Eight companies made the second round of bidding for the Hard Rock hotel and casino, including major public gaming companies and private real estate investors, the property's chief financial officer says.

Owner Peter Morton narrowed a much wider field because he wanted to close the deal within nine months, CFO Jim Bowen said. Morton, who built the Hard Rock for $85 million in 1995, is selling it to Morgans Hotel Group for $770 million — a package deal that includes about 23 acres of adjacent land, a condo development plan and the rights to the Hard Rock brand in Nevada.

The process weeded out companies that didn't already have a Nevada gaming license or couldn't line up a casino manager quickly. (It takes at least a year to get licensed.) Morgans expects to obtain a license to run the casino at the Hard Rock but will hire a management company in the interim.

Investors say Morton is one lucky man — maybe too lucky. Some shareholders have been unhappy with the deal, which values the Hard Rock property at about $25 million per acre and the undeveloped land at around $11 million per acre. Morgans, which wanted a foothold in Las Vegas yesterday, is betting on the property's long-term potential.

Considering the price of entry on the Strip and the lack of existing boutique hotels that cater to Morgan's brand of hipster, the company probably considers itself lucky.

Eight also proved to be a portentious number for the Riviera, which narrowed down a larger field of interested buyers for the aging north Strip property to eight last year that submitted formal proposals to buy the entire company, including the company's sister casino in Colorado.

Six of those eight buyers, with offers ranging from $12 to $24 per share, dropped out of the running. Winning bidder Riv Acquisition Holdings stayed on the roller-coaster for several more months, reducing a $23 offer made at a time when Riviera stock was higher than $26 per share to $15 after the stock plummeted.

Riviera's board rejected that offer.

After stealthily buying up the chief executive's personal stake at $15 per share, the buyers headed to the negotiating table again, settling on a final purchase offer of $17 per share.

As luck would have it, over the next few days the stock shot up from less than $16 per share to more than $20, where it has traded the past couple of months.

On the flip side of the equation are some less-than-satisfied shareholders who say the company is worth more. But those bettors aren't buyers. After the flurry of initial interest last year when the company initiated a formal bidding process, no buyers surfaced in the final months of negotiations, Riviera officials said.