SCL announces long-term partnership to bring NBA to Macau

SCL announces long-term partnership to bring NBA to Macau – photo by Renato Marques

Sands China Limited (SCL) has announced it has established a multi-year partnership with the National Basketball Association (NBA) to bring world-class basketball to Macau.

The newly inked partnership aims to bring NBA preseason matches and other complementary initiatives every year.

According to the plan, SCL will host two preseason games per year over the next five years at its newly reopened after an extensive revamp Venetian Arena.

The Brooklyn Nets and Phoenix Suns will be the teams kicking off this partnership, featuring two games to take place in October next year.

Details provided by NBA’s deputy commissioner Mark Tatum during a media roundtable held at the Londoner Macau, the first game will take place on Oct. 10, with a second to follow on Oct. 12.

At the same event, Patrick Dumont, president and chief operating officer of Las Vegas Sands Corp., said, “This is a very exciting day for us. We’ve been working on this for a long time. It’s a big dream of ours to be able to bring international sports and entertainment to Macau,” adding, “What better way to bring sports than to bring the best sport in the world, which is basketball? So we’re very proud that’s how we have this partnership with the NBA. It’s a multi-year partnership, it’s long term, it’s about investment in Macau’s future, it’s about driving high-value tourism, it’s about driving sports, usual dialogue, and all kinds of fun things around basketball.”

Sharing the same excitement, Tatum unveiled the details of the games, noting, “I’m excited to announce that next October (October 10 to 12), the Brooklyn Nets and the Phoenix Suns will be returning to China to play games here as part of this partnership with Sands,” he said, adding, “Basketball has a long history here, and it is an exciting day. [We have a large] number of fans in this area who love the game of basketball. It’s the number one sport here,” remarking that the teams of the Nets and Suns are also very popular among the fans in Macau, mainland China, and Hong Kong.

(Left to right) Grant Chum, CEO and president of Sands China Ltd, Mark Tatum, NBA’s deputy commissioner, and Patrick Dumont, president and chief operating officer of Las Vegas Sands Corp. – Photo by Renato Marques

Addressing the fact that the partnership also involves a significant part of both companies’ corporal social responsibility, Tatum noted that players like Kevin Durant, Dennis Schröder (who’s a world champion from the 2023 World Cup last year), Devin Booker (an Olympian and all-star) would all be here. [This event] will give the opportunity for fans in Macau and throughout the region to see the world’s best basketball players in addition to the game. I want to say that this partnership is also about giving back to the community.”

In his turn, Grant Chum, CEO and president of Sands China, noted that with the signing of this multi-year partnership with the NBA, SCL will be bringing a whole series of landmark and iconic events, sporting content, and related lifestyle events to Macau.

“What we are looking to do here is through this multi-year partnership is taking this tourism + sports strategy to a new level,” Chum said, adding, “I think you’ve heard a lot about the direction in Macau about tourism + convention, tourism + retail, tourism + sports, we believe the strategy works both ways. We are bringing internationally renowned sporting events, such as the NBA games, to Macau to enhance the tourism landscape, but at the same time, we believe the sporting spectacle and the sporting events will also be enhanced by the hospitality and the integrated resort tourism context, where people can enjoy the best of hospitality, entertainment, retail, food, and beverage, together with these great sporting events and the spinoff lifestyle and indeed mice events that will arise out of this great partnership.”

Remarking on the company’s social responsibility aspect, Chum also added that this is also a key focus for SCL, advancing that this would not be restricted to the time of the games (in September or October every year) but that would extend throughout the year and through a series of opportunities to engage with the local community and to promote youth sports and to leverage NBA Cares with Sand Cares program.

The SCL CEO also remarked that the extensive revamp of the Venetian Area, which received great compliments from the NBA officials, is a project that Sands is very proud of and very proud of the large investment made in one facility that he said to be “a key part of our integrated resort.”