Planned Conversion Of Mirage To Hard Rock Casino Clears Nevada Gaming Approvals

December 20, 2022 by Dave Haynes

Anybody that sells specifically into the casino and overall hospitality market will know this, but if that’s just one market being chased you should be aware of a monster opportunity for displays and other gear has cleared approvals for Las Vegas.

The Mirage resort has been sold by MGM and the new owner is the Seminole Tribe of Florida, through its Hard Rock International subsidiary. So the Mirage will become the Hard Rock, and the existing building will be gutted and re-imagined, with the big feature a giant new guitar-shaped building right along the Strip.

If you have not been to Vegas in a while, the old Hard Rock casino resort that was off the strip is now Virgin Hotels LV.

The old and new Hard Rock towers will house between 3,600 and 3,700 rooms, which means, presumably, a whole bunch of IPTV hotel TVs.

The casino, restaurants, and public areas will also be rebuilt, with the casino almost doubling in size to 174,000. Slot machines will more than double and table games will quadruple.

Some 83,000 square feet in convention space will be added to the 200,000 square feet in place, including a new ballroom. The theater will almost double in seating and there will be at least 21 restaurants under the rebuild.

All that likely means a whole bunch of flat panel and interactive displays and software licenses, as well as large format LED, will be up for tender, along with a mountain of integration work.

The new owners stress the hotel will not be closed during the time, and that some of the revisions are still in design stage. Construction would take at least 2.5 years.

A tribal-owned and operated casino resort is not entirely new to Vegas, but this will be the first mega-resort right on the Strip operated by a Native-American tribe. The San Manuel Band of Mission Indians acquired the Palms, which is just off the Strip, and the Mohegan Sun of Connecticut operate the Virgin (old Hard Rock) resort.

I dunno what this means for the Hard Rock Cafe on the Strip, which is way down towards the south end of the Strip. That’s been the home, most years, of the DSE mixer. I used to have all kinds of people come in saying they went to the casino, only to learn they should have gone to the cafe. Once this is up, I can’t just say the Hard Rock on the Strip … unless they relocate this into the new resort and sell this place.