Dotcom dizziness
Macau equity-buzz, driven by both property development and the many new hotel and casino projects, sometimes seems reminiscent of late-90s-era dotcom-mania, especially on Hong Kong's Hang Seng stock index. But there's no going back to the days of drho.com: the whimsical website that promoted the gambling empire of Dr Stanley Ho (alas, the site--which presented Macau's premiere tycoon as a James Bond-type figure--has "gone 404"). Sociedade de Turismo e Divers'es de Macau (STDM), founded and managed by Ho in 1962, remains the largest business group and corporate employer in Macau. According to veteran journalist Harald Bruning, publisher of The Macau Post Daily newspaper, STDM also owns 80 per cent of SJM (Sociedade de Jogos de Macau). The remainder is owned by Stanley Ho personally and top STDM executives, said Bruning.
While Ho's SJM remains a formidable player in the MSAR's gaming industry, the Macau magnate been joined by Las Vegas showmen Steve Wynn and Sheldon Adelson, who envision vast swathes of neon, much located on newly reclaimed land. But Macau-watchers say Ho may have the last laugh, citing his savoir faire vis a vis the entertainment desires of the local populace--the Vegas boys, many say, are too rooted in the Wayne Newton/Siegfried and Roy mindset to appeal to local tastes.
Vertical industries like hospitality and gaming deploy vast amounts of enterprise IT--their volume can even approach verticals like banking and aviation in some cases. With the vast increases in casinos and hotels underway in Macau, opportunities for major players in the enterprise space abound. Microsoft opened their MSAR office last year (see box: "Microsoft Macau"), with HP following suit this month--these pioneering branch offices currently house sales staff.
Gaming and number-crunching
"With a staff of 50, we're one of Macau's larger enterprise IT firms," said Adam Iao, general manager for Vodatel subsidiary Mega Datatech. "We specialize in providing network infrastructure, from wireless to security, and are currently concentrating on the government sector."
Iao said that much of his firm's mission--supplying network solutions to Macau entities--is focused on hotels and casinos in the private sector. Ho's STDM is cited as a major client by Iao, who said the projects from STDM (SJM) aren't indicative of a "single-empire" philosophy. "They're more diversified, smaller networks, a couple hundred nodes [each]," he said. "We build them under time pressure and must work closely with vendors, suppliers and project teams. We have to be agile, and react quickly."
Iao added that Macau's rapid growth meant that infrastructure not only needed rapid deployment but scalability was a major concern in recent MSAR deployments. The Mega Datatech GM also said other projects his firm had helped complete include the structured cable networks, servers and storage for both Macau Polytechnic and the University of Macau.
Macau's smart cards
Like Hong Kong, Macau started issuing "smart" ID cards to its citizens about two years ago. According to Andy Mok, executive director and sales & marketing director for Megainfo Holdings (Vodatel is the parent company of MegaInfo and Mega Datatech), about half of MSAR citizens currently have the SIM-embedded identification cards. The smart cards will help enable Macau's civil service, the IACM (Instituto de Assuntos Civicos e Municipais), described by Iao as a one-stop service for Macau's citizens (and also the second largest employer in Macau, after the police force) to consolidate e-government services. Iao said his firm helped build IACM's new network, which involved migrating a legacy AS/400 system to J2EE, with Phase One of the project completed several months ago.
As smart cards put technology literally in the hands of the general populace, e-government is never an easy build. E-government is all about transforming and streamlining traditional services like driving licenses, library cards and immigration services. The changeover means privacy issues and secure identification techniques must be addressed.
Iao stated that Macau CE Edmund Ho's mandate to boost government services by improving efficiency and transparency has brought new business to Macau-based SMEs like his firm. "There are 64-65 government departments in Macau," said Iao, "each with its own budget." Iao added that while some of these departments were small units with as few as 50 employees each, the smart cards with their embedded e-certificates were drivers for new business. "We have CA [certification authority through Macau Post and PKI [public key infrastructure]," he added. "The aim is to electronically consolidate government services."
One such example is Macau's automated immigration clearance gates which are now operating at the Macau-Zhuhai border. Similar to the automated gates at the Hong Kong-Shenzhen, they operate via a two-factor authentication system: a smart card opens the first gate while the second factor (a fingerprint) opens the second gate, allowing travelers to clear immigration without the need for an immigration officer present.
East Asian Games 2005
"Our firm built the infrastructure for the East Asian Games, held in Macau in October/November 2005," said Mok. The quadrennial event (previously held Shanghai, Pusan in Korea, then Osaka-next stop: Hong Kong 2009) required network infrastructure comprising two redundant datacenters. Mok said that one of the datacenters at the Games' headquarters and one at the Macau Dome where several events will be held. According to Vodatel's website, the data center contract was valued at HK$43.4 million (US$5.6 million) with an additional contract of HK$19.6 million for "the provision of a hospitality system, system integration and project management."
The dome itself was built on reclaimed land in Cotai (in addition to hotels and casinos, this area will develop the Cotai International Sports Complex, also slated as host for the 2nd Asian Indoor Games in 2007). Inaugurated in July 2005, the dome is a three-story multi-purpose sport complex covering a total area of 139,960 square meters. The structure incorporates two separate functional indoor pavilions for different indoor sports and activities, as well as a hall that can accommodate up to 2,000 people. Other new facilities include the Macau International Shooting Range, the Tennis Academy & Bowling Centre, the latter boasting "24 lanes provision with approximately 300 temporary spectator seats," according to the Macau 4th East Asian Games website.
New infrastructure, new uses
One of the events in the East Asian Games--ten-pin bowling--is more often associated with recreation than gold-medal competition. Yet the infrastructure created for this year's event in Macau will not only have spin-offs within the IT sphere, but for Macau's general population as well. "I love to bowl," mused Mok, "but there hasn't been a bowling alley in Macau since the one in the Hotel Lisboa closed. And that was a long, long time ago."
SIDEBAR
Macau's "Olympics"
To create more opportunities for greater sports and cultural exchanges between the National Olympic Committees (NOCs) in the East Asian region, the idea of the East Asian Games was officially proposed at the 1st Assembly of the East Asian National Olympic Committees (NOCs) on 15 September 1991. In November the same year, at the 2nd Coordination Meeting of the East Asian NOCs, the quadrennial East Asian Games was formally approved and the inauguration edition scheduled to be held in China in 1993.
At the 3rd Coordination Meeting of the East Asian NOCs held in Beijing on 27 January 1992, the Coordination Committee of the East Asian National Olympic Committees (EANOC) was officially established and its Charter passed. It was determined at this meeting that the 1st East Asian Games would be held in Shanghai, China from 9 to 18 May 1993.
Later at the 6th EANOC Meeting held in Shanghai on 17 May 1993, EANOC was renamed to its present title, the East Asian Games Association (EAGA).
Members of EAGA are the National Olympic Committees (NOC) in the East Asian Zone as defined by the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA). These include the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, China, Japan, Korea, Macao, China, Mongolia, Democratic People's Republic of Korea and Chinese Taipei.
Extracted from the website of the Macau 4th East Asian Games 2005
SIDEBAR
RIM, CTM deploy Blackberries at EAG
Canadian firm Research In Motion (RIM) has leveraged the event to announce their plans to offer BlackBerry PDAs in Macau. The popular mobile devices will operate on the GPRS network of Macau telco Companhia de Telecomunica''es de Macau (CTM).
The Macau 4th East Asian Games Organising Committee (MEAGOC) will deploy BlackBerry devices through CTM's sponsorship of 35 BlackBerry wireless handhelds for the event. These BlackBerry handhelds will have a pre-installed EAG calendar to allow EAG personnel to easily check the event schedule while on the go, said CTM and RIM in a joint statement.
For corporate customers, BlackBerry Enterprise Server software tightly integrates with Microsoft Exchange, IBM Lotus Domino and Novell GroupWise and works with existing enterprise systems to enable secure, push-based wireless access to email and other corporate data, said the statement. For individuals and smaller businesses, BlackBerry Internet Service allows users to access up to ten corporate and/or personal email accounts (including Microsoft Exchange, IBM Lotus Domino and many popular ISP email accounts) from a single device.
SIDEBAR
Microsoft Macau
In June 2004, Microsoft announced the opening of its new office facility in Macau. Located in the Bank of China Macau Building, the office's function is "to spearhead the smart use of IT and broad availability of IT training and education in support of the city's accelerated economic growth," said Microsoft in a statement.
"The new office reinforces Microsoft's commitment in Macau as the city welcomes the challenges of a fast-growing gaming and tourism industry as well as its emerging enterprise sector spurred by the Closer Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA)."
"The opening of the new Microsoft office in Macau is a testament of our long-term commitment to the territory," said Alex Huang, regional director, Greater China, Microsoft, in the 2004 statement. "Microsoft is devoted to bring IT closer to the people of Macau and play a part in helping the city realize its full potential...the set-up of Microsoft Macau signals our confidence in the territory's long term economic viability."
Microsoft said it expected the number of Macau visitors "to expand further with the conclusion of CEPA and the liberalization of the gaming industry and as new hotel, casino and entertainment facilities are put into use."
"The company also plans to partner with local solution and training partners to set up the Certified Technical Education Center (CTEC)," said the statement, which also said that Microsoft will be officially launching TechNet, a bi-weekly information and community resource designed for IT professionals in Macau including technical briefings and online training materials and "information on planning, deploying, managing, and supporting Microsoft products and technologies."
"In April 2004, Microsoft partnered with the Macau University of Science and Technology (MUST) in the establishment of the MUST Education Centre," continued the statement, adding that Microsoft has invested a total of HK$1.2 million in the MUST Education Centre in the form of software including servers, applications and development tools.
Microsoft said their key customers in Macau include the Macau SAR Government, Venetian Macau Ltd., Companhia de Electricidade de Macau (CEM), the Education and Youth Affairs Bureau, including primary and secondary schools in Macau.
SIDEBAR
New Ground
Visitors to Macau in years past remember the then-enclave's southern islands as hilly outcrops connected by bridge. But in the mid-90s, massive dredging operations began that essentially merged the two islands, creating an area known as "Cotai."
"Cotai is a land reclamation area between Taipa and Coloane Islands that measures 4.7 square kilometers, while the entire MSAR measures 27.5 sq km," said publisher Harald Bruning, of The Macau Post Daily. "The Venetian casino-hotel-convention center is planned to open in phases between late 2006 and late 2007."
"Galaxy will also open a casino-hotel-resort complex in Cotai, probably around 2008," said Bruning, who added that Galaxy is a Hong Kong-owned company owned by the Lui family and known for its investments in hotels in Hong Kong, North America and mainland China.