The Glenn Group Launches Sister Agency
The Glenn Group launched a sister agency called Wide Awake to help gaming properties innovate, differentiate and master the modern marketing landscape. Wide Awake brought all the history, experience, talent and creativity of The Glenn Group, with an added depth of expertise and knowledge in gaming, the company said in a news release. The name Wide Awake pays homage to Nevada, where the company cut its teeth on gaming and where gaming was born. During the gold and silver rushes, well before gaming was legal, Nevada frontier towns that were open to gambling were referred to as “Wide Awake.” Wide Awake was not only a way of paying tribute to Nevada’s pioneering spirit and its deep gaming roots, but also focuses on the challenges of marketing casino properties within a modern marketing landscape and highly competitive gaming environment. Wide Awake shares offices with The Glenn Group in Las Vegas and Reno under the leadership of B.C. LeDoux, president and partner. For more information, visit www.wideawakenv.com.
Scientific Games Launches Online Games Library in New Jersey
Scientific Games Corporation announced the launch of its premium game server library for online casino sites powered by bwin.party. The bwin.party platform powers some of the best-known gaming brands in New Jersey, including BorgataCasino.com (Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa) and nj.partypoker.com (partypoker), whose players now have access to many of the slot titles from the Scientific Games Williams studio that are already popular on casino floors throughout Atlantic City, including Gold Fish®, Zeus III™ and Spartacus Gladiator of Rome™. For more information, visit www.scientificgames.com.
135 Billion GameAccount Network Virtual Credits Wagered in a Month
GameAccount Network announced that 135 billion virtual credits were wagered on its Simulated Gaming product in December. The announcement came a week prior to GameAccount’s appearance at ICE, where it anticipated significant interest in the social gaming product that allows players to purchase virtual credits enabling them to play their favorite slot and table games on a website, which may be connected to a land-based casino. For more information, visit www.gameaccountnetwork.com.
IAGA Announced International Gaming Summit
The International Association of Gaming Advisors announced its 34th annual International Gaming Summit will be held June 2-5 at the Fairmont Pacific Rim hotel in Vancouver, Canada. The Summit provides gaming operators, suppliers, attorneys, investors, bankers, regulators and other advisors with an unparalleled opportunity to meet and discuss the top issues and challenges facing gaming today. The International Gaming Summit will include a wide range of panels, break-out sessions and keynote speeches addressing the top issues facing global gaming today. This event is an excellent opportunity to expand the critical knowledge, tools and best practices needed to be successful in the dynamic global gaming industry. Gaming Laboratories International will hold a University Regulator Seminar on June 2 that will include numerous sessions covering a wide range of gaming regulation issues. For more information, visit www.theiaga.org.
Aristocrat Names Jay Sevigny as President of VGT
Aristocrat Leisure, Ltd. confirmed the appointment of Jayme Sevigny as president of VGT, subject to the necessary normal regulatory approvals. Sevigny who is based at VGT’s headquarters in Franklin, Tenn., reports to Aristocrat CEO Jamie Odell. Sevigny has more than three decades’ experience in the gaming industry. He began his career in casino operations for Boyd Gaming Corporation in 1980 before moving through a range of senior leadership roles in finance, marketing and general management at Harrah’s Entertainment and later with Gaylord Entertainment Company. Sevigny also served as VGT’s chief operating officer from 2006-2011. Sevigny took over from VGT Interim President Rich Schneider, who returned to his permanent role as chief product officer for Aristocrat, responsible for game development and technology across Aristocrat’s global business, including VGT. For more information, visit www.vgt.net.
Avigilon Appoints Collis Heath to Senior Vice President of Global Operations
Avigilon Corporation has appointed Collis Heath to the role of senior vice president of global operations. Heath leads and manages all aspects of Avigilon’s operations functions, including quality control, supply chain, logistics, operational excellence and enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation. Heath reports to Bryan Schmode, Avigilon chief operating officer. Heath brought more than 20 years of experience leading global operations teams in the technology industry. Throughout his career Heath has worked in and traveled extensively throughout North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia. His most recent role was with Foxconn Technology Group, one of the world’s largest electronic contract manufacturers, where he led the company’s Americas operations. Heath has also held positions at Suntron Corporation, Sony and General Electric. For more information, visit www.avigilon.com.
JCM Installs Curved Video Wall at Tachi Palace Hotel & Casino
The largest curved video wall in North America was installed at Tachi Palace Hotel & Casino and is visible throughout the entire Casino of the Moon. Measuring 38×21 feet the curved video wall is comprised of 1517 Nixels (NanoLumens’ LED board), housing a total of 776,704 pixels. JCM Global’s digital media team directed the installation of the JCM NanoLumens video wall. JCM expedited the installation with a 24/7 installation schedule over a 3-day period. Additionally, the Tachi Palace installation deploys JCM’s media management system for a simple, operator-controlled method of ‘publishing’ to the wall.
In other JCM news, Merkur Spielbanken chose JCM printers for its new casino in Sachsen-Anhalt, Germany. Additionally, JCM also installed its iVIZION® bill validators. The casino—the first from Gauselmann—has 121 slots and eight tables. For more information, visit www.jcmglobal.com.
Navegante Names Gary Armentrout as Senior Vice President
Navegante has named Gary D. Armentrout as its senior vice president. He leads development efforts within Navegante and specifically the efforts of Trillium Entertainment, which was formed by Navegante and its Canadian partners to bid on, acquire, expand and operate selected casino properties that the OLG in Canada is in process of privatizing. Armentrout brought a wealth of knowledge and experience to the Navegante team. He began his career with Harrah’s while working his way through law school. After practicing law for four years for the state of Nevada, he returned to Harrah’s as its corporate attorney, and then VP/AGM. He’s held numerous other positions including vice president and chief operating officer of President Casinos, senior vice president of development for Harvey’s Resorts, director of development for Rumsey Band of Winton Indians and its Cache Creek Casino operation and most recently president of Foxwoods Development Company. For more information, visit www.navegantegroup.com.
GTECH to Provide MGM Resorts International with Sports Betting and Mobile Solutions
GTECH Interactive U.K. and MGM Resorts International have signed a multiyear agreement to provide sports betting technology at 12 MGM Resorts properties and GTECH OnPremise™ mobile sports betting and casino gaming at 10 MGM Resorts properties in Nevada. The agreement represented GTECH’s first planned sports betting and GTECH OnPremise mobile gaming deployment in the U.S. GTECH modernized MGM’s sports betting offerings to include live in-play betting and enabled customers to place sports betting wagers via mobile anytime, anywhere in the state of Nevada. In addition, GTECH provides real-money on premise mobile casino and slots, playable anywhere within an MGM property through the players’ smartphones or tablets. The gaming and sports betting are combined into a single mobile app and linked to the players’ MGM Resorts M life loyalty club membership. GTECH also extended the mobile services to other on-premise screens that MGM installed throughout MGM Resorts properties.
GTECH also recently announced that its Doggie Cash™ progressive link game was installed at Casino Mono Blanco in Lima, Peru. Each of the three floors at the casino features four machines linked to the four-level Doggie Cash progressive jackpot. The Doggie Cash link game is available on GTECH’s e-motion™ cabinet and features two bonus round games in addition to four supporting game titles. The two bonus rounds, Mystery Dog and Doggie Cash, award one of the four jackpot levels. The Doggie Cash link game was designed for regular casino players and offers a chance to the hit the highest jackpot when getting into the Doggie Cash bonus. The progressive prize starts with a base win of 4,000 Peruvian soles. Casino Mono Blanco operates a wide range of products from GTECH’s SPIELO brand, including Action Jackpots™, Volcano Island™, Mega Kong™ and diversity™. For more information, visit www.gtech.com.
New Appointments and Changes in Aruze Officers and Directors
Aruze Gaming America, Inc. has appointed Kelcey Allison to chief executive officer, the company recently announced. Allison oversees all of Aruze’s operations in North and Latin America. Allison joined Aruze in 2009 and most recently served as chief operating officer. With Allison’s appointment, Aruze announced that Richard Pennington stepped down as CEO of Aruze to focus on personal priorities. Pennington retains certain global responsibilities in the areas of finance, legal and administration. In addition he remains Aruze Gaming America’s president and one of its directors. Pennington joined Aruze in December 2010 as chief executive officer. Aruze also announced the promotion of Yugo Kinoshita to the positions of global chief operating officer, treasurer and director. In his new roles, Kinoshita is responsible for global sales and operations. Kinoshita joined Aruze in December 2013 as senior vice president of corporate strategy. He received his MBA from Babson University in Massachusetts. For more information, visit www.aruzegaming.com.
ICE Reaches 25,000 Visitors
Visitor figures for ICE 2015, which closed February 5, broke the 25,000 mark for the first time. The interim figures, which are subject to a final independent audit, showed that a total of 25,386 unique attendees made the journey to London’s ExCeL Centre, an 8 percent increase on 2014, and the sixth consecutive year of growth. For more information, visit www.icetotallygaming.com.
Konami Gaming Promotes Michael Coppert to Senior Director, Customer Service
Konami Gaming, Inc. has promoted Michael Coppert to senior director, customer service, the company recently announced. Coppert joined Konami in 2012 as director of customer service and technical support. In his new role, he is responsible for overseeing Konami’s games and systems customer service department including system implementations, game installations, customer training, field service operations, project management and ongoing customer technical support and professional services. Coppert’s career is characterized by more than 35 years’ delivering enterprise software solutions to customers domestically and globally across sectors including gaming, telecommunications and global information technology. As Konami’s senior director of customer service, he reports directly to chief operating officer and executive vice president Steve Sutherland. Sutherland and Coppert collaborate in furthering Konami’s reputation as a top industry service provider by continuing to strengthen customer success. Coppert holds multiple technical patents surrounding casino gaming software development solutions. For more information, visit www.konamigaming.com.
Zitro Highlights New Products at ICE; World of Bingo Launches Video Bingo Tournaments
The Zitro Revolution was presented in London as part of ICE Totally Gaming 2015. A further innovation at ICE came from the Zitro Interactive Division, which showed off its new products for the online market via www.worldofbingo.com, which is currently played in more than 160 countries. Many visitors were attracted by Zitro’s eGaming through its different platforms and business models. Zitro’s Electronic Bingo also caught the eye of those attending the show, which offers players a gaming experience in which they participate in a major prize network.
World of Bingo, Zitro Interactive’s social game app, launched its social video bingo tournaments. In these video bingo tournaments, World of Bingo players compete against each other to take away as much of the community jackpot as possible. The tournaments last a half-hour, with the possibility of re-entering once a player has no points left, and the players with the most winnings throughout the tournament win a prize. Both the distribution of prizes and the player’s position in the overall ranking are constantly shown in real-time. For more information, visit www.zitrogames.com.
Properties Choose Rainmaker Solutions to Improve Revenue and Profit; Hotel Group Sales Challenge Solved with New GroupREV®
The Rainmaker Group announced that more than 20 new system implementations for its revenue management and profit optimization software solutions have been booked in 2015. All of the relationships are new customers and include The New Tropicana Las Vegas, Golden Nugget Lake Charles, as well as two properties within GF Management and three within the Wind Creek portfolio. All of the new implementations will include GuestREV® and many also include GroupREV®.
The Rainmaker Group also announced the introduction of its most powerful version yet of its GroupREV group pricing software solution to grow and maximize an organization’s total revenue from meetings and events sales. GroupREV was introduced in 2012 to complement Rainmaker’s GuestREV solution, creating the first complete pricing and revenue management solution in the hospitality industry for traditional hotels, resorts and casino hotels. The latest version of GroupREV has upgraded functionality to import and leverage relevant meeting space and sales and catering data. For more information, visit www.letitrain.com.
GLI Promotes Justine Kelleher to Manager of Supplier Development
Gaming Laboratories International promoted Justine Kelleher to manager of supplier development. Kelleher has been with GLI since 2012, serving as a supplier development representative prior to ascending to her new role. She has worked in-casino at both tribal and non-tribal operations. Kelleher is based in GLI’s Las Vegas office. Kelleher works primarily with land-based suppliers in Nevada, Southern California and Texas, and her extended territory spans North America. Kelleher holds a bachelor’s degree in hospitality and tourism management with an emphasis on tribal gaming from San Diego State University. For more information, visit www.gaminglabs.com.
Win Systems Selects New Senior Business Development Director
Win Systems welcomed Mariano Sosa as senior business development director for Latin America. Sosa joined the business development team to drive the expansion of its business in the Latin American market. Sosa has a degree in information systems together with experience in the industry, having worked in companies such as EDS (at present the consulting area of HP) as technology manager, in IGT and more recently in Bally. He has been working in the region for more than 10 years with the most important companies and operators in the gaming and entertainment industry. For more information, visit www.winsystemsintl.com.