Sphere Entertainment Co. has said it will soon roll out a new global development plan that focuses on smaller and cheaper venues so it can more easily expand.
“We’re definitely talking worldwide about Sphere,” said Chairman and CEO James Dolan on Thursday’s Q1 earnings call. “But we do have another initiative that I think is very important that we are undertaking this year. We’re right in the middle of designing a smaller Sphere deployable in markets inside and out of the U.S. The strategy there is to build faster, cheaper, and have an ROI that makes investors enthusiastic.”
“I expect by the end of the year, I expect we’ll be talking about that smaller Sphere product as another way of expanding the business, as well as continuing to build [larger] Spheres like in Abu Dhabi and other markets.”
No other markets have been named yet beyond Vegas and Abu Dhabi, but Skift looked at the company’s trademark filings last October, which included IPs for Oman and Qatar.
For the quarter, the Sphere segment of the Sphere Entertainment business had revenue of $157.5 million, an 8% decline. The operating loss was $93.8 million.
One bright spot was events, where revenue jumped $25.6 million, with the Vegas venue offering 10 more shows than in the prior year’s quarter.
“When you look at the company and the development, it’s all about growth,” said Dolan. “It’s all about our ability to take what we see as a great product and expand it across the globe. For questions on how we use our capital, it’s done primarily towards growth so we can make the business bigger and the goals we have for it, versus necessarily returning capital to shareholders.”
“I take a look at this new project of building a smaller sphere and it’s a tremendous opportunity.”
The company’s Sphere in Las Vegas cost an estimated $2.3 billion to construct and has a seating capacity of 20,000. A second Sphere in Abu Dhabi (after a failed attempt in London) is confirmed to be a similar size to its Sin City counterpart, but the price tag and opening date have yet to be revealed.
