegas and Washington State also has their sports book and we're going to be uh soon adding one in Niagara so I think it's an opportunity to actually attract new people I don't think it's just it's had any effect on uh the attraction of New Yorkers coming to Connecticut that they have the sports wager in fact I think it's allowed us to attract new guests who would come here and be able to uh watch the games on a big screen and be able to wager on it uh as well again just building that Community with having everyone there together engaging with the event in the game uh that sounds good yeah sure related question would be about how it's been working with two different sports books since you work with both betfred and FanDuel in the different locations have there been major differences has everything been smooth so actually we work with more than that um so uh obviously our relationship here in Connecticut was with Vandal um in Las Vegas that's with bet Fred our relationship actually in Pennsylvania is with Kindred slash unibet in in uh Niagara it's actually with Camby so we have four various partners that we work with on the sports wagering side and you know they were chosen for specific reasons in specific locations and and certain abilities uh that that each of them provided in the jurisdictions whether you chose them I can tell you that our relationships with our partners have all been fantastic and and uh it's a pleasure to work with them all they're all experienced operators and sports wagering um they're all obviously had experience in in the European markets and had been doing it uh for a long a long time and you know we weren't looking to recreate the wheel when we were entering into the sports wagering Market in our various jurisdictions um so we selected partners that we thought we could work with that we had uh similar values and similar goals and and to this point all of our relationships have been fantastic with all of our uh our platform providers okay speaking of similar goals uh we wanted to talk to you about the potential New York City Casino bid and we previously at gaming America spoke to Michael hirschman the CEO of this little VF group and why he wanted to partner with Mohegan and how he liked your style but we wanted to know why Mohican chose to Libya for the potential project there's so many similarities between you know our organization and and their company you know we're both relatively large organizations but you wouldn't know that because they're both also family organizations um and we both work as family organizations we have very similar views on you know giving back to the community on caring about the environment and making sure that we're socially responsible um and we're family businesses on on built on making sure that we're taking Fair care of the families as well as the communities in which we operate it's such a symbiotic relationship and such a great connection um they were the perfect partner for us and you know we know we have a great project and we're putting our best foot forward that's going to be very very competitive but we couldn't be happier happier than working with uh Michael and and the entire team at solvieve and the commonalities that we have and um I think that the relationship that we've had and the work that we've done together over uh the last several months of putting this project together just prove to both of us uh that um we are exceptionally similar and want the same goals and uh have the same values he did mention uh social responsibility as well as Style just throwing that out there and Michael Hurston spoke of the museum that you plan to build in relation to the history of democracy and we were curious if there will be any tribal history included in the development as well you know there's there's so much work going on in New York you know to be honest with any of you there's a lot of prognosticators saying when's New York gonna happen um it's going to be a while it's a slow process um and quite honestly there's a lot of work that's going into the design that's going into the details um and all those discussions are going on right now you know quite honestly you know the massive size of of uh of the project that we're building is going to require a lot of talk a lot of details and a lot of discussion among the partners and we're having those and you know we've been going through those on a daily basis with them and we have teams that are meeting on a regular basis to make sure we're starting to get into those details but you know the overall size of the project has got to be you know um landed on First and and we've gotten into a good place there and now we're going to dig into the details I can't tell you right now whether there'll be tribal history within the Democracy Museum I think it's a fantastic uh concept for them to have something because the property is located within uh within uh two doors of the UN building um which you know couldn't be any higher praise for for maintaining democracy so I think it's a tremendous asset to have for the property but as we move on and we talk to the community and we talk to the leaders in the community and we talk to the residents you know we're making tweaks along the way of what they want to see and being good as I said good Community Partners and making sure we build a project that that works within the community where we want to build it has ended its time um we were wondering what uh you think will happen to uh theolani and the Cowlitz tribe when Mohegan is no longer its partner going forward yeah so um well let me you know first say that that our partnership continues until next July um our management agreement uh currently does not expire to then and we're working with them on making sure that we provide a perfectly seamless transition plan so that they're fully prepared to take over operations uh when the management agreement expires I will tell you that I'm tremendously proud of what uh Mohegan has accomplished in Partnership uh with the college tribe and Elon a um they are um a leading uh property in Washington state and and are dominating the Portland market and it's a tremendously beautiful property we uh you know we ourselves as a tribal operations went through our own self-determination we we had a management agreement with a management company in the first five years of our operation and actually um also transitioned out of that as well so we fully support self-determination for a tribe and tribe have controlling their own destiny the intent all along was to make sure that uh that we built them for success in the future so I wish them nothing but the greatest of success and and I think that we've set them up for to for continued success in the future okay uh one of our last questions for you is about another very big project I'm sure you know um what it's going to be about but the Inspire entertainment Resort in South Korea we wanted to know how that's been process uh progressing and if you're expecting it to draw local visitors with its non-gaming amenities or if you're mostly aiming towards tourists a great question what an exciting project um you know I ex I explain Inspire in in a simple fashion we're building what we have in Connecticut which is about three million square feet of facility space which we built in in four phases in one phase in Korea we're building approximately three million square feet of space with three hotels 1200 rooms a 1500 seat a 15 000 seat Arena um a fully enclosed uh climate controlled um water park uh Convention Center Entertainment space um obviously the casino uh retail shopping dining it's just a very exciting project I just came back from there a couple weeks ago and the progressing making has been tremendous and they've made even greater progress over the last uh two weeks since I've left we fully anticipate um a soft launch opening um in the fourth quarter of this year unfortunately our Casino license is subject to being open and receiving some approvals from the government post opening so we anticipate that'll follow shortly after we open the facility in the in the fourth quarter of this year I think it's going to be tremendous success you know obviously it's a foreigners only Casino I will tell you there are a lot of expats that live in Seoul and in and around Seoul Incheon area because it's a major metropolitan area um there are also many dual passport holders but we're also focusing a lot on non-gaming amenities so to your question we are looking to attract not only locals but foreigners as well we will be the largest and I believe the most exciting integrated Resort in South Korea South Korea pre-pandemic had the seventh busiest airport in the world um and is actually the hub for a lot of stopovers for many of the other South uh Southeastern Asian countries where they stop over there before they go on to the destination on the average stay over is over five hours and we're Within a two-minute Drive uh from the airport so I think between attracting uh foreign visitors between attracting Travelers that have a stay over and inch on and our non-gaming amenities which is a tremendous uh is a large part of our project in South Korea that we intend to attract people from Seoul and Incheon and locals as well as foreigners so uh that property will probably have a larger portion of their overall Revenue coming from non-gaming amenities and locals uh than our other properties as we've put put a tremendous focus on non-gaming attraction and amenities that are desired in the local community be different from your regular operations to run a casino floor that is strictly based on foreign players well you know the the one difference that you know we really have to pay attention to um is passports right you know you have to make sure that that they are foreigners only and that uh you know they're not uh residents of South Korea that are gambling there so you know that'll be the one major difference but but beyond that you know running a gambling floor running again like oh that's gonna have slot machines and and table games and uh very similar to other properties you know we're going to have amenities like the hotel and the convention center and the and the water park similar to our other our other properties the arena so I don't think operations necessarily will be different um obviously the the additional requirement to make sure that um that we're checking passports that we're only allowing those who permitted to come into the gaming gambling part of the facility old school geolocation then there you go our last question for you is uh whether or not you have any other future projects you want to tell us about so you know Korea is a very large project and we have a uh we have a um a a big part of our team that's focusing on Korea right it's it's a uh it's not only large but it's obviously you know we're we're spending a tremendous amount of money to make sure that we have a successful project so you know that's taking up a lot of our team's time New York is not in any way a small project it's a it's an enormous project um and we have a very large team that's working on that project as well um so those two projects you know we're pursuing uh vigorously um with the full effort of our of our team behind them and backing them I can tell you that that uh as an organization we constantly look at other opportunities that that are out there and there's you know one that I can't disclose now that that we are uh exploring as a potential opportunity but we have a development team and it's led by uh um a tremendous uh senior vice president that's always out there looking for opportunities that meet meet this organization's standards um and if something comes up that we feel uh meets the quality and standards that we want to pursue do we will continue to look at opportunities there's nothing to announce today but I will tell you our team is vigorously pursuing completing Korea and winning the New York license well thank you for joining us and for answering all of our questions and we look forward to seeing how everything with Mohegan develops then thank you Stephanie it's a it's a pleasure speaking with you thanks so much