Venetian parent company Las Vegas Sands Inc. has signed letters of intent with five hotel companies to develop the 120 acres into a mini-Las Vegas Strip, anchored with a 3,000-suite version of The Venetian, complete with a mall and convention center.

"We have introduced to the government another seven or eight brands and investor groups, and as we finish those deals, we'll end up with a Las Vegas-style strip of approximately eight different brands, one of which is The Venetian," said William Weidner, president and chief operating officer of Las Vegas Sands Inc.

Venetian officials hope to develop a strategy in Macau similar to the one that contributed to record first-quarter results this year.

"The Venetian in Cotai is a destination-style resort, 3,000 rooms, very similar to The Venetian here," Weidner said. "It has approximately 1 million square feet of meeting and exhibition space. It is the demand spine for that whole strip."

Weidner said as in Las Vegas, The Venetian wouldn't be able to accommodate all the guests it expects to generate through conventions in Macau. That's where the other hotel properties come in. Weidner said they would develop rooms to serve what is expected to become a strong mid-week convention market.

"The concept of Cotai is kind of a re-execution of the strategy here in Las Vegas but on a broader scale since we now have investors interested in the kind of demand we develop," Weidner said.

Weidner named Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc., White Plains, N.Y.; Marriott International Inc., Bethesda, Md.; Four Seasons Hotels Inc., Toronto; Hard Rock International, Orlando; and InterContinental Hotels Group PLC, Windsor, England, as signers of letters of intent to participate in the Cotai project.

Representatives of those companies did not give details of their development plans, and some could not be reached for comment.

Hard Rock has nine hotel properties worldwide, some with casinos. Among the company's Asian properties are developments in Bali, Indonesia, and Pattaya, Thailand.

InterContinental owns the Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express and Candlewood Suites brands.

Starwood is a partner in the company attempting to acquire the Aladdin hotel-casino and convert it into a Planet Hollywood hotel-casino. Starwood has had a revitalized interest in the Las Vegas market with its Westin brand at the Westin Casuarina, but it doesn't operate casinos.

Weidner said each of the hotels at Cotai would have casino and entertainment venues that would be run by his company.

"Most of these operators aren't necessarily interested in operating casinos anyway," Weidner said. "Their business is hotels and meetings, food and beverage. They couldn't operate the casinos if they wanted to, because only the licensees can actually operate the casinos, but most of them are not in the business anyway."

Las Vegas Sands is one of two American gaming concessionaires building in Macau. The other is Steve Wynn, who recently engineered a stock offering to help finance his growth in Las Vegas and China.

"No one else can really do a casino concession other than ourselves, Wynn and (existing Chinese concessionaire Stanley) Ho," Weidner said. "Mr. Wynn and Mr. Ho have decided their direction and we have then begun this process on a broader scale. The idea is to develop an Asian destination similar to Las Vegas."

Las Vegas Sands' hope is that its new casino will give Chinese gamblers a taste of what they can expect from the company.

The company hasn't made a big splash for its opening. For several weeks, the company has issued a multiple-choice list of potential opening dates -- May 10, May 12 or May 18, all of which have some significance of good luck on the Chinese calendar.

But Weidner promised that the casino is unlike anything the Chinese have ever seen in Macau.

"In Macau, normally what you have are hotels with smaller rooms that are casinos," he said. "We essentially have a very large casino. The main casino floor has 235 table games and 600 slot machines under an 88-foot-high ceiling and it's very modern, very 21st century."

He said the decor combines Eastern and Western cultures, including a tea pit with 200 different varieties of the world's best teas available.

But Weidner said even with the future development of Cotai, he doubted that casino development in Macau would ever outdo Las Vegas.

"We could never rival the Strip, with billions and billions of dollars in investment, 130,000 rooms and 20 or so megafacilities," Weidner said.