J. Brin Gibson Appointed to a Second Term as Colorado River Commissioner
J. Brin Gibson was reappointed by Gov. Brian Sandoval to serve a second term as a member of Nevada’s Colorado River Commission, which is responsible for acquiring, managing and protecting Nevada’s water and hydroelectric power resources from the Colorado River. Established in 1935, the Commission works with the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the other six Colorado River Basin states to effectively manage one of our country’s most important natural resources. Gibson will serve as one of seven Commissioners for another three-year term. Gibson is an attorney in Lionel Sawyer & Collin’s Gaming and Regulatory Law Department. He joined the firm in 2008 after receiving his J.D. from the J. Reuben Clark Law School at Brigham Young University, where he was a member of the BYU Law Review. For more information, visit www.lionelsawyer.com.
Jumer’s Casino & Hotel Names David Wolf New President and General Manager
Jumer’s Casino & Hotel announced the selection of David M. Wolf as its new president and general manager. With more than 33 years of leadership experience in the gaming arena, Wolf will oversee all aspects of the operation at the Rock Island, Ill., venue, including gaming, food and beverage, and lodging. Wolf comes to Jumer’s after spending four years as general manager at Odawa Casino Resort in Petoskey, Mich., where he oversaw all aspects of the property, including 1,300 slots, 26 table games, a poker room, a 1,000-seat showroom, five food and beverage venues, a hotel and a 550-person staff. Wolf spent the first 16 years of his career with Harrah’s Resort in Atlantic City, serving in a myriad of roles, including internal auditor, senior operations analyst, supervisor of operations analysis, manager of planning and analysis, director of planning and analysis, and director of financial reporting and analysis. In 1997, he joined Majestic Star Casino in Gary, Ind., as vice president of finance and administration and was promoted in 2001 to vice president and general manager. Wolf’s career also includes senior leadership positions at Fitzgerald’s Casino and Isle of Capri Casino, before taking over in 2006 as corporate vice president of planning and analysis at Diamondjacks Casino & Resort, where he remained until 2010. Wolf is a graduate of Rider University in Lawrenceville, N.J. For more information, visit www.jumerscasinohotel.com.
Casino Lisboa Names JCM Global Preferred Bill Acceptor Supplier
Portugal’s Casino Lisboa has named JCM Global its preferred bill validator supplier. Specifically, Casino Lisboa named JCM’s iVIZION® as its preferred bill validator. Casino Lisboa is the latest in a string of casinos across Europe that have named JCM their preferred supplier in recent months. A long-term JCM customer, Casino Lisboa has used JCM’s WBA® and UBA® bill validators in the past. Now after a successful three-month trial, the casino is converting to the groundbreaking iVIZION bill validator. For more information, visit www.jcmglobal.com.
GTECH Canada-led Consortium Gets $5 million to Develop Cross Channel Gaming Platform; GTECH Signs Contract Extension with Minnesota State Lottery, Wins eGaming Review’s Lottery Software Supplier of the Year
The province of New Brunswick has awarded a consortium led by GTECH Canada ULC with a five-year, CAN $5 million research grant for the development of a new multi-channel content application platform. The consortium, comprised of GTECH Canada, T4G, New Brunswick Community College and First Mobile Education, will develop a technology platform to deliver game content and features across a broad range of mobile and web-based devices and land-based gaming machines. Funding for the project is being provided through the province’s $15 million Industry Innovation Challenge. Launched last October, the New Brunswick Research and Innovation Council unveiled a provincial competition designed to identify large-scale industry research and development initiatives that will mobilize provincial assets to fuel economic growth. The challenge awarded the top innovative groups with a $5 million grant to develop their proposal. As part of the project, GTECH Canada will establish an Interactive game development team in Moncton while leveraging in-house experience in new game development for Interactive games and providing synergies with land-based and Interactive game content development. The team will work to develop cross-channel games and functionalities, and will utilize T4G’s analytics platform that will combine performance measures of single game titles across multiple channels, as well as compare player behavior and player segmentation.
GTECH has extended its agreement with the Minnesota State Lottery for a one-year period that started May 29, 2014. GTECH and the Minnesota State Lottery initially entered into an agreement for instant-ticket printing services in December 2011, which was the result of a competitive procurement and named GTECH as a secondary instant-ticket vendor for the lottery. The initial contract included the option to extend the term for two one-year periods. This is the first extension option that has been exercised by the lottery. GTECH supports the lottery with instant-ticket printing services as well as prize structure development, customized sales data analysis, game planning and strategy. Over the past year, GTECH and the lottery have worked together to revitalize the lottery’s $30 price point by introducing the industry’s first $30 licensed property game. The game launched in August of 2013 and included three instant 1 million dollar top prizes, a mass media marketing program and second chance prize opportunities. The game was successful in increasing sales for the price point, selling more tickets than the two most recent $30 games launched by the lottery.
GTECH was named Lottery Software Supplier of the Year for the fifth consecutive year by eGaming Review. The eGR B2B Awards is the egaming service industry’s event of the year for providers and celebrates those who have powered the egaming industry in the last 12 months. eGR B2B presents awards in several categories of service excellence including lottery software. For more information, visit www.gtech.com.
IGT Partners with bwin.party for Games Rollout, Shows Global Systems Prowess with DLV Latvia Win
IGT partnered with bwin.party digital entertainment to launch many of IGT’s top-performing interactive games on the bwin platform. IGT supplied its content to bwin.party, which launched online poker and casino offerings in New Jersey under the license of Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa, for distribution in New Jersey at nj.partypoker.com and internationally at partypoker.com, bwin.com, as well as at other bwin.party brands in nationally regulated European markets. bwin.party gained access to IGT’s complete game library via a one-time, simple integration to the IGT remote game server solution.
IGT also signed an agreement with DLV to install IGT systems in 50 slot halls connecting approximately 1,000 machines in locations throughout Latvia over the next two years. With first installations scheduled for July of 2014, DLV planned to leverage IGT Casinolink, Medialink and EZ Pay systems to maximize efficiency and player engagement through improved accounting with jackpot and player management technologies. The agreement also marked the introduction of the IGT Xtra Credit systems module to the European market, which should enable easy deployment of promotional awards while increasing play time. For more information, visit www.igt.com.
Aristocrat Announces VGT Acquisition for US $1.3 Billion; Also Strenthens Systems and Linked Progressive Offerings with Paltronics Purchase
Aristocrat Leisure Limited announced that it entered into an agreement to acquire North American based gaming machine provider Video Gaming Technologies, Inc. for total consideration of approximately US $1.3 billion in cash, subject to certain adjustments and regulatory approvals.
Aristocrat Leisure Ltd also announced the acquisition of all material assets of Paltronics Inc., including IP relating to product. Paltronics provides a range of value-added applications for in-game media windows and bonusing applications for EGMs, video poker machines and table games. In North America, Paltronics provides a complementary product offering to Aristocrat’s OASIS 360™ systems portfolio, with digital media and venue-wide progressive bonusing products. In Australia, New Zealand and throughout Asia, Aristocrat will maintain the relationship with the independently-owned Paltronics Australasia Pty Limited, which has acted as the exclusive distributor for Paltronics products in the regions. This acquisition further strengthened Aristocrat’s OASIS 360™ systems offer in North America, while delivering incremental product synergies, access to new technologies and product features, cost savings and integration benefits. This deal also secured Aristocrat’s access to key technology underpinning the company’s exciting new generation of linked progressive products, while protecting existing multi-site progressive technology infrastructure and opening up further innovation opportunities in the jackpot segment. For more information, visit www.aristocratgaming.com.
AGEM Announces Nine New Members Join Organization, Creation of AGEM Mexico Committee to be Based in Mexico City
AGEM announced that its Board of Directors approved the membership applications of nine new companies, bringing the trade group comprised of the world’s leading gaming suppliers to a total of 141 members, an all-time high. The new AGEM members are: Adlink Technology, Amatic Industries, Boss Gaming, Gold Club, Intervision Gaming, Metronia, Portilla, U1 Gaming and Wells Fargo.
AGEM also announced that its Board of Directors has approved the creation of the new AGEM Mexico Committee based in Mexico City that will focus on issues specific to the Mexican market that affect a wide range of gaming suppliers. For more information, visit www.agem.org.
Bally Technologies Acquisition of Dragonplay Ltd.
Bally Technologies, Inc. announced that on July 1, 2014, it completed the acquisition of Dragonplay Ltd. Launched in 2010, Dragonplay ranks among the 10 top-grossing game developers in the social casino genre with approximately 700,000 daily active users and nearly three million monthly active users across all platforms. For more information, visit www.ballytech.com.
Okla. Downstream Casino Resort Selects BIS²’s Casino Player Development Solution
The Quapaw Tribe selected BIS²’s hostViz™ mobile-enabled player development solution for its Downstream Casino Resort in northeastern Oklahoma. BIS²’s hostViz product puts powerful information in a highly efficient way into the palm of every casino host’s hand. It enhances a host’s ability to reward players while identifying and tracking known and unknown players with lift potential—all in real time. The software, designed for both desktop and mobile devices, contains interactive casino floor maps that allow hosts, managers and marketing executives to view live activity on the casino floor, locate specific players on the floor, view player activity, including a player’s history—all at their fingertips. hostViz leverages BIS²’s extremely powerful Data Integration Hub, which enables casinos to easily access data from multiple sources, without the time and expense of building a data warehouse. hostViz also gives casino operators the option of storing data on premises or in the cloud depending on their needs. In addition, the software allows casino operators to utilize all player data without incurring any additional data-integration costs. For more information, visit www.bis2.net.
Cordeck® Selected as Provider of In Floor Cellular Raceway System on Hollywood Casino Project
Cordeck announced that it was awarded the contract for its N-R-G-FLOR® In Floor Cellular Raceway System at Plainridge Park Casino. The Cordeck team has a successful history of working closely with Penn National and its project teams to provide a secure, future-friendly and highly flexible wire and data management solution for its casinos located throughout the country. As the provider of the UL approved, N-R-G-FLOR, In Floor Cellular Raceway System, Cordeck has worked with corporations throughout the United States and abroad. By merging structural building components with wire management systems this solution delivers highly flexible power and cable management. Cordeck provides free design collaboration, offering BIM proposal plans early in the design phase to insure a project’s success. With a wide range of projects in commercial, government, entertainment, recreation and post-secondary educational facilities, Cordeck has developed a deep understanding of how to meet a variety of unique needs with the application of the In Floor Cellular Raceway System. With an entrepreneurial family history of more than a half-century, Cordeck continues the legacy as a family-owned and operated corporation headquartered in Kenosha, WI. Started in 1995, Cordeck manufactures and sells a range of construction materials including the N-R-G-FLOR In Floor Cellular Raceway System used in offices, casinos, libraries, recreational facilities and media labs throughout the U. S. and abroad. For more information, visit www.cordeck.com.
Galaxy Gaming Expands European Operations into France
Galaxy Gaming, Inc. announced the installation of its proprietary table games in France. This event marks the first French approval of a proprietary table game. France’s largest gaming operator, Groupe Lucien Barriere, agreed to install Galaxy Gaming’s award-winning table game “Lucky Ladies” into six different French casinos. The first installation occurred at the Casino Barriere du Deauville in Normandy. In addition, both Lucky Ladies and another popular Galaxy table game, “21+3”, are currently offered in five Groupe Lucien Barriere casinos in Switzerland. Barriere also operates additional casinos in France and Egypt, representing additional potential market expansion opportunities for Galaxy. Many industry observers believe France’s gaming industry is often overlooked, despite the fact that approximately 200 casinos are operating countrywide. The application process, regulatory approvals and technical agreements needed to enter this market, however, have made it difficult to reach for foreign companies. For more information, visit www.galaxygaming.com.