Global Gaming Business, November 2020

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GGB Global Gaming Business Magazine

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November 2020 • Vol. 19 • No. 11 • $10

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CONTENTS

Vol. 19 • No. 11

november

Global Gaming Business Magazine

18 COVER STORY

COLUMNS

The New Leaders

10 AGA Responsible Gaming Evolution

The winners of the class of 2021 Emerging Leaders of Gaming 40 Under 40, a program that recognizes young professionals making significant impacts in the casino gaming industry, includes these 10 profiled young leaders, and others to be profiled throughout the year. The 40 Emerging Leaders, compiled by GGB and The Innovation Group, reflect the strength and ingenuity that will move the industry forward.

Cait DeBaun

By Maria Casias, Alex Goldstein, Roger Gros, Frank Legato, Allison McCoy, Krista McPherson, and Bill Sokolic

DEPARTMENTS

12 Fantini’s Finance Caesars Cake Eaters Frank Fantini

38 Making My Point Go Along to Get Along?

Roger Snow

4

The Agenda

FEATURES

6

By the Numbers

14 Sports Action

8

5 Questions

As the sports betting business continues to heat up in the U.S., operators and suppliers strive to create a product that stands up to the illegal market.

13 AGEM 44 New Game Review

By Marjorie Preston

28 Southeast Asia Revisited The Covid-19 crisis has slowed the emergence of Southeast Asia as a gaming market of the future, but the ASEAN countries still represent opportunity.

By Adam Steinberg and Brendan D. Bussmann

50 Cutting Edge

36 Innovation Celebration

52 Frankly Speaking

The 19th annual GGB Gaming & Technology Awards recognize the top innovations of the industry, with a new category addressing this unprecedented year.

54 Goods & Services 57 People

32 A Place in the Sun

By Patrick Roberts

In an excerpt from his book At the Sands, a distinguished historian, gaming author and educator recounts how Sheldon Adelson used an iconic Las Vegas landmark to launch the industry’s meetings and convention revolution.

58 Casino Communications

40 The Fixers

With Derek Stevens, CEO, Circa Resort

By Dave Bontempo

By David G. Schwartz

By Sarah Procopio

More operators are turning to industry consultants to help out with the myriad business challenges of the day.

46 Digital-Age Marketing Casinos are using digital marketing techniques to target the right people at the right time.

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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THE AGENDA

Measuring Stick

By Roger Gros, Publisher

A

s everyone knows, this year has been unlike any other. When casinos close for at least three months, that’s bad enough. But when they reopen with reduced capacity, social distancing, dining restrictions and a gaming experience unlike any other—not in a good way—the year just continues to get more weird. Is that revenue lost forever? Will those customers ever return if it takes years for life to go back to “normal?”

Just to add insult to injury, now we have to wonder how to evaluate the performances of not only our properties, but also our employees and customers.

What is a reasonable expectation and how will those expectations be interpreted?

I’m a big baseball fan. One of the biggest regrets when this thing hit in late March was the start of the baseball season was suspended indefinitely. And when they could have returned earlier than other sports, Major League Baseball dithered, argued and prevaricated about how to do it. When they finally got started in late July, it meant an abbreviated season of just 60 games (a normal season is 162 games), with expanded playoffs (meaning some teams with less than winning records could get in), and strange rules (too complicated to mention here, but things that would never have happened in any other year).

So my opinion throughout the process was that it was going to be a bogus season. Some mediocre teams would get hot and make the playoffs while other better teams would get off to slow starts and never catch up. Winning a championship in such a convoluted season wouldn’t be as compelling as any of those fullseason crowns.

But then I heard an opinion that maybe it was the complete opposite. Every team had the same unbelievable challenges when it came to staying healthy, working through multiple postponements because someone on the team or the staff tested positive, making up those games as parts of doubleheaders of seven innings each game (in every other season, nine-inning games were always played). These things have never been factors in any other season. So teams had to overcome incredible obstacles to work toward the championship.

While I could see that side of the argument, I’m sticking to my original impression. A championship this year is the ultimate asterisk and the team that wins will be forever tainted by it. This year in baseball will never be repeated—we can only hope.

But this gets back to, how do we evaluate per-

4

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

formance in this year, and probably next year, of our casino, our employees, our customers?

Casinos are usually big companies or owned by tribes. Most commercial casinos belong to corporations that own multiple properties. Lots of casinos these days are owned by real estate investment trusts (REITs) and operated by pure gaming companies.

When the REITs bought the properties, they worked out a deal for rent that forecast a reasonable amount of revenue. But with casinos closed for months and no revenue coming in, how will the REITs adjust?

Tribes count on casinos to fund their social services to tribal members. What happens when that revenue falls short?

Early on in the pandemic, there were lots of prognostications about how long certain corporations could last without any revenue coming in.

Some of them were surprisingly long, as much as two years in some cases. But then again, the REITs rent due was pretty substantial. I’ve been told by several experts that deals are being worked out between the REITs and the operating companies that will lessen the burden and spread out the payments. But what if unforeseen circumstances arise like another closure (God forbid) or simply a lack of response from loyal customers?

When it comes to executives who had proposed budgets last year that are now blown to pieces, how does a company evaluate whether the executive team is doing a good job when it fails to meet that budget? Of course it’s a hopeless exercise, but where do you draw the line in how much revenue is not enough? And how do you meet those expectations?

Do you count on increased revenue or do you cut costs by not bringing back employees that might be needed?

And speaking of employees, how do you judge their performance when they do come back? Are they going to be rated on their customer service skills or how efficiently they do their job, thereby bringing in more revenue? Are they going to be stressed out by wearing masks all day? Are employee unions cooperating or obstructing your operations?

And finally, are your loyal customers comfortable returning to your property, or are you going to have to bottom-feed for people you would not normally pursue? This, of course, is the question that will eventually determine how well the industry recovers and how we will look back to determine what should have been the ultimate expectation.

Vol. 19 • No. 11 • NOVEMBER 2020 Roger Gros, Publisher | rgros@ggbmagazine.com twitter: @GlobalGamingBiz Frank Legato, Editor | flegato@ggbmagazine.com twitter: @FranklySpeakn Marjorie Preston, Managing Editor mpreston@ggbmagazine.com Monica Cooley, Art Director mcooley@ggbmagazine.com Terri Brady, Sales & Marketing Director tbrady@ggbmagazine.com Becky Kingman-Gros, Chief Operating Officer bkingros@ggbmagazine.com Lisa Johnson, Communications Advisor lisa@lisajohnsoncommunications.com twitter: @LisaJohnsonPR Columnists Cait DeBaun| Frank Fantini | Roger Snow Contributing Editors Brendan D. Bussmann Dave Bontempo twitter: @bontempomedia Maria Casias | Alex Goldstein | Allison McCoy Krista McPherson | Sarah Procopio | Patrick Roberts David G. Schwartz | Bill Sokolic twitter: @downbeachfilm Adam Steinberg __________________

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Rino Armeni, President, Armeni Enterprises

•

Mark A. Birtha, Senior Vice President & General Manager, Hard Rock International

• Julie Brinkerhoff-Jacobs, President, Lifescapes International

• Nicholas Casiello Jr., Shareholder, Fox Rothschild

• Jeffrey Compton, Publisher, CDC E-Reports twitter: @CDCNewswire

• Dean Macomber, President, Macomber International, Inc.

• Stephen Martino, Vice President & Chief Compliance Officer, MGM Resorts International, twitter: @stephenmartino

• Jim Rafferty, President, Rafferty & Associates

• Thomas Reilly, Vice President Systems Sales, Scientific Games

• Michael Soll, President, The Innovation Group

• Katherine Spilde, Executive Director, Sycuan Gaming Institute, San Diego State University, twitter: @kspilde

• Ernie Stevens, Jr., Chairman, National Indian Gaming Association twitter: @NIGA1985

• Roy Student, President, Applied Management Strategies

• David D. Waddell, Partner Regulatory Management Counselors PC Casino Connection International LLC. 1000 Nevada Way • Suite 204 • Boulder City, NV 89005 702-248-1565 • 702-248-1567 (fax) www.ggbmagazine.com The views and opinions expressed by the writers and columnists of GLOBAL GAMING BUSINESS are not necessarily the views of the publisher or editor.

Copyright 2020 Global Gaming Business LLC. Boulder City, NV 89005 GLOBAL GAMING BUSINESS is published monthly by Casino Connection International, LLC. Printed in Nevada, USA. Postmaster: Send Change of Address forms to: 1000 Nevada Way, Suite 204, Boulder City, NV 89005 Official Publication

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BY THE

NUMBERS

IN The MASked Age, OPeRATORS exAMININg ‘gAIT ANAlySIS’ A

panel at the virtual Global Gaming Expo Asia Online Conference 2020 examined new security technologies including “gait analysis,” a method of identification that uses body shape and walking gait to identify subjects.

The session, moderated by GGRAsia, was a component of the “Roadmap to Growth” series presented

by G2E Asia, about how the casino sector can manage a return to growth after the Covid-19 pandemic.

Panelist Chris Chan, head of cybersecurity research at UDomain, a specialist in data and digital security, presented gait analysis, also known as “gait recognition,” as one of the newest developments in digital security. According to the presentation, authorities in China are already using gait recognition software to identify people even when their faces are hidden from cameras.

Dave Dalleske, vice president of sales for Asia Pacific at Synectics, which already supplies video surveillance equipment to casinos in the region, told the panel that the use of surveillance cameras for detailed analytic purposes, including being able to track an individual throughout a gaming property based on the color of their clothes, is an emerging tool for the gaming industry.

Technology to help monitor the occupancy inside a property is another emerging security tool for casinos, according to the panel. Dalleske said he new sports betting industry in the United States already has several recognizable brands. But how casinos need to monitor occupancy under strict recognizable? The sports betting community is still relatively small and very young. While some 25 guidelines on how many people are allowed into states and territories have legalized sports betting, many of them are not yet operating, and others are any given area. “We have seen a lot of developstill mostly in their nascent stages. Nonetheless, CivicScience recently released a survey of almost 7,000 ments in this area, and will be keeping close track people to determine what brands are currently resonating with bettors—and non-bettors. Five brands to see which are the best and which we can potenshowed up on the first page. Understandably, fantasy sports, now also sports betting, took the top two tially partner with,” he said. spots. The first chart at left measures simply whether respondents knew about the brands and the second outlines whether they know the brands and whether or not they are or will be participating.

Brand Recognition

T

Popular Sports Betting Apps Ranked by Nationwide Awareness (among U.S. adults age 21 and older)

6

Global Gaming Business

NOVEMBER 2020

Adoption and Awareness of Popular Sports Betting Apps In Applicable Sports Betting States

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NUTSHELL

“They

5Questions David McDowell CEO & Co-Founder, FSB

W

hile FSB is somewhat late to the party for U.S. sports betting, CEO Dave McDowell says the wait will be worth it. FSB has developed some of the most cutting-edge sports betting technology, which will vault online sportsbooks clients years ahead of their competitors. Founded in 2007, FSB has innovative platform and CRM systems, as well as expertise in casino aggregation. The company has also developed a sophisticated wallet and is currently making inroads in the U.S. online gaming market. McDowell spoke with GGB Publisher Roger Gros from his offices in London in September. A full podcast of the interview can be accessed at GGBMagazine.com.

GGB: Give us some background on FSB. David McDowell: The company was founded in 2007 with my co-founder Sam Lawrence. We had spent

1 2 3 4 5

“No credible public health expert would advise permitting smoking right now.”

—Bronson Frick, director of advocacy of Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights, speculating on whether smoking will ever return to casinos in the wake of Covid-19

CALENDAR November 4-5: SBC Summit CIS. Produced by SBC Community. For more information, visit SBCEvents.com. DIGITAL November 5-6, 12-13, December 2-3 & 9: 34th National Conference on Gambling Addition and Responsible Gaming, Hyatt Regency Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C. Produced by the National Center on Problem Gambling. For more information, visit www.ncpgambling.org/conference. LIVE

six years working together in the online industry already, so we came at this with a really good idea how systems integrated with online gaming technology. Even then, we realized that live data feeds coming from the stadiums could be delivered more quickly and more reliably, and that those data feeds would drive realtime pricing models. We knew that this would cause a fundamental change in the architecture of sportsbook technology and the way you operate a sportsbook. Those real-time data feeds did not exist, and the systems weren’t designed to access them.

Over the subsequent years we became experts at handling these data feeds. We covered 35,000 live events last month, providing real-time data to our clients.

November 9-10: Cyprus Gaming Show, Nicosia, Cyprus. Produced by the Cyprus Gaming & Casino Supervision Commission and National Betting Authority. For more information, visit CyprusGamingShow.com. LIVE

How were you able to bridge the gap from sports betting to online casinos?

November 26-27: Ukrainian Gaming Week 2020, International Exhibition Centre, Kyiv, Ukraine. Produced by SmileExpo. For more information, visit ugw.com.ua. LIVE

We could see the business model around casino, bingo and poker all had a service supply business where the supplier was providing a turnkey solution. But nobody could do that in sports betting because the technology was too complex, and you needed 250 traders to run your sportsbook. We felt there was a market for what we know of today as an MTS or managed trading system. We sat down and built an MTS for sports betting, but the vast majority of casino, bingo and poker sites were run with that business model.

Our strategy was to take the biggest sector and reinvent the business model using our technology.

Did you have clients on the casino side of the business?

Actually early on it was more in the fantasy sports side of the business. We were doing player ratings, we’d give advice on which players would score more fantasy points in the game, that kind of thing.

In 2012, we signed up Genting Casinos as a client for our full-scale sports betting platform. We worked with them for several years to set up their online sportsbook and integrate it into their online casino.

What kinds of services does FSB offer?

Today we offer a full turnkey service, which covers both retail and online sports betting, and it also includes our entire iGaming suite—the player account management and casino aggregation tools. It also includes the user interface—the customer experience, fully responsive website and the various apps that go with it. We back that up with employee-manager training service, AML and responsible gaming tools, and marketing support.

Did you anticipate how quickly U.S. sports betting would be legalized when you started FSB?

I’ve been in online gaming for many years, and our saying was that sports betting legalization in the U.S. was always 10 years away. When the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act was passed in 2006, I read the entire bill, which created the opportunity for daily fantasy sports. When you watch it every single day, it moves like a glacier, but all of a sudden, pop, and it’s happening. It’s been amazing to see how so many states have moved forward with positive legislation allowing sports betting.

8

Said It”

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

November 15-21: Executive Development Program. Produced by UNLV’s International Gaming Institute. For more information visit UNLV/igi/edp. DIGITAL

December 1-2: Betting on Sports America.

Produced by SBC. For more information, visit SBCEvents.com. DIGITAL December 7-9: World Gaming Executive Summit (GES). Produced by Velo Partners. For more information, visit terrapinn.com/conference/world-gaming-executive-summit. DIGITAL February 16-18: SIGMA Europe. Produced by SIGMA. For more information, visit SIGMA.com.

DIGITAL March 10-12: IMGL Spring Conference 2021, Hotel Grand Bretagne, Athens, Greece. Produced by the International Masters of Gaming Law. For more information, visit IMGL.org. LIVE March 22-24: CasinoBeats Summit, InterContinental, St. Julian’s, Malta. Produced by SBC. For more information, visit SBCEvents.com. LIVE March 23-25: SPiCE India, Goa Marriott Resort & Spa, Goa, India. Produced by Eventus International. For more information, visit sportsbettingevents.com. LIVE March 30: Prague Gaming Summit, Vienna House Andel’s Prague, Czech Republic. Produced

by European Gaming Media and Events. For more information, visit PragueGamingSummit.com. HYBRID

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AMERICAN GAMING ASSOCIATION

Responsible Gaming Evolution Responsible gaming prevention has evolved over three decades, and is ready to protect sports bettors and meet other challenges

M

ore than 30 years ago, Harrah’s pioneered the first formal responsible gaming (RG) program, Operation Bet Smart, to educate customers and employees while differentiating Harrah’s from competitors. Operation Bet Smart provided signage and informational materials for customers and training for employees to understand and recognize the signs of problem gambling behavior.

Sound familiar?

That’s because many of today’s responsible gaming programs draw on the same foundational pillars to educate customers and employees.

Certainly, RG programs have become more robust, research-based, and responsive to customers—look no further than MGM’s GameSense or Hard Rock’s PlayerEdge. It has also become more integrated into who we are as an industry. Responsibility is no longer a competitive advantage, but a regulatory requirement and community expectation of how we operate. It is the underpinning of our social license to operate.

This prioritization of responsible gaming over the past three decades is reflected in gaming’s expansion. With gaming legalized in 44 states, two-thirds of American adults live within an hour’s drive from a casino, and four in 10 Americans can now legally wager on sports betting in their home state.

As more Americans than ever before are encountering gaming in their daily lives, we need to ensure they can access RG resources as easily as they can our innovative offerings. Responsible gaming efforts must evolve and grow to keep up with the legal market.

That starts with applying the same innovation in responsible gaming that has led our expansion far beyond mechanical slots and into being a technology and entertainment power-

10

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

By Cait DeBaun

house. While the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has rightfully been the story of 2020, we are also starting to see the beginnings of an important and needed responsibility evolution.

This started in January when the Responsible Gambling Collaborative released first-ofits-kind effectiveness principles for evolving responsible gaming to meet the needs of today’s market, like investing in independent research and treatment. It’s incumbent upon operators and suppliers to consider the recommendations outlined in the principles and how they can advance them organizationally.

2020 also has shown how technology can empower consumers to govern their own spending and gaming behavior while providing operators tools to better understand customer habits. For example, GeoComply’s new PlayPause product carries a bettor’s self-exclusion across state lines, a much-needed solution to the patchwork of self-exclusion programs nationwide.

We are pursuing payments modernization, in part, to give consumers new tools to monitor gaming activity and set time and spending limits when they come to our properties. Digital payments equip consumers with real-time information on their spending across verticals, keeping them in control of their budget. Digital RG controls have the added benefit of moving seamlessly between gaming in a casino and at home in states with interactive gaming.

Our understanding of responsible gaming as it relates to payments modernization will also benefit from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas International Gaming Institute’s Payments Collaborative with AGA members Sightline, Everi, Worldpay and Global Payments.

Our evolved commitment to responsibility has never been clearer—or more impor-

tant—than with the growth of legal sports betting. A little more than two years ago, legal sports betting was limited to one jurisdiction; now, it’s in 23. The gaming industry and our partners have accelerated our responsible sports betting efforts to keep pace with its rapid spread.

Most recently, the AGA introduced a new compliance process for the Responsible Marketing Code for Sports Wagering. This proactive step establishes a high bar and creates transparency through self-regulation. The code sets restrictions for all sports betting stakeholders, AGA member or not, on marketing target audiences, outlets and materials branding, while mandating responsible gaming inclusion.

Consumer education is also vital, which is why the AGA launched “Have A Game Plan.

Bet Responsibly” to educate new and seasoned bettors about safe betting practices. The public service campaign encourages bettors to wager responsibly by setting a budget, betting legally, keeping it social, and knowing the odds.

We’re also making strides to educate new entrants into the sports betting ecosystem and bring them into the fold as partners in our responsible sports betting initiatives. You can see this in NASCAR’s partnership to promote “Have A Game Plan” to their fans through PSAs and original digital content. We look forward to building upon this momentum with more league and team partners soon.

There are clear efforts under way to ensure our commitment to responsibility grows in tandem with the industry’s growth, but this is just the start. It will take the full force of the gaming community to ensure our responsible gaming efforts continue to meet the needs of this modern industry.

Cait DeBaun is senior director, strategic communications and responsibility for the American Gaming Association.

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FANTINI’S FINANCE

Caesars Cake Eaters A possible purchase of William Hill gives gaming’s largest company even more leverage

W

hoever said you can’t have your cake and eat it, too, apparently didn’t know Caesars CEO Tom Reeg and the other former Eldorado guys now running Caesars.

Their proposed purchase of U.K. sports betting giant William Hill puts Caesars in a can’tlose position.

If Caesars acquires William Hill at its offered 272 pence a share, it will have acquired a company that Jefferies equity analyst James Wheatcroft says is worth 350 to 500 pence.

Another analyst, Steve Wieczynski of Stifel, has neatly outlined the situation: Caesars buys William Hill then sells the non-American operations, keeping the U.S. portion that Wieczynski values at up to $10 billion. That would allow Caesars to pay down any debt associated with the transaction and gain an equity value greater than the 18 percent dilution that comes from selling stock to help finance the purchase.

If someone comes in and outbids Caesars for William Hill, Caesars still would benefit because it could renegotiate the terms of its sports betting deal with William Hill US on more favorable terms. That is because their joint venture was negotiated before Eldorado bought Caesars and gained access to its casinos throughout the United States and its industry-largest database of more than 60 million players, Wieczynski reasons.

And access to Caesars’ network and its media contracts are why William Hill US would be attractive to a potential buyer of William Hill PLC in the first place. In other words, another buyer would not pay up to buy William Hill and then walk away from its deal with Caesars.

Wieczynski has been perhaps the most consistent bull on Caesars among sell-side analysts, extolling Reeg and his management team as the best in the business and expressing confidence that he will meet and exceed the goal of $900 million in synergies from the Eldorado-Caesars merger.

In his most recent research note, Wieczynski

12

By Frank Fantini

raised his stock price target on Caesars to $80, attributing $28.02 of that to the William Hill USCaesars sports betting and iGaming operation based on his 2024 EBITDA forecasts.

However, that opportunity is $32.44 a share factoring out the discount that Wieczynski applies for uncertainty of the deal being realized.

Wieczynski has consistently said that Caesars stock could be worth more than $100 a share if it achieves $10 a share in free cash flow—and that was before the added EBITDA a wholly owned William Hill US would contribute.

To Reeg, online sports betting and online gaming is the biggest opportunity in the gaming industry since riverboats were legalized in the central and south-central United States in the 1990s.

Access to Caesars’ “network and its media

contracts are why William Hill US would be attractive to a potential buyer of William Hill PLC in the first place. In other words, another buyer would not pay up to buy William Hill and then walk away from its deal with Caesars.

”

To illustrate, he notes the latest third-party estimates of research firms that see a $30 billion revenue opportunity when online matures.

To capitalize on that opportunity and build a national sports betting network was the reason Eldorado signed its partnership with William Hill, Reeg says.

Then the opportunity to buy Caesars came along. Now, the online opportunity was enhanced

by Caesars’ industry-largest player database and media deals with the likes of ESPN. The Eldorado, William Hill and Caesars combination, in

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

brief, presents Caesars with the chance to garner significant market share in that potentially $30 billion industry.

In other words, Reeg says, buying William Hill is about “controlling our own destiny.”

Journeys These must be heady days for Reeg and William Hill US CEO Joe Asher.

My first meeting with Tom Reeg was sitting just outside Brew Brothers pub in Eldorado Casino in Reno, then the flagship of the small company that had recently gone public. He was CFO. Tom was, as he has remained, a modest guy who speaks in plain American English in outlining strategy and finances. Eldorado stock was in the mid-single digits. Today, Caesars stock trades in the upper 50s on its way, as Wieczynski says, to $80 and higher. The market cap is nearly $10 billion and should go much higher.

Asher also has come a long way. Growing up in Delaware, the avid young sports fan managed to become a race caller at Harrington Raceway as a teenager, the youngest race caller in America.

Later, as a young attorney with bond house Cantor Fitzgerald, Asher, with Cantor’s proprietary mobile trading device in hand, was assigned to go to Nevada and lobby to legalize mobile betting. That happened, and Joe stayed in Nevada to head a new company, Cantor Gaming.

Joe then went off on his own, starting Brandywine Gaming, which ran sportsbooks for small casinos under the Lucky’s brand. When William Hill decided to enter the United States for the potential of exactly what we are seeing today, it bought Brandywine and appointed Joe CEO of its U.S. operations.

Now, Joe heads a business that Steve Wieczynski thinks is worth $10 billion.

That’s a lot accomplished by two guys who are still young by CEO standards.

Frank Fantini is the editor and publisher of Fantini’s Gaming Report. For a free 30-day trial subscription email subscriptions@fantiniresearch.com.

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AGEMupdate AGEM MEMBER PROFILE

Regulatory Management Counselors, P.C. (RMC Legal) is a professional corporation com-

posed of legal, business and governmental relations professionals able to service the diverse needs of businesses working in the casino gaming industry.

The professionals at RMC Legal work closely with their clients to assist with developing and implementing methods to ensure timely compliance with governmental and regulatory requirements including multi-jurisdictional licensing, transfer of ownership requests, disciplinary actions appeals, license agreements, legislative monitoring, and financial restructuring.

RMC Legal has a great deal of experience assisting iGaming and iSports platform providers and suppliers with obtaining licenses to service casinos in Michigan, as well as in a number of other jurisdictions.

RMC Legal places strong emphasis on assisting clients in reducing operational costs, legal complexities and inefficiencies to reduce the time, effort and errors associated with compliance management and allow clients to focus on core business opportunities, sales, growth, and expansion.

RMC’s professionals have developed a comprehensive information tracking and data collection system, which allows for immediate access to developments that impact clients both nationally and locally. RMC Legal also has established relationships with key regulators and a mature network of legal and consulting professionals in order to assist clients with a variety of issues.

AGEM Board of Directors Actions for October 2020 • AGEM will once again be partnering with the European Casino Association and Clarion Events for the Executive Development Program (EDP) Gender Diversity Scholarship. Due to the current situation, this year’s EDP, titled, “All the Crises, All the Time,â€? will be a virtual event that will run November 15-21.

This important scholarship is open to women with two to three years experience in the land-based casino sector. Eligible candidates have to be employed by a direct or indirect member of the ECA and show ambition for holding a leadership position in gaming and a desire to further their professional education.

The process for selection will conclude by the end of October with the winner announced shortly after. • Two very useful web resources (NevadaWorksTogether.com and TheManufacturingInstitute.org) continue to be active to help gaming employees who have been furloughed or laid off with new postings daily. Nevada Industry Excellence has recently secured funding for a new training program that gives up to $2,700 per hire for cross-training gaming employees to work in new industries. • The Nevada Gaming Control Board recently rescinded its policy that now allows developers, manufacturers or distributors of new games or gaming devices to be able to collect revenue during field trials, provided they are properly licensed to do so. This change of policy has been discussed for some time but is thought to have been fast-tracked to assist suppliers during this challenging period. • There has recently been a lot of activity surrounding unregulated and illegal gaming machines in the U.S. Earlier this year, AGEM and the American Gaming Association released a fact sheet designed to help combat the spread of unregulated machines in multiple markets throughout the U.S. and is following these developments closely. In Virginia, legislation passed earlier this year to prohibit skill games, but on July 1 the governor proposed a 12-month reprieve applying a $1,200 per machine monthly fee to generate revenue for a Covid-19 relief fund. In Pennsylvania, SB 1256 had a hearing, with its introduction aimed at expanding lawful VGTs beyond truck stops to other licensed establishments in the state. The proposed expansion of VGTs and skill games will require them to go through the same full licensing procedures as slots. Casino operators have joined together to lobby against this expansion. In Missouri a court ruling stated that an unregulated gaming machine popular in convenience stores constitutes a form of illegal gambling. Policymakers have been seeking clarity on the legality of skill games while they also

consider legislation to authorize VLTs. • AGEM recently welcomed House Advantage as a Bronze member. in Las

The company, headquartered

Vegas with offices in Macau, Boston and Memphis, offers a loyalty management platform for the market

resort, leisure and entertainment properties. AGEM members now number an all-time ing of casino, high of 185 companies globally.

Forthcoming Events • The AGEM Memorial Awards in honor of Jens Halle and Peter Mead will take place as a virtual video presentation on October 28 between 8:30 a.m. 8:45 a.m. PT. The ceremony, which usually takes place on the show floor of G2E, will still be aligned to the event October 27-28. The winners will be announced in the morning and a video will be posted for all to view after.

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Through political action, trade show partnerships, information dissemination and good corporate citizenship, the members of AGEM work together to create benefits for every company within the organization. Together, AGEM and its member organizations have assisted regulatory commissions and participated in the legislative process to solve problems and create a positive business environment.

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The AGEM Index increased by 48.85 points in September 2020 to 530.87 points, a 10.1 percent gain from August 2020. Five of the 13 AGEM Index companies reported stock price increases despite downward trends in major U.S. stock indices in September.

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NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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Big Bets

By Marjorie Preston

As more U.S. states launch legal sports betting, operators and suppliers are flooding the field in search of some action

F

or decades, U.S. lawmakers and sports leagues resisted legal sports betting for fear it would be a corrupting influence on leagues and players. Blocking the action was New Jersey Senator and former NBA star Bill Bradley, who claimed legal bets would turn each athlete into “a roulette chip.”

Bradley’s 1992 Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA) made the activity a nonstarter for state legislatures, but the wagers kept rolling thanks to neighborhood bookies and offshore black marketers.

In 1999, the National Gambling Impact Study Commission estimated that illegal betting generated $80 billion to $380 billion a year.

In May 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court nullified PASPA, opening the door to legal sportsbooks on a state-by-state basis. And the big game was on. In the first full year of New Jersey’s legal market, bettors placed more than $2.9 billion in wagers, of which $22.6 million went to the state. Since then, the industry has skyrocketed, in spite of the pandemic, which shut down major sports and reduced U.S. fans to betting on darts and table tennis. In August, with pro sports back in full swing, Garden State gamblers set a record for the most money bet on sports in a single month—$668 million, up 56.7 percent over August 2019.

“New Jersey was the first domino,” says Brian Wyman, senior vice president of operations and data analytics for The Innovation Group. “And given the results there, I’m not surprised that we’re in the place that we are now.”

political parties and even retail gaming operators. Sports leagues, while condemning the industry for decades, didn’t understand the benefits that working with the betting industry could bring.”

The light began to dawn in 2014, when NBA Commissioner Adam Silver wrote an op-ed in The New York Times calling for sports betting to be “brought out of the underground and into the sunlight, where it can be monitored and regulated.”

“This article got the conversation started,” says McDowell, “and it was pure economics that took over from there.”

Among the first providers in New Jersey was iGaming supplier GAN, which originated in Europe but had been scoping the landscape since 2013, when state lawmakers OK’d online casinos.

“The Supreme Court decision … had been building for a while, and equally importantly, there was a groundswell of alignment and a pretty big shift in the mindset from the leagues, the general population and all the stakeholders within the industry,” says GAN Chief Commercial Officer Jeff Berman. “We saw it coming, and as a company made the very conscious decision to focus exclusively on the United States in anticipation of legal sports and casino betting.”

Today, 20 U.S. states offer legal sports betting, and eight more have legislation that would introduce the activity.

Keeping Score

In New Jersey alone, more than two dozen mobile and retail sportsbook operators have staked a claim, with European sportsbooks and suppliers AmerSo, what happened to change the perception of sports betting in the U.S.? icanizing their models to serve the exploding U.S. market. Plenty of upstarts Dave McDowell, CEO of FSB Technology, a London-based gaming are challenging the bricks-and-mortar casinos and market leaders like Fansoftware company, says it came down to “education across sports leagues, Duel and DraftKings.

“I see DraftKings commercials in Nevada, where DraftKings doesn’t even operate yet,” says Berman.

“Their marketing spend is astronomical, and we’re “New Jersey was the first domino. seeing that reflected in their top line. Over time, as it And given the results there, I’m not focuses more on profitability, its competitors will become better capitalized, form better media partnersurprised that we’re in the place ships and be able to better compete in the advertising that we are now.” space.”

—Brian Wyman, Senior Vice President of Operations and Nowadays, it’s hard to keep track of the overlapData Analytics, The Innovation Group ping partnerships among leagues, media outlets and sportsbooks: DraftKings’ dance card includes the New York Giants, the Denver Broncos, the PGA

‘Pure Economics’

14

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

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In the first full year of New Jersey’s legal market, bettors placed more than $2.9 billion in wagers, of which $22.6 million went to the state.

Since then, the industry has skyrocketed, in spite of the pandemic, which shut down major sports and reduced U.S. “U.S. states that have already fans to betting on darts passed regulation could now be and table tennis. looking to advance discussions regarding iCasino, creating a full ecosystem for iGaming.”

—Max Meltzer, Chief Commercial Officer, Kambi

Tour, Major League Baseball, the NFL, ESPN and Wrigley Field. BetMGM is allied with the Broncos, the Detroit Lions and NASCAR, among others.

Australian comer PointsBet has compiled an impressive list, joining with NBC Sports, the PGA, the NBA, the Denver Nuggets, the Colorado Avalanche, the Indiana Pacers, the Detroit Tigers… and the list goes on.

The pending acquisition of William Hill by casino giant Caesars Entertainment suggests a trend of mergers and acquisitions that will make the big fish even bigger (Caesars owns or manages 54 casinos in 16 states, and William Hill owns sportsbooks in 10 states plus the District of Columbia).

“The companies that control the brick-and-mortar assets have balance sheets that allow them to accumulate and grow vertically and horizontally— really, they have the ability to shape their future,” says Michael Soll, president and founding member of The Innovation Group. “I expect to see more absorption and more control by a smaller number of larger companies in the long run, but there will always be a diversity of other companies in the fray who aren’t so tied to bricks-and-mortar who will keep it interesting and competitive.

“In a pure gaming revenue sense, sportsbooks don’t provide a mindbending contribution,” Soll points out, “but it’s going to be well-received, it’s going to be a lasting part of the industry, and the numbers will be meaningful.”

In January, Penn National Gaming bought a piece of sports media player Barstool Sports, a transaction Wyman calls “a play on customer acquisition.

With these kinds of mergers, a lot of times it’s about looking at databases and understanding whether you can cross-monetize them to make the transaction price attractive.”

While that matchup may have been a head-scratcher to some—buttoned-down Penn allying itself with wild and woolly Barstool—there’s no question the latter has a fiercely loyal audience of young, engaged sports fans.

Rather than investing heavily in customer acquisition, Penn “found a creative way to compete that didn’t turn this into an arms race in the media space,” says Wyman. “That’s what we’re seeing with the Penn-Barstool deal, and what we’ll see with other partnerships down the road.”

The User Experience So, what are bettors looking for in a sportsbook?

Richard Schwartz, president of Rush Street Interactive, owner of the BetRivers and PlaySugarhouse brands, says reliability and simplicity are essential, plus a user interface that’s “clean and easy to follow.

“They want a wide range of content. They want in-game and prematch content and live streaming so they can bet while they watch, along with strong loyalty programs, prompt payouts and good customer service.

Early cash-out is a valuable feature for players who have an edge and want to guarantee a win. The live-odds offering appeals to a wide audience, because it creates an extra dimension and excitement while watching games.”

He says RSI emphasizes the basics: “things like being trustworthy, offering a great user experience, being efficient with players’ time when they reach out to our customer service team, and removing friction from the user experience wherever we can. We create loyalty by doing the little things right and making a difference to players.”

The company’s key to success is “having a foundationally strong business, and not simply chasing what others do in the industry. Our focus has been on doing the things that matter most: increasing our conversion and retention rates. We do that by marketing smartly and efficiently to acquire the right players, and once we acquire them, doing everything we can to differentiate the user experience and provide a high-quality service.”

Max Meltzer, chief commercial officer for U.K.-based sports betting provider Kambi, now expanding into the U.S., says a high-performance sportsbook “requires a supply chain capable of delivering on all levels, beginning with the integration of official data partners and proven algorithms that process the data, followed by excellence in trading and risk, which must all be supplied through a fast and intuitive front end.”

Beyond that, he adds, “Giving bettors the opportunity to drive their own experience is a trend sports betting must continue to embrace. The technology exponentially increases the size of the menu, offering odds on demand and lifting the limitations on player freedom to a far greater extent than the traditional bet-builder.”

Movies vs. Netflix For obvious reasons, the emphasis this year has been on mobile sports betting, but Schwartz says retail can and will endure if operators “create experiences that are unique to the land-based physical experience, and give players something they can’t replicate at home.

“If you look at the movie industry, there’s still ample interest in going to theaters. It’s going to cost you more, but you get a bigger-than-life experience, and that’s what casinos can create in a sportsbook. There’s nothing more exciting than the thrill of a big game, experiencing that massive enthusiasm among other bettors, with everybody cheering together at the outcome.

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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“It will be up to the operators of retail properties to create experiences that are unique to the landbased physical experience, and give players something they can’t replicate at home.”

—Richard Schwartz, President, Rush Street Interactive

“But there’s also the Netflix equivalent, with convenience and a lower price versus the bigger-than-life experience out on the town. I think there’s room for both. Rush Street has a heritage in land-based, so we focus on ways to converge online and land-based casinos, motivating a player online to visit the land-based casino more often.”

Wyman agrees that retail sportsbooks provide a communal experience that players can’t get from their man caves and La-Z-Boys. “If you’ve ever been in a sportsbook during a game-changing touchdown or home run, the whole place erupts.” He points out that even before the pandemic, “80 percent of bets in New Jersey were on the mobile platform. Mobile was always the winner here, but retail sportsbooks won’t go away, even if the way we use them changes.”

Will fallout from Covid-19 get more states in the game and push mobile permanently to the fore?

“We’ve already seen Michigan look to expedite its online sports betting regulation, and wouldn’t be surprised to see others follow suit,” says Meltzer.

“I also think that U.S. states that have already passed regulation could now be looking to advance discussions regarding iCasino, creating a full ecosystem for iGaming.”

Covid-19 may cause holdout states to reconsider, especially when it comes to mobile and online betting, agrees Berman.

“It’s no secret that states’ revenues from casino tax revenues have dried up. They’re looking at alternative revenue sources online. We think the vast majority of states will have sports betting and online casino within five years.”

Out of the Shadows Will legal U.S. sportsbooks ever put their biggest competitors—offshore, unregulated operators—out of business?

“Over time, it will be more difficult for these black-market sites,” says Schwartz. “The illegal sites may initially be attractive because they can offer credit and better pricing, since they’re not paying taxes, gaming fees and leagues. But they’re certainly not as reliable and trustworthy as legal, regulated operations. They can’t offer the same variety of content in most cases.

And when players win, it takes a long time to be paid.”

In a telling move, in September Costa Rican sportsbook 5Dimes reached a $46.8 million settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice, part of a rumored bid to re-enter the market as a legal operator. The firm has already incorporated a U.S. arm, 5D Americas LLC in Delaware.

When a onetime illegal operator is willing to pay to go straight—with no guarantees the gambit will work—that says something about the value of the legal market.

16

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

Do the Right Things Dave McDowell CEO, FSB Technology GGB: You said last fall that the U.S. will have one of the largest regulated sports betting markets in the next five years. Is that still true?

Dave McDowell: Without a doubt, the

U.S. will become one of the largest regulated sports betting markets, provided that sports betting is rolled out responsibly and intelligently.

Ignoring social responsibility and causing harm to consumers is the single biggest threat to continued expansion, and can reverse the gains we’ve made to date. Over-taxation, which includes monopoly pricing on official league data, is the single biggest threat to consumer adoption and will keep the underground markets thriving. But if we move forward responsibly, both consumers and operators will come out as winners.

Regulated sports betting and online gaming in general is long overdue.

It’s a pretty simple argument—the black market offers no player protections, there are no jobs created and there’s no tax revenue. I think everyone finally agrees that prohibition and turning a blind eye to it doesn’t work.

Regulated sports betting and online gaming in general is long overdue. It’s a pretty simple argument—the black market offers no player protections, there are no jobs created and there’s no tax revenue. I think everyone finally agrees that prohibition and turning a blind eye to it doesn’t work.

Do you see sports betting becoming truly global as a result of technology, or will it remain a hometown, “home team” thing?

The sports betting industry is already global; the real question is if U.S. consumers will ever take a serious interest in anything other than domestic competitions. That isn’t something I’d bet on in the short term.

But consider soccer, the most popular betting sport. Live data feeds are collected from hundreds of countries and distributed to the industry in near-real time. Hundreds of billions of dollars are wagered in the Asian, European, African, Latin American and Middle Eastern markets, where the largest global operators are closely monitored for price movements that can shift odds across the globe.

Companies like FSB use all this data as inputs into our own real-time odds models to create hundreds of betting markets on a single game, then distribute data into sports betting platforms to take wagers across the globe.

In just a few seconds, a goal scored in one country affects data that’s transmitted to almost every other country on the planet. The same happens for every NBA game. The league has a massive following in China and across many European countries.

OPT 1

CONGRATULATIONS

CONNIE JAMES! EMERGING LEADERS OF GAMING 40 UNDER 40 Class of 2020 -2021

Connie James Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, Gaming Scientific Games

#PeoplePowerSG

ScientificGames.com The look and feel of the games and their individual components and displays are trade dress of Scientific Games and its Subsidiaries. All ® notices signify marks registered in the United States. ™ and © 2020 Scientific Games Corp. and its Subsidiaries. All rights reserved. Scientific Games is committed to responsible gambling. Responsible gambling features are proactively developed to ensure the safety and security of players while using Scientific Games products.

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The Best Is Yet To Come Emerging Leaders of Gaming

40 Under 40 for 2021 is an extraordinary class

By Patrick Roberts

T

he newest members of the gaming industry are consistently hardworking, innovative, and globally aware. They understand that to progress the industry, and their own careers, extra thought and time are required. And, with that effort, they are often recognized as elite members of the Emerging Leaders of Gaming 40 Under 40.

When The Innovation Group, organizers of the Emerging Leaders of Gaming program, and Global Gaming Business Magazine (GGB) announced the winners of the class of 2021 Emerging Leaders of Gaming 40 Under 40, a program that recognizes young professionals making significant impacts in the casino gaming industry, it was clear that the selections were the cream of the crop.

The winners were part of 150-plus industry members who were nominated by colleagues who recognized their commitment and dedication to the gaming industry.

“During such a difficult time, it’s heartening to see so many excellent candidates nominated for the Emerging Leaders Program,” says The Innovation Group President Michael Soll. “These young professionals are poised to lead the industry now and into the future to maintain excellence in serving our customers and their extended families. The Innovation Group is proud to be able to showcase these remarkable individuals.”

“The quality of this year’s Emerging Leaders class is a cut above the rest,” says Roger Gros, publisher of GGB. “They represent the best and the brightest of the gaming industry, and anyone who has any doubts about the recovery of gaming after the pandemic need only understand the dedication of these professionals to their craft.”

The selection process, says Gros, has become increasingly competitive with nominations growing by 50 percent over last year. “It’s incredible,” he says.

“The talent. The diversity. We’re able to highlight a truly impressive group of young people shaping gaming’s future.”

The five “Judges Choice” winners of the Emerging Leaders of Gaming 40 Under 40 were announced at a webinar for the virtual 2020 G2E in October.

The judges for the Emerging Leaders of Gaming 40 Under 40 are: • Mark Birtha, president of Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Sacramento at Fire Mountain • Christie Eickelman, vice president of global marketing for Gaming Laboratories International (GLI), and chairwoman of Global Gaming Women • Mick Ingersoll, director of gaming strategies at Everi Holdings, Inc. • Virginia McDowell, former president and CEO of Isle of Capri Casinos, and former chairwoman of Global Gaming Women “We’d like to thank our judges, who were very helpful in assisting us in choosing this amazing group of individuals,” says Gros. “It shows that dedication true leaders in the gaming industry have for the people who will be running the gaming industry for years to come.”

18

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

2020-2021

Class of Emerging Leaders of Gaming 40 Under 40 Melissa Aarskaug, Vice President of Business Development, Bulletproof *

Marshall Adair, Vice President and Executive Producer – Digital / Online, Everi Holdings Inc. Eduardo Alvarez, Director of Sales – LatAm, AGS Allen Ambrogio, U.S. Director of Operations, Tipico Robert Baldassarre, Associate, Fox Rothschild LLP André Barnabei, Vice President of Gaming, Rivers Casino Pittsburgh *

JaNessa Bumgarner, Chief Executive Officer, Lucky Eagle Casino & Hotel

Charlotte Cain, HR Manager, Continent 8 Technologies Jeffrey Caldwell, Director of Hotel Operations, Encore Boston Harbor

Cherchi Chen, Managing Director, Finance and Operations, NagaWorld

Suzanne Duchene, Slot Operations Service Manager, Seneca Niagra Falls Gaming

Rick Eckert, Managing Director, Slot Performance & Analysis, Eilers & Krejcik Gaming, LLC Brad Egnor, Senior Vice President of Marketing, San Manuel Casino

Ashley Eurich, Vice President, Lockdogs Jennifer Fales, Vice President, Global Brand Licensing, IGT * Don-Lee Hardy, Safety Specialist, Sycuan Casino Resort Molly Hart, Licensing and Compliance Manager, Gaming Capital Group, LLC Bryan Hayes, Senior Vice President of Gaming Operations, Foxwoods Resort Casino

p. 18 40under40:Layout 1 10/14/20 6:21 PM Page 19

Think Positive Matthew Heyerdahl, Chief Accounting Officer and Director of Finance, Gaming Arts

Melissa Aarskaug, Vice President of Business Development, Bulletproof

Connie James, Chief Financial Officer, Gaming, Scientific Games Corporation *

Paul Juliano, Vice President of Operations, Twin River Worldwide Holdings, Inc.

Mohit Kansal, Partner, Clairvest Group JoyceLynn Lagula, Design Director, Wilson Associates Zachary Levine, Corporate Vice President of Table Games Strategy, MGM Resorts International Martin Lycka, Director of Regulatory Affairs/Trustee, GVC Foundation U.S., GVC Holdings PLC *

James Manuel, Director of Fine Dining, Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tampa

Olena Nall, Director, Business Development, Wind Creek Hospitality

Malou Neguembor, Head of CRM, Megalotto Mike Nguyen, Director of Engineering, JCM Global Mary Parker, Management and Program Analyst, National Indian Gaming Commission Marvin Phillips, Director of Information Technology, Akwesasne Mohawk Casino Resort David Rittvo, Vice President, Development, Caesars Entertainment Corp.

Sam Rook, Director of Marketing, Mystic Lake Casino Hotel Nav Sandhawalia, Chief Compliance and Risk Officer, Niagara Casinos (Mohegan Gaming & Entertainment) Araksi Sargsyan, Head of Business Development, DS Virtual Gaming

Meghan Sleik, Director of Marketing, Aristocrat Steven Slotwinski, Chief Technology Officer, Eclipse Gaming Systems

Anthony Strangia, Deputy Attorney General, New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement Hui Min Tiffany Bernadette Tay, Associate Director, Strategic Planning, Marina Bay Sands Pte. Ltd. Peter Wolff, Director of Global Technical Compliance, Gaming Laboratories International

* One of the five “Judges Choice” selections Nominations for the 2022 Class of Emerging Leaders of Gaming 40 Under 40 will open in April 2021. For more information on the program, visit GGBMagazine.com.

A

fter graduating from the University of Nevada, Reno with a civil/environmental engineering degree, Melissa Aarskaug began her career in banking and civil engineering.

As one of only three women in her engineering classes, Aarskaug relied on her open-mindedness and positive attitude to succeed. As finishing school, Aarskaug began mentoring young women and men, recruiting some into the College of Engineering.

Aarskaug subscribes to the notion that when and if the student is ready, a teacher will appear. The first of many mentors in her life, her father taught her about managing money, how to build a business, how to lead, and how to achieve her goals. Aarskaug now spends time with younger girls, mentoring self-confidence, goal-setting, and understanding finances. Actively involved in multiple volunteer organizations, Aarskaug has served on various boards, and is engaged with Global Gaming Women and Lean-In groups.

Aarskaug was working—and achieving success—in the civil engineering field when an opportunity presented itself to join the gaming industry with Gaming Laboratories International (GLI). After excelling at GLI, she transitioned to an executive role as vice president on the Bulletproof team. The gaming business presented unfamiliar challenges with intricacies and unique client needs.

With time and dedication, she was able to expand her knowledge and develop trusting relationships with colleagues, partners and clients. Applying her leadership skills and forward-thinking vision, Aarskaug assisted in successfully growing and leading Bulletproof services across the globe in the gaming industry.

Additionally, she grew business lines in state governments, utilities, voting, construction, finance, and other verticals.

“All of us are effectively led by experience and habit, the people we surround ourselves with, what we have learned from our mistakes and successes, books we’ve read, and companies we’ve worked for,” she says. “We can always alter our direction. Do not let an adverse past affect your future.”

Aarskaug is a firm believer in always looking at change with a willingness to adapt whether to positive or negative experiences. She is eager to meet and overcome new challenges, and she has the foresight to recognize the next. A lifelong student, she hopes to continue to grow within her company and to lead by example. She constantly seeks to strengthen her relationships with her customers, and she excels at reaching out to new customers to help them identify and solve their business challenges.

Her advice to future emerging leaders is to flow with the seasons of life, follow your instincts, and do not be afraid to ask for guidance. Similarly, she advises to not be afraid to speak up with a new idea or if you disagree with the approach, methodology, application or implementation, because there is always room for improvement. She recommends communicating in real time with all parties concerned, pertinent to the challenge at hand, the result of which will only accelerate a positive outcome.

“Own your success and be proud of your accomplishments,” Aarskaug advocates. “Do not wait for someone to tell you ‘good work.’ Tell yourself ‘good job.’

Be humble and proud!”

—Allison McCoy is vice president of business development for The Innovation Group.

NOVEMBER 2019 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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2020 EMERGING LEADERS

40 UNDER 40

Climbing to the Tree Top

Getting IT

Suzanne Duchene • Slot

Marvin Phillips • Director, Information

Service Manager, Seneca Niagara Falls Gaming

Technology, Akwesasne Mohawk Casino Resort

I

n sports, teams often enjoy a home field advantage. For Marvin Phillips, home field advantage meant growing up and then working in the same community.

Phillips has worked for the Akwesasne tribe’s Mohawk Casino Resort his entire career, leading to his current position as director of information technology.

“When we refer to tribes, we’re talking about our families,” says Phillips, a tribal member.

Working for the Mohawk property was not a hard sell. “Watching the Akwesasne Mohawk Casino Resort being built in my back yard more than 20 years ago, it was an easy decision for me at an exciting time throughout Indian Country.”

Still, working in gaming was not something he initially felt was a calling. The State University of New York College of Agriculture and Technology at Morrisville, where he received a bachelor’s degree, offered gaming and casino management courses as electives. He researched both commercial and tribal gaming, and because of the aid the casinos provide for their communities, went with the tribal courses.

At the time of his arrival at Mohawk, the IT department was in its infancy, Phillips says. It’s grown along with the resort. So have Phillips’ responsibilities.

“I am responsible for our organization’s IT infrastructure, and my team develops the overall technology strategy, including cybersecurity. Mitigating risk is my 24/7 job,” he says.

The Covid-19 pandemic crashed down on Mohawk like it has on casinos elsewhere in the country. “It’s much more than a casino floor, it’s our tribal general fund, our community organizations and social services, health care, education, public safety funding. This pandemic has forced us to lean out operations and increase our emphasis on cybersecurity and resiliency,” he says.

Almost everyone worked virtually, which required diligence from Phillips’ IT department. “That responsibility includes constant network maintenance, developing solutions to improve the service and keeping our members secure, online,” he says.

The single most difficult obstacle Phillips faced has been ageism. He was a director at 22. “That brought challenges with both my colleagues and the vendors I negotiated with.

I learned to modify my approach, adapt, and create my own leadership style,” says Phillips, who relaxes by traveling and exploring, at times with members of his large extended family.

More than 20 years later, Phillips witnessed the maturation of IT, shifting from a reactive business unit to an integrated, long-term, strategic planning unit that adds decision-making to the entire organization.

Phillips cites two mentors that helped him along the way. Dwight Terrance was his first director of IT. “Dwight drilled process, process and the importance of processes into me.”

Patrick Bassney was a former GM/CEO during a major property expansion.

“Patrick taught me how paying attention to every little detail makes an enormous impact. These two men influenced my career immeasurably. They helped me understand that mentorship is a two-way street.”

And of course, Phillips credits his parents, Richard and Vicky, who instilled the strong work ethic and sense of contributing to the greater good, he says.

Phillips says continual learning is key for anyone interested in the IT end of the industry. That could mean online courses or conferences. “Keeping your skills fresh is imperative. Cybersecurity threats evolve rapidly, and we have to meet that challenge by protecting our guests and our investments.”

That said, the field is an exciting one for Phillips. “It’s why I’ve stayed for so long, and I’m still under 40. It’s how I hope to spend the rest of my career,” he says.

—Bill Sokolic 20

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

I

n all aspects of life, Suzanne Duchene exemplifies drive, tenacity, dedication and ambition.

She is a proud member of the Seneca Nation Heron clan, a wife, and mother to three amazing boys.

With true passion and excitement for gaming, Duchene has been involved in the industry for nearly 14 years. At the age of 18, she began her career as a part-time slot attendant. While working on the floor of Seneca Niagara Resort & Casino, Duchene noticed supervisors within leadership roles that she believed would exemplify her innate leadership traits and abilities. Devoted to progressing her career, Duchene began attending various training offered by Seneca Niagara and working with their career development department to refine and develop leadership skills.

After three years of hard work and perseverance, Duchene took a leap into management at only 21 years old. She went from working side by side with the people in the slot department to leading them.

Seneca cultural tradition helped her make that transition. Applying the “principles behind the Great White Pine tree—how the roots, the branches and the soil work together in order for the tree to thrive,” she committed to the leadership ideal that all team members, “from the entry-level workers to each rising level of management, have to be taken care of in order for us to succeed as a department and ultimately a business,” she says.

By the age of 30, Duchene had distinguished herself among her peers as a high-performing junior leader in the organization, and accepted a promotion to slot service manager. This role has provided her the opportunity to make changes behind the scenes to better enhance and improve the experience and property for guests and team members.

Duchene strives to continue to improve herself to make a positive difference within the workplace, and during these unprecedented times is looking forward to coming up with innovative ideas on how to successfully navigate through these obstacles, arising to reap the rewards.

Duchene is ready to take on any task, and to assist wherever it is needed.

She lives by the belief that “there is no task beneath you. You have to be willing to assist wherever and whenever it is possible for you to do so.”

By taking on more responsibilities and continuing to grow to gain greater industry knowledge, Duchene aims to assist Seneca Gaming Corporation in attaining their collective goals as a company and team.

When asked what being a part of 40 Under 40 means to her, Duchene states how it is truly a humbling honor. As an honoree, she hopes “to empower other young professionals to set and achieve their goals so that they recognize their importance in their workplace and realize it does not simply have to be a job, but that with hard work and determination, it can become a fulfilling career.”

The best advice Duchene has to offer young professionals is to “always jump at the opportunity to learn and improve” and to remember that “you were chosen to be in your position for a reason. Others have faith in your abilities, so always keep in mind that you are a reflection of those who believed in you.”

—Krista McPherson is an analyst with The Innovation Group.

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2020 EMERGING LEADERS

40 UNDER 40 Trusting the Tribe Bryan Hayes • Senior Vice President, Gaming Operations, Foxwoods Resort Casino

B

ryan Hayes got a promotion to senior vice president of gaming operations at Foxwoods Casino Resort in March. Heck of a time for promotions.

“We almost immediately closed the property, of course, so I have been acclimating to the role since we reopened in June,” Hayes says.

Except for his time at Nichols College in Massachusetts and three years in Las Vegas, Hayes spent his entire career at Foxwoods. The fact that he is a member of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribe which owns the casino added icing to the cake.

“But I didn’t always want to go into the gaming industry,” he admits. “In high school, I began to steer towards a career in the investment banking industry.”

But the idea of working for his community made a lot of sense, so Hayes pursued gaming.

“I was fortunate to be able to take advantage of our tribal member development program after graduating from college, participating in an internship rotation both here and with our former partners in Las Vegas.”

MGM Resorts selected him for the corporation’s Management Associate Program as a finance student, which is how he gave three years to MGM Grand and Luxor.

At Foxwoods, Hayes has worked in income audit, general ledger, financial analysis and slots, holding various positions. In his current job, he is responsible for strategy and direction of the gaming and analytics divisions, a broad brush of activities.

Since his appointment, Covid-19 and its impact have been a focal point. For the first time in its history, Foxwoods shut down for almost three months.

“Working through and reopening in the middle of this pandemic has been extremely challenging and educational at the same time,” says Hayes, who enjoys watching the Yankees, playing sports, and hiking with his wife, Kirsten, and his sons Alexander, 13, and Landon, 6.

“We had to make decisions to only reopen portions of the property. Every day has been a learning experience and we still continue to learn how to operate, compete, protect our team and guests and most importantly, we have had to be flexible,” he says.

To state the obvious, 2020 has thrown the most obstacles in Hayes’ career path. But before Covid-19, Hayes leaned on certain people for guidance.

“Our current chairman, Rodney Butler, was one of my first mentors,” says Hayes, “and he continues to be a great source of leadership. He spent a lot of time with me when I first joined Foxwoods discussing the business and sharing his expertise.”

A former boss—and current peer—Karen Lanigan, senior vice president of finance at Foxwoods, taught Hayes about due diligence and working collaboratively. The late Felix Rappaport became one of the most influential people in his life.

“I worked under him in Las Vegas for two years, and then again when he took the helm of Foxwoods as CEO in 2014,” Hayes says. “He was just a tremendous human being and taught me so much about the importance of being positive, and investing in building lasting relationships.”

Rappaport also imparted this simple lesson: treat everyone the same.

“I work tirelessly to embody that. He always supported my growth and pushed me to embrace new roles. His confidence in me and my ability to lead has had a big impact on my entire career,” Hayes says.

Hayes learned from the industry giants before him. He’d like to help those coming into gaming behind him. “Be as collaborative as possible and build as many relationships as you can.

I have been very fortunate in my career to have many great mentors, and they all were extremely skilled at collaborating with others, and creating strong teams. Also, take time to reflect; life moves quickly, and be sure to make time.”

—Bill Sokolic 22

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

Brand Power Jennifer Fales • Vice President, Global Brand Licensing, IGT

O

ne of the main reasons slot manufacturer International Game Technology came to dominate the supply sector in the 1990s was its introduction of the licensed brand. Beginning with the introduction of Wheel of Fortune in 1996, IGT made recurring revenue from licensed brands a fixture of the industry.

But that singular idea does not begin to tell the story of the executive now in charge of that vital function at IGT, Jennifer Fales. Fales, who is currently IGT’s vice president of global brand licensing, has succeeded not through a singular idea, but through a diversity of experience covering nearly every aspect of the casino industry—both the operational and supply sides.

A Louisiana native, Fales had no inkling of a career in gaming while studying finance and management at Tulane University in New Orleans. A slow economy in the early 2000s would change that.

“I was dead set on being an investment banker,” she recalls.

But the gaming industry came calling in the form of a recruitment effort at Tulane by Harrah’s New Orleans.

“I believe half my class interviewed for the job; there was one position,” says Fales. “I got the job offer, and I remember telling my mother, ‘I don’t think I want to work for a casino.’ I’d never even thought of working for a casino. Then, I remember thinking, ‘Try it; you might love it.’ And that’s exactly what happened.”

It was fortuitous that the operator was the company then called Harrah’s Entertainment, which put a lot of emphasis on planning and analysis. After nearly two years as a property-level

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financial analyst, Fales’ career was off and running, and her experience eventually covered every aspect of casino operations, from digital marketing at the corporate level to media performance. She was senior financial analyst for the corporation when Harrah’s acquired Caesars in 2005.

“During those years, I learned the way a property works, inside and out,” Fales says. “I got to learn about the dynamics of various properties in an enterprise that was so large. At Caesars and Harrah’s before it, planning and analysis was a springboard department. You learned the business, and then you could go into any aspect of the business you liked. It opened up a lot of doors.”

One of those doors opened to the supply side of the business, when in 2008, IGT brought Fales on as chief of staff to the chief operating officer. In that role, she honed her expertise in every aspect of IGT’s day-to-day operations.

Fales’ diverse experience led to a rapid rise at IGT. For five years, she progressed through roles in global marketing and product management, ultimately leading to her current role directing one of the company’s most vital areas.

These days, she oversees brand licensing for all segments of the company’s business globally, from casino slots to digital gaming to the company’s venerable lottery division.

“The responsibility spans from the beginning of the process, where we acquire brands,” Fales explains. “We do research, through to contracts, launching

the game, and working with product management and the studios, through to working with the marketing team when we launch.” The scrutiny, she says, extends through the entire life cycle of each brand.

While Fales is always on the hunt for new brand partnerships, she says maintaining the current partnerships is among her most important functions.

For instance, next year, the company plans to stage a series of events honoring the 25-year anniversary of Wheel of Fortune, the star in the company’s partnership with Sony. Other important partnerships include Fremantle Media (American Idol) and Warner Bros. (The Hangover).

“We’re always searching for new branding opportunities, but a lot of our new opportunities come from our existing partners,” says Fales. “So, (my job is) really about continuing to maintain those good partnerships with our existing partners, because they continually have new properties that they bring to the table.”

Fales’ career path is a testament to building a diverse background, which is her primary advice to young executives entering the industry.

“Expose yourself to as many different segments of the business as possible, whether you’re on the operator side or the manufacturing side of the business,” she says in advice to those entering the industry. “I’ve had a lot of success with a diverse background.”

Clearly, that success will continue for a long time.

—Frank Legato

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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2020 EMERGING LEADERS

40 UNDER 40

Home Sweet Home André Barnabei • Vice President

Listening Leads to Big Ideas JaNessa Bumgarner • Chief Executive Officer, Lucky Eagle Casino & Hotel

I

n July 2020, JaNessa Bumgarner took on a new role and a new challenge: chief executive officer of Lucky Eagle Casino & Hotel. In doing so, Bumgarner became the first Chehalis tribal member to serve as CEO in the casino’s 25 years. Her ascent up the corporate ladder started in 1999 when she walked through the doors of Lucky Eagle to start as a busser, not knowing what the future had in store.

Bumgarner acknowledges that there are many people who have helped get her to where she is today.

Sean Vestal, Bumgarner’s former boss and first mentor, was a champion for her during the early years of her career. Vestal would constantly gush about his experience at college, and over time, he inspired Bumgarner to get a college education, which resulted in her landing in the Hospitality Management program at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Bumgarner says about her experience, “My decision to return to college and complete my degree at UNLV was definitely the most impactful decision of my career. It fueled a number of career opportunities and provided a foundation to build from.” As a student, she realized it is best to understand where you lack experience and to not hesitate to reach out for help.

After internships with Marriott and Great Wolf Lodge, Bumgarner returned to Lucky Eagle in 2014 as the director of hotel operations, and three years later faced what she cites as the greatest challenge of her career: becoming chief operating officer. Initially unsure if she wanted the position, she ended up applying at the last minute. After all, her passion was in hotel operations and hospitality, not slot and table utilization. Bumgarner was offered the role and subsequently had to adapt to the new challenge. She learned how to succeed, not by pretending she had all the answers, but by relying on and learning from those who worked for and around her.

“Throughout a career, we will be faced with new challenges and issues,” Bumgarner says. “Being honest about our initial limitations is simply an honest approach to dealing with any challenge or situation. I think my team appreciated this, and it gave me some great opportunities to learn and acquire new skills.”

Now as CEO of Lucky Eagle, Bumgarner has taken the initiative to help her team members work collaboratively and share ideas, much as she has throughout her career. A step in that direction has been the creation of the “Big Idea Room.”

Tons of thought went into transforming an empty office into an area “for brainstorming, creative thinking, and problem solving—where people can share ideas about making our organization better.

“This is a space in which I hope emerging leaders feel safe, allowing them to thrive,” Bumgarner says. Everything from the color of the room to the scent and lighting—which she describes as “perfect”—was done intentionally to promote productive brainstorming. Although she has only been CEO for a few months, the implementation of the Big Idea Room is one of Bumgarner’s proudest changes to date.

Bumgarner’s advice to aspiring young leaders is, “There is far more to be gained from listening than from speaking. Learn to listen. It is a skill and it is something you can do better.”

—Alex Goldstein is an analyst for The Innovation Group.

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Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

of Gaming, Rivers Casino Pittsburgh

T

urns out Thomas Wolfe was wrong. You can go home again, or at least close to home.

André Barnabei was working in Harrah’s Philadelphia casino when a headhunter contacted him about an opening with Rivers Casino Pittsburgh.

“I grew up about 30 miles from Pittsburgh, so I welcomed the opportunity to return close to home and be closer to my family,” he says.

The job involved human resources, his major at Washington and Jefferson College. Barnabei spent more than eight years in human resources at Rivers Casino then moved to the gaming side when another position came along.

“I had discussions with our general manager and let him know I was interested in other opportunities where I could add value,” he says.

The GM asked Barnabei to become vice president of slots, and his career on the gaming side matured into his current role as vice president of gaming.

He oversees slots, tables, BetRivers Sportsbook and poker operations.

“I am a leader on the executive team where we look for continuous improvement across all lines of our operation,” Barnabei says.

The team did not expect the coronavirus pandemic. “Covid-19 has challenged all of us to look at the way we run our business through different lenses. Our first mission was to ensure we had proper plans in place to make sure our team members and guests were able to enjoy a clean and safe environment,” he says.

The executives determined how to run the casino in the most efficient and effective ways when reopening, knowing guest levels would not be close to preCovid days.

“Personally, it continues to motivate me to find new and innovative ways to advance our business,” Barnabei says.

Rivers Casino is feeling a sense of normalcy with familiar faces returning to the property. Especially important at this stage of recovery is guest support for how clean the place seems and how safe patrons feel, he says.

Covid-19 is not the only obstacle Barnabei has had to overcome. On a flight returning to Pittsburgh from G2E, the GM leaned across the aisle and said the CEO wants to open a retail sportsbook by December, less than 50 days.

“He said I would be responsible for getting it off the ground. He smiled and said ‘I think it is an aggressive timeline, but you will figure it out.’ For the remainder of that flight, I worked to develop an opening timeline that led us to debuting the first retail sportsbook in Pennsylvania.”

Barnabei credits his family with the largest impact on who he is today. “I find myself repeating some one-liners passed on to me from my parents and grandparents such as ‘When you walk in to a room, you’d better greet every person and say goodbye when you leave.’ When you think about it, it is really that simple!”

Relaxing is not in Barnabei’s DNA, he says. In addition to his hours with Rivers Casino, he owns a property rental company. But he finds ways to wind down. Doing projects around the house, for example. And with his wife, Jessica, getting involved with their children.

“I coach T-ball and youth football.”

Barnabei suggests prospective staffers in the industry jump in with both feet. “It doesn’t matter where you start, it just matters that you maintain a positive attitude. The greatest thing about this business is the opportunity to advance your career. Where else could you move from one department to another and stay working for the same company?”

— Bill Sokolic

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Determination Over Difficulty Mary Parker • Management and Program Analyst, National Indian Gaming Commission

A

s a little girl, Mary Parker dreamed of becoming a kindergarten teacher at the local elementary school. Her small Oklahoma town was all that she knew, and the world past its borders seemed like something vague and intangible. Little did she know, however, that as an adult, she would embark upon a career adventure that would carry her to the far reaches of the nation, empowering her to make professional achievements she had never imagined.

Just eight short years ago, Parker found herself raising her children during a pivotal point of her life, a stay-at-home mom who knew she needed a plan of action, and fast. She drafted up a list of “crazy goals,” as she called them. And one by one, she checked items off the list, items like getting a job, buying a house, and obtaining a master’s degree in administrative leadership from the University of Oklahoma. Thinking that desperate times called for desperate measures, she accepted the first job she was offered, as an administrative assistant for Will Rogers Downs Racino. But the position turned out not to be desperate at all.

Within a year, she was promoted to talent development specialist. A year after that, she was promoted yet again to compliance trainer. In the blink of an eye, Parker surveyed her surroundings to realize that not only did she have a career in the making, but she was able to give back to her people while doing something she loved, a benefit she knew that many people are not afforded.

After seven years of serving her tribe of Cherokee Nation, Parker was offered an enticing opportunity with the National Indian Gaming Commission (NIGC). She knew the position would pose its own set of challenges in forcing her to juggle the demands of career and parenthood, but she was not about to let the difficulty level dissuade her from pursuing her dreams.

With her drive to achieve outweighing her fear of failing, she took a leap of faith and accepted the position. As expected, her new arrangement called for a substantial amount of travel, but it was also a scenario she had dreamed of all her life, taking her on regular trips to Washington, D.C. and other locations throughout the U.S. Parker’s new role offered her the chance to represent not only her own tribe, but all tribes across the nation. Her conflict in wanting to excel at parenting and at the job she deeply loved inspired the creation of a personal motto that she has lived by ever since: you can do anything hard for a little while. Proud to work for the NIGC and the mission it stood for, Parker recognized that this was more than just a job. It was a chance to do what she loved, to act as a role model for small-town girls like she herself had once been, and to make a real difference.

Known for her rock-solid work ethic, Parker’s passion for understanding effective leadership lends itself to forging relationships destined for success. She is now pursuing her doctorate degree in instructional systems design and technology at Sam Houston State University, and she continues to thrive in both her role as a career woman and as a parent, even finding time to undergo community volunteer work.

Advises Parker to future emerging leaders, “Don’t do something just for advancement. Find something that you are passionate about, look for ways to grow while pursuing your dreams, and be sure to share with and teach your peers along the way.”

—Marie Casias is manager of marketing and administration for The Innovation Group.

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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2020 EMERGING LEADERS

40 UNDER 40

Responsible Approach Martin Lycka • Director of Regulatory Affairs, Trustee of the GVC Foundation U.S., GVC Holdings PLC

W

hen Martin Lycka cites his parents as one of his influences, there is one aspect he thinks may have disappointed them.

“My parents were both professors of chemistry when my sister and I were growing up, so it was expected that we’d follow them to university,” he explains. “But when I chose a legal career, I don’t think that’s what they were expecting.”

It has worked out for Lycka. After graduating from the Prague Law Faculty, he got an internship at the Dentons, one of the leading law firms in the Czech Republic. Since the country had recently passed a law that legalized gaming, he immediately started studying gaming regulation, and after earning his law degree at the College of Europe in Bruges, he was offered a job at an early incarnation of Betfair, now part of Flutter Entertainment.

Lycka says the expectation early on was that gaming laws would become “harmonized” within the European Union.

“If that had happened I might be out of a job,” he laughs. “Ever since then counselors were important. At Betfair, I would work with officials of the Isle of Man, Denmark, Spain and other countries, progressively moving myself up the ladder.”

Just as sports betting and online gaming started to proliferate in the U.S., GVC offered him a job, much better than the offer he had at Betfair.

He says his experience in the European regulatory environment prepared him for the U.S. “It’s just another version what happened in Europe,” he says.

Lycka says he actually prefers the state-by-state approach to regulation.

“It’s better for the global operators,” he says,

26

“even though there is a strong tendency to at least partially reinvent the wheel.”

He’s hoping that the U.S. can avoid the backlash from elected officials that many European countries have seen as a result of a lack of focus on consumer protection and responsible gaming. As such, he’s helped GVC craft a proactive approach in the U.S. toward those factors through collaborations with such institutions as Harvard’s Division on Addictions, Seton Hall University, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and others.

“First of all,” he says, “it’s the right thing to do. If the U.S. industry is much quicker off the mark, we don’t have to go through the purgatory of what occurred in the U.K., Italy and other countries. This was sadly self-inflicted by the industry, and now we’re paying the price for the sins of the past. How long will it take to reconcile?”

Ironically, Lycka doesn’t see a harmonization of responsible gaming responses by gaming operators as superior to going it alone. He says the general parameters of responsible gaming are agreed upon, but each company has a unique approach, which should not be discouraged.

“Every single operator has introduced triggers into the system to detect possible problem gambling,” he says. “So the implementation should be left to individual operators.”

Lycka says he learned from partners in his early law firms, but cites in particular his first boss at Betfair, Fiona Dormandy.

“She’s now the general counsel for Airbnb in the EMEA, and she taught me an immense amount about regulations,” he says.

He also says his current boss is somewhat underappreciated.

“Robert Hoskin likes to keep a low profile, but I’ve learned a lot from him about strategic issues. He’s a pragmatic, no-nonsense guy.”

Lycka believes it is a great time for young people to get involved in the gaming industry.

“Internet gaming and sports betting are still novelties,” he says. “There are massive opportunities in these areas. Yes, it will take hard work and there’s a steep learning curve, but if you get in, it can be a very rewarding career because you get exposed to all parts of the industry—lawyers, regulators, suppliers, operators.”

To cut down that learning curve, Lycka also has suggestions.

“Listen to the more senior members of the team. Learn from your mistakes. Think outside of the box. There really are no shortcuts,” he says.

—Roger Gros

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

Invaluable Connections Connie James • Chief Financial Officer, Gaming, Scientific Games Corporation

I

n January, Connie James was named chief financial officer of the gaming division at Scientific Games. For James, heading finance at one of SG’s three main divisions represents the completion of a full circle in a career that flourished during nine years working at one of the supplier’s chief rivals, Australia’s Aristocrat Leisure Limited.

James, like many executives in the gaming industry, did not start her professional career with gaming in mind. When the Southern California native was in her senior year of high school, her family moved to Las Vegas. After graduation, she earned an accounting degree from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

At UNLV, James took an introductory course in gaming conducted by an adjunct professor who was vice president of internal auditing for MGM Resorts. She was invited to intern in MGM’s audit department, which led to her hiring as a senior analyst in the risk services practice at Las Vegas-based Deloitte & Touche LLP in 2004.

“Being centered in Las Vegas, clearly Deloitte had a portfolio centered in the gaming industry,” James says. “So, those companies became my clients.”

After Deloitte moved James to its Sydney, Australia office in 2007, James worked more closely with Aristocrat, one of the firm’s major clients. “(Aristocrat) knocked on my door enough times that I finally joined them,” she says.

Hired as Aristocrat’s head of global risk & audit in 2009, James was to rise through the finance ranks at Aristocrat through nine years—as VP of finance, product and technology in Australia, back to Las Vegas in 2013 as CFO for the Americas and

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business operations, and finally, as CFO of global land-based gaming before leaving in 2018 for a position in global finance for Cargill in Minneapolis-St. Paul, the hometown of her husband.

“Cargill is just a phenomenal company,” she says. “I had made this deliberate decision to move to Minnesota and be closer to my husband’s family, and I quickly became ingrained with that business, and had this vision that for the next 20 years, I’d be part of the Cargill family.”

However, history would repeat itself to intervene in her life. Jamie Odell, who had become CEO and managing director of Aristocrat shortly after James arrived, became an adviser to Scientific Games CEO Barry Cottle in 2019, shortly after James went to Cargill. This year, Odell took over as executive chairman of Scientific Games, and Toni Korsanis, the former CFO of Aristocrat under Odell, was named vice chair.

Those two executives are part of a management transformation at Scientific Games that has seen several former top Aristocrat executives brought on, including Matt Wilson, now SG’s CEO of gaming. Last year, Odell called on James to complete the new executive team as CFO of the gaming division.

“It’s exciting,” James says of her new role at SG. “I worked directly

for Toni Korsanis for nine years in a number of different roles. I think Jamie and Toni are industry legends, and their ability to look at organizations, understand the strategic elements, the operational execution, and most importantly, focus on people and culture, is a winning combination.”

James now works with Wilson in SG’s relatively decentralized organizational structure. She says their focus is defining the strategic direction of the division, and on enabling current processes and operational excellence to assure the execution of that strategy. “The key focus needs to be pairing our investments to the products the players and our customers are most excited about, first and foremost,” she says.

“While we have become a more efficient organization, we’re laser-focused on executing a three- to five-year plan that we’ve just articulated. And now, with this amazing leadership team that has been assembled, we are positioned for a great future.”

In the end, most important is creating what James calls the “secret sauce” of a high-performance culture—“leading through values and driving the excellence in a team spirit, and making sure we’re all playing at our best to deliver on the strategic plan.

“I’m super excited, and super optimistic about the future.”

—Frank Legato

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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Revving the Engine How Southeast Asia is using gaming as an economic generator

By Adam Steinberg and Brendan D. Bussmann

I

t seems like an eternity since we heard discussions about the robust nature of gaming in Southeast Asia. Recent discussions have surrounded the continued development of brick-and-mortar facilities in areas like Vietnam, Laos and others. Most of the concerns about gaming were related to the crackdown on online gaming that had been influenced by China and the geopolitical pressures they propagate to exercise their policy views on various parts of the world.

However, SARS-CoV-2 came and shuttered the gaming world as part of the Great Shutdown. Since then, many existing land-based gaming properties have struggled to reopen or, if open, are operating at less than full capacity.

Part of this has been due to restrictions at the local level, but part of it has also been due to a lack of visitation levels upon which these markets had become dependent, especially visitors from mainland China. However, history can still show how gaming continues to be an economic engine for those that have forged ahead and offered a model for others as they re-emerge from the Great Shutdown.

GDP Per Capita

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Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

ASEAN as a Region Of the 10 countries that comprise the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), only Singapore and Brunei have GDP per-capita levels that exceed the global average. In fact, GDP per-capita for six of the ASEAN countries is less than half the world’s average.

The current global pandemic provides an opportunity for some of the ASEAN countries to address weaknesses in existing gaming regulations, eliminate or reduce illegal gaming operations, and attract new investment that will accrue benefits to the country and the population.

For religious or political reasons, not all countries will, or should, pursue the development of an integrated casino and entertainment industry. But for those that do, there is a benefit in terms of increased tourism, new high-wage jobs, economic diversification, and meaningful investment in high-traffic properties and the infrastructure necessary to support these projects.

ASEAN GDP/Capita Relative to World Average

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GDP as a Benchmark Indonesia has the largest GDP of the ASEAN countries, but GDP per-capita telecommunications activity. is approximately 36 percent of the world’s average. Because Indonesia is also Other items to be addressed in new and updated gaming laws are a reathe world’s largest majority Muslim nation with 87 percent of the population sonable tax rate, a robust regulatory regime prepared to enforce the laws, identifying as Muslim, the gaming industry would not likely be viable in that and anti-money laundering laws consistent with the recommendations of country. the Financial Action Task Force. The laws could also decree certain requireHowever, Laos and Myanmar are two of the poorer countries in the ments, like a minimum investment or the inclusion of certain amenities. world, with underdeveloped infrastructure and economies that are primarily This would ensure that only the largest, multi-jurisdictional operators could agriculture and commodity-based. The roadways in both Laos and Myanmar satisfy the requirements, thus ensuring proper safety measures are adopted remain underdeveloped, particularly in rural areas. In Laos, only 14 percent of and lending to the potential for ancillary investment in the community, the country’s 39,600 kilometers of roads are paved, while 22 percent of the such as transportation and schools.

157,000 kilometers of roads are paved in Myanmar. By comparison, 65 percent of the 6.6 million kilometers of roadway in the United States are paved.

Gaming as the Economic Engine Since 1975, the Laotian government has been a single-party communist There are two great examples of gaming as the economic engine that exist in state, but it began allowing limited private ownership and relaxed foreign inSoutheast Asia today: Singapore and Cambodia. vestment laws in the late 1980s. Agriculture is the leading industry in Laos, One can look at the growth in Singapore as a template on how to run accounting for approximately 20 percent of GDP and almost three-quarters an effective process to launch a gaming enterprise. Gross gaming revenue of total employment. levels of nearly $3.4 billion represent 0.9 percent of GDP for the republic.

In recent years, the country has benefitted from significant foreign direct Tourism has also been the contributor to that factor, and has enhanced the investment (FDI), particularly related to hydropower dams along the multiplier effect, not only in terms of visitation to the market, but also in Mekong River. In an effort to increase the attractiveness of the country to terms of the average length of stay for visitors from across the region. foreign investors, the government has created special economic zones with generous Visitation to Singapore by Area of Origin tax incentives. While gaming is technically illegal in Laos, there are three casinos allowed to operate in these special economic zones. There is also a number of illegal casinos that continue to operate, particularly in northern Laos, despite police crackdowns.

Meanwhile, Myanmar remained essentially under military rule from 1962 until 2016, when the new government led by the National League for Democracy party was sworn in. However, civil unrest with the ethnic Rohingya minority has inhibited tourism to and investment in Myanmar, with the U.S. State Department characterizing violence in August 2017 as ethnic One of the better examples is Cambodia, and the growth caused largely cleansing. by one company, NagaCorp, and its flagship property, NagaWorld in While the government has instituted reforms to enhance the investment Phnom Penh. While others have flirted with development in Sihanoukville, climate, Myanmar remains one of the poorest countries in Asia with about Naga’s property has proven to be a cornerstone for the country’s overall ecoone-quarter of the country living below the poverty line. The economy is nomic growth. mostly agriculture and natural resource-driven, but according to data from the Ministry of Tourism and Hotels, there has been an increase in foreign inNagaWorld, Phnom Penh vestment in hotels. Since passage of the 1986 Gambling Law, casino gaming is illegal in Myanmar, with the exception of two legal resorts approved in 1992 to boost tourism. Similar to Laos, there are a number of illegal casinos operating in Myanmar.

The Case for the Opportunity There remains substantial underserved demand for gaming in Asia, or as Sheldon Adelson noted, “Asia can handle 10 Las Vegases.” Both Laos and Myanmar are easily accessible from large, wealthy populations in China, Vietnam, Thailand and India, and could be economically viable as foreigneronly destinations. There remains, however, a number of other issues to address for the industry to be viable in those countries, including improved roadways, better connectivity to air routes, electricity infrastructure, and NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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Looking over the last two and a half decades, the contributions have been remarkable, considering the development cycle of NagaWorld from a waterbased facility on the Mekong River into a large integrated resort and a dominant gaming operator in the region. From the initial riverboat barge to the development of Naga 3, the team at Naga has developed both gaming and non-gaming amenities that continue to serve as an economic engine for the country, creating thousands of good jobs that have a multiplier effect on not just the country but the region. The chart below illustrates this growth over the last 25 years.

Cambodia Historical GDP

Vietnam’s Vinpearl Phu Quoc Casino Resort

The Mekong Region provides some of the greatest opportunity for gaming to be the economic engine that further advances growth in Southeast Asia.

Opportunities to Consider The Mekong Region provides some of the greatest opportunity for gaming to be the economic engine that further advances growth in Southeast Asia. The industry will struggle during Black Swan events, such as the Great Shutdown, but there will be opportunities for expansion if established properly. This includes building a strong economic argument and cornerstone for development as well as ensuring strong regulations to serve as a guide for compliance. This allows operators and developers to pursue only the best opportunities that can create a win-win scenario for a market that can benefit in multiple ways.

Two of the best cases for development include Laos and Myanmar, as mentioned earlier, that are still developing and need further investment in infrastructure such as transportation (roads and air lift) and telecommunications to modernize the region. Vietnam has already begun to further develop gaming as an engine, but its ultimate success will be determined by finding the right partner in the right regulatory environment that can serve as a catalyst for growth.

While not all will be able to replicate the opportunities created by Cambodia and Singapore that have proven themselves as solid models, there is a formula to success for government to evaluate and implement a thoughtful plan for growth and opportunity.

The greatest challenge to this is likely the geopolitical influences of the region. While this includes the current tension between the United States and China, this also touches on the social balance that the Chinese government seeks through its own citizens and their ability to travel, while balancing the expansion of infrastructure through the Belt and Road Initiative in regions where China seeks further influence and access. This could be a concern to these and other expanding markets that will emerge from the bubble created by the Great Shutdown, and will likely cater to a significant increase in Chinese tourists.

The good thing about these markets is that they will likely not be on the radar of the coming “black list” that China seeks to produce as it cracks down 30

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

on gaming activity by its own people, both at home and aboard. Likewise, a strong regulatory regime, combined with operations consistent with “best practices” safety procedures, could ensure these countries are not placed on the black list.

As mentioned in a September article in the South China Morning Post, at least 1 trillion yuan (US$145.5 billion) flows out of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) through gaming activities every year. China sees this as an economic and national security risk. This unraveling will continue as Xi Jinping looks to strengthen his influence on the social balance in the PRC. The challenge for these jurisdictions will be to balance their current economic drivers with the ability to turn to gaming as an engine for development than can ignite further economic growth and tourism. However, they must consider the social balance of protecting the Chinese customer that would contribute to visitation.

This is best done through solid regulations including anti-money laundering regulations that will curry favor with Xi Jinping. While gaming can serve as a strong source for development, the industry continues to face the challenges of politics that can stifle its growth potential.

However, it remains today one of the strongest sources for an emerging jurisdiction to bring investment, job growth, and tourism growth that will form a basis for long-term success of a market if done properly through a strong regulatory environment.

Adam Steinberg is the founder of AM Steinberg Advisors. Brendan D. Bussmann is a partner and director of government affairs with Global Market Advisors (GMA).

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An Excerpt from At the Sands: The Casino That Shaped Classic Las Vegas, Brought the Rat Pack Together, and Went Out With a Bang

By David G. Schwartz

M

y latest book, At the Sands, traces the history of the famous Las Vegas Strip hotel from before its December 1952 opening to after its June 1996 closing. There’s a reason that chips from the Sands are consistently worth more to collectors than those of other casinos of the era: the Sands has an incredible mystique around it. It was my job as the author to try to capture some of that mystique and explain what made the Sands so special.

The Sands is most famous today as the home of the Rat Pack, even though Sinatra loathed that name, which only became popular in the 1980s. But the Rat Pack (or the Clan, as Sinatra preferred) didn’t coalesce until 1960, more than seven years into the Sands’ history. In the first several chapters of the book, I look at what made the Sands the place where the definitive icons of classic Las Vegas came together. The answer is a lot of hard work by three men in particular: Jack Entratter, who made the Copa Room an entertainment mecca; Carl Cohen, the casino manager par excellence; and Al Freeman, a publicity maven who wooed the media and presented an image of the Sands as a place where fun happened.

The story of Frank, Dean and Sammy and their friends at the Sands is an incredible one, but there is much more to the Sands than the Rat Pack. After Howard Hughes bought the casino in 1967, the Sands began its second chapter. While the Hughes years don’t have the same “cool” aura as the earlier days, they are nevertheless important to history, and necessary for a real understanding of the Sands; Hughes and Summa, his successor corporation, owned the Sands for longer than the original owners.

In 1988, the Interface Group, chaired by Sheldon Adelson, acquired the Sands. At the time, Adelson was a Las Vegas outsider and something of a maverick. Comdex, the computer show that brought more than 100,000 visitors to Las

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Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

Vegas, was a behemoth, but many in the industry lamented the fact that convention-goers gambled much less than other visitors, looking past the boost they gave the bottom lines of other departments.

This excerpt from At the Sands looks at how Las Vegas reacted to Comdex 1990, and how the Sands played a critical role in bringing conventions to the forefront in the gaming industry.

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The greatest names in the entertainment industry graced the stage of the Sand’s Copa Room, including the famous Rat Pack

L

as Vegas casino operators had first flirted with the convention business in a major way after the disappointing summer of 1955.

But, as the Sands Expo and Convention Center rose from the ground behind the Sands, alarm bells went off on the Strip. To date, casinos had treated meetings as a stopgap that kept hotels full when gamblers were scarce, and tended to work cooperatively, deferring to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority when it came to the big shows.

Now, Sheldon Adelson’s new convention center threatened the status quo. The Las Vegas Convention Center existed to serve the casinos, and the convention business was seen as moderately profitable at best. A public-private partnership, the Convention Center contracted out a range of services, from providing flowers to maintenance. The Sands Expo Center planned to operate them in-house, with all profits flowing only to it.

The Convention Center’s focus on room occupancy over convention hall profitability made sense, given that it was mostly funded by room taxes, and empty rooms didn’t yield taxes. But the Sands was in business to make money for itself. So, some feared a new era of competition for mega-shows like Comdex that could upset everything the LVCVA had built over the previous three decades. Already, rival casinos were intimating that; in periods of heavy demand, they wouldn’t make blocks of rooms available to Sands convention-goers, which the new Expo Center would desperately need before its own room expansion came online.

(Then-General Manager) Steve Norton even suggested something daring.

“What we’re going to do here,” he told the media in September, as the Expo Center was nearing completion, “is have the first Nevada operation where the catering department may be making more than the casino.”

Former Sands General Manager Steve Norton, Las Vegas convention innovator

With a small casino and good margins on catering, it wasn’t as crazy as it sounded.

The first phase of the Expo Center, with 576,000 square feet of space in three massive halls, opened just in time for Comdex 1990, whose 110,000 delegates filled up most of Las Vegas’ 74,000 hotel rooms from November 12 to November 16.

Adelson, exultant that it had taken only eight months to build the convention center, promised to add another 800,000 square feet to the complex within three years, making it the largest single-level convention facility in the United States.

Bringing the Comdex delegates to Las Vegas was one thing; finding them rooms was another. With other casino owners not rolling out the red carpet for conventioneers, Adelson had a simple task for Norton.

“You know these guys—you get the rooms.”

Norton began working the phones, offering a deal: Casinos could triple their typical midweek room rate (usually around $50), cutting in the Sands for a 10 percent commission, which would cover the cost of bus transportation for Comdex delegates to all of the various exhibits, meetings and ban-

“We are inclined to believe that a Las Vegas which could bill itself as the ‘convention capital of the world’ would profit handsomely in the long run.”

—Review-Journal editorial, October 1993 NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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Las Vegas Sands Chairman Sheldon Adelson (above) changed the industry through his promotion of meetings and conventions at the Sands Expo and Convention Center

quets that would be held at the Hilton, Bally’s, Caesars, and the Las Vegas Convention Center, along with the Sands Expo. The hotels would make money renting those spaces and catering functions, with Norton promising that their gourmet restaurants would be full of paying (not comp) customers all week.

“You might want to ask a few of your dealers to stay home that week,” Norton concluded, “but you’ll make plenty on the rooms and dining.”

Booking attendees into Downtown hotels and even casinos well off the Strip, Norton was able to find rooms for everyone, with all major Strip properties, except Circus Circus, committing most of their rooms. The first day of the show, Circus Circus CEO Bill Bennett, hearing reports of hundreds of convention-goers at Circus Circus and Excalibur, called Norton.

“Can you send us some of those free buses?” he asked.

The experience opened eyes. Here was a way to turn loss leaders into profit centers. Though they were initially resistant, most of the Strip came around to Adelson’s point of view, and relying on business travelers to buoy profits became the “conventional” wisdom in Las Vegas.

The success of the Expo Center didn’t lead to stability in the Sands’ executive offices. Norton, who had taken on the job as a consultant, continued to advise on riverboat legislation in three states. He departed in May 1991 (“before he could fire me,” he later quipped) to serve as president of the Gold River casino in Laughlin before becoming president of Argosy Gaming, which operated five casinos in the Midwest and South.

Though Adelson took a larger role in planning the resort’s expansion, he lured Phil Bryan from Reno’s Peppermill Hotel to serve as the Sands’ full-time president in January 1992. This was a new role expressly created for him. But Bryan lasted scarcely two months in the role before resigning. The longtime gaming executive professed to have had no disagreements with Adelson. Instead, he was leaving because of his growing commitment to his Buddhist faith. He would be leaving Las Vegas for a religious retreat in either Northern California or New York, after which he would pledge himself to environmental concerns.

Bryan’s departure opened the door to speculation about the Sands’ future.

Former Harrah’s executive Richard Goeglein was rumored to either be auditioning for Bryan’s job or to be putting together a group that would buy the Sands from Adelson. Some thought that Adelson considered the casino resort itself a distraction and would welcome the chance to focus on the Expo Center, which would not be part of the sale. Months later, though, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority was exploring the opposite scenario, putting together a master plan that weighed the possibilities of buying the Sand Expo Center.

Nothing came of that idea, but ground hadn’t been broken on the new hotel tower. Adelson admitted in November 1992 that money was not as easy to come by as it had been a few years earlier.

“The financing market for casinos is not good now,” he explained. “If I could raise the money, I would build the tower. But lenders are concerned about overbuilding. They are watching MGM, Luxor and Treasure Island.” These megaresorts might expand the market—or they might glut it (soon, it was ap34

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

parent that it was the former). Lenders were waiting to see how Las Vegas responded to these massive projects before financing anything new. Until then, it looked like a retheming and expansion of the casino for $15 million was the most that could be done.

So the Sands spent the next year in a holding pattern, although the growth of conventions in Las Vegas vindicated Adelson’s faith in business travel. In the three years since he bought the Sands, annual convention revenues grew by almost 25 percent, from $1.5 billion to nearly $2 billion.

By now, public opinion in Las Vegas had shifted; conventioneers might not gamble extravagantly, but they were, overall, good for business. “We are inclined to believe,” a Review-Journal editorial said in October 1993, “that a Las Vegas which could bill itself as the ‘convention capital of the world’ would profit handsomely in the long run.” So much so that the LVCVA should seriously consider Adelson’s offer to double the size of his Expo Center before selling it to the convention authority for $150 million, instead of pursuing its own growth plan, which would take 15 years to reach fruition. Adelson promised to expand the Sands Expo in 14 months.

The LVCVA had not responded to Adelson’s proposal when, in March 1994, he announced plans to expand the Sands Expo and Convention Center to 1.15 million square feet. By September, with the second phase nearing completion, Adelson came close to taking his offer to the LVCVA off the table.

“I don’t think I want to sell it to them now,” he said. “I’m making too much money.” Demand was so high that he was charging up to three times more for convention space than the Convention Center. “I’m making millions of dollars of profit a year.”

Business at the Expo Center was so good that, in February 1995, Adelson sold the Interface Group’s 17 gaming trade shows to Tokyo’s Softbank Corporation for $800 million. As part of the deal, Adelson bought out his erstwhile partners in the Sands, making him the sole owner. He had grown Comdex into a powerhouse—the previous November, it had welcomed nearly 200,000 visitors. Now, he looked to a new future at the Sands.

With Las Vegas growing to accommodate the now-opened Luxor, Treasure Island, and MGM Grand, banks were far more open to lending money for new projects. Then again, a man with $800 million in his pocket didn’t have to worry quite as much about lenders. The long-awaited Sands expansion, it appeared, was now very close on the horizon.

David G. Schwartz, a former gaming industry employee, is a professor, gaming historian, and the associate vice provost for faculty affairs at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He has written several books, including Grandissimo, Boardwalk Playground, Roll the Bones, and the brand-new At the Sands.

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Innovation Rules Winners of 19th Annual GGB Gaming & Technology Awards Announced

By Patrick Roberts

G

aming’s most respected technology awards reveal the top innovators in the industry—the winners of the 19th Annual GGB Gaming & Technology Awards.

The GGB Gaming & Technology Awards are the industry standard in the field, recognizing excellence in innovation and practical application in all gaming disciplines. Hundreds of gaming products and services were entered into this important competition.

The awards prove that innovation did not cease with the industry shutdowns and other challenges this year has presented.

In fact, the industry’s suppliers responded to the crisis with a host of new products designed to facilitate a safe return to business. Because of this, a new category was added to this year’s awards, Best Guest Health & Safety Product.

“Once again, the nominations for the GGB Gaming & Technology Awards represented the best new products and services in the gaming industry,” says Roger Gros, publisher of Global Gaming Business magazine, which administers the awards program.

“As technology advances at a rapid pace, it’s often difficult for casino executives to stay current. The judges for the GGB Gaming & Technology Awards are some of the most dedicated and respected executives in the business, so their opinion carries a great deal of weight. The winners of this year’s edition beat out some amazing competition and demonstrated true innovation.”

The awards were presented in concert with the virtual Global Gaming Expo October 27-28.

Judges for the awards are: Claudia Winkler, president of GHI Solutions; Rob Russell, gaming analyst, Regulatory Management Counselors, P.C.; Frank Neborsky, general manager, the Downs at Albuquerque; Gerhard Burda, president and CEO, ESCAPES Advisory Services; Cliff Paige, slot director, South Point Casino Resort, Las Vegas; and Skyelar Perkins, corporate slot director, Choctaw Casinos.

Nominations for the 2022 GGB Gaming & Technology Awards will open in June 2021, and include new products and services to be introduced in 2021 or 2022.

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Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

GGB GAMING & TECHNOLOGY AWARDS 2020 Best Productivity-Enhancement Technology GOLD: rGuest Service • Agilysys SILVER: SYNK31 • Konami Gaming, Inc.

Best Table Game Product or Innovation GOLD: TableView with Chip Recognition • Scientific Games SILVER: TITA System • JCM Global

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Best Slot Product GOLD: The Vault • Everi SILVER: Cash Express Luxury Line • Aristocrat

Best Consumer-Service Technology GOLD: Bring Your Own Device • Kambi SILVER: CashClub Wallet Core Edition • Everi

Best Interactive Product GOLD: Mystic Slots • Ruby Seven Studios: SMSC Gaming Enterprise - Mystic Lake Casino Hotel SILVER: IGT PlaySports Platform • IGT

Best Guest Health & Safety Product GOLD: Reel Clear • Aristocrat SILVER: Social Distancing & Automated Game Sanitization • Scientific Games

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MAKING MY POINT

Go Along to Get Along?

When ‘We’ve always done it this way’ becomes ‘Maybe there’s a better way’

T

o agree or not to agree, that is the question.

But the answer—at least the right one—might come as a surprise.

Imagine if you will a spectrum, a spectrum that measures agreeability, your agreeability in the workplace, from brown-noser to ball-buster and all points in between. Let’s score it on a 10-point system, the way judges do with gymnasts, frat boys do with coeds, and nerds do with baseball cards.

What’s your number, cucumber?

While determining that digit, concurrently contemplate what’s happened over the last 15-20 years. It’s become an almost religious tenet in modern business that everyone has to get along.

Like. All. The. Time. No infighting. No arguing.

No knock-down, drag-out, Jerry-Springer-style melees where insults—and the occasional chair— pinball around the board room.

Ah yes, the good old days.

But today and tomorrow (and tomorrow and tomorrow) many companies will continue to run on the fuel of unanimity. It’s like a murder trial: everyone agrees or it’s a hung jury and nothing happens. And this vector leads to one destination, where we’re all sitting in a circle, legs crossed, palms up, and singing that old song from the Coke commercial.

And while the Kumbaya Culture does wonders for the soul, does it also bring peace and tranquility to the bottom line? Or what about the other extreme, aka the demolition derby, Royal Rumble, human cockfighting ecosystem—we’ve all worked at places like that—where it’s so ruthless you might actually stab yourself in front to avoid getting stabbed by someone else in the back?

When it comes to agreeability, you don’t want to occupy either tail of that bell curve, a one or a 10. The optimal way to navigate through the typical corporate labyrinth is with a score of 7, leaning a little more toward Doberman than doormat, warrior than windsock. Whether it’s a product feature or a pricing program or a strategic initiative, if you want to contribute, like truly contribute, then you had better ball up your fists and mix it up every once in a while.

You owe it to your company… and to your

By Roger Snow

career. Let’s dig deeper.

Collision Course Steve Jobs, if autobiographical allegories are to be believed, learned everything he needed to know about the value of agreeability—or lack thereof— as a teenager, when he was doing yard work for a widowed neighbor. Jobs recounted the tale of putting the lawnmower away in the man’s garage and seeing some rocks so smooth they looked like marbles. The man told Jobs he didn’t find them; rather, he made them with a tumbler.

Jobs, inquisitive to a fault even at a young age, needed proof. He grabbed a handful of jagged, scraggly rocks and threw them into the can. He added some liquid and some grit power, closed the can and flipped the switch that started the motor.

“And he said, come back tomorrow,” Jobs said. “And the can was making a racket as the stones went around. And I came back the next day and we opened the can, and we took out these amazingly beautiful, polished rocks.”

This for Jobs, and for Apple, became a metaphor, and then the metaphor became a guiding principle of product innovation. It was more than hand-holding and back-slapping; rather, it was rough and tumble.

“It’s through the team, that group of incredibly talented people bumping up against each other, having arguments, having fights sometimes, making some noise. They polish each other and they polish the ideas. And what comes out are these really beautiful stones.”

Group Think Stinks “Ever wonder why fund managers can’t beat the S&P 500?” Gordon Gekko asks Bud Fox in the movie Wall Street. “Because they’re sheep, and sheep get slaughtered.”

Score one for contrarianism.

It’s not easy to be the fly in the ointment, the monkey in the wrench, the pain in the ass (wait, that’s a different ’80s movie), but somebody’s got to do it. Somebody needs the temperament and the temerity to stand in front of that speeding locomotive of group think and hold up a hand to slow it down.

“If everyone is thinking the same, then somebody isn’t thinking,” General George Patton famously said. And whether the campaign is military or marketing, you need to tread cautiously when everyone wants to attack, and as a corollary, consider aggression when passion is prescribed.

You have to be willing to zig—or at least consider it—when the rest of the team wants to zag.

Emily Post Moves Just because you have to disagree doesn’t mean you have to be disagreeable. There’s an art to argument, and it’s a subtle and fluid art. Remember, you’re going to have to work with these people again: you can’t, like those rocks in the tumbler, literally smash and bash into them with no regard for their position or sensitivities.

There’s a great saying that gets co-opted by a lot of companies that goes like this: “Say what you mean, mean what you say, but don’t say it mean.”

Grammatical imperfection aside—should be “meanly”—there’s a lot to glean from this message.

As leaders, you are not paid to patronize or parrot.

You need to voice your opinion, to say what you mean, even if it means you are the lone holdout in the debate. That’s your job. Conversely, and by the time this sentence is over, you will have an image of someone in your mind, a co-worker past or present that lived to contradict. We all know them. You say black, they say white. You say yes, they say no. You say shark, they say barracuda.

Don’t argue to argue. If you chime in with a differing opinion, make sure it’s genuine.

And the last part is self-explanatory. When shooting down someone’s idea, don’t use a Howitzer, use instead a little tact and decency. In other words, don’t be an ass. This will help keep your culture in the proper wheelhouse, where there’s indeed combat but it’s not overly combative. Besides, you’ll be glad to have shown restraint when it’s your idea that gets in the crosshairs.

Roger Snow is a senior vice president with Scientific Games. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Scientific Games Corporation or its affiliates.

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

38

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Sending the SOS Gaming consultants come to the rescue when companies need an outside perspective

By Dave Bontempo

C

all them fresh eyes, professionals flagging company problems from a distance, or architects propelling operators onto new, profitable paths.

But call them.

Gaming consultants provide casinos a detached, unemotional, yet critical look at their operations. They examine numbers, trends, charts and performance figures with no concerns for turf.

Their industrywide perspective helps consultants advise properties grinding out day-to-day operations. The gaming industry contracts numerous consulting companies.

Here are four that stand out.

“There is an opportunity to leverage this decline to rethink the industry and how it meets demand for a new generation of customers who are not as focused on traditional casino gaming but looking for more stimulating alternatives.”

—Michael Soll, President, The Innovation Group

The Innovators The Innovation Group fashioned a long, storied journey in a relatively short period of time.

The company was a planning and engineering firm that grew into gaming feasibility and demand analysis through a transportation demand and urban planning perspective.

It expanded into providing economic and community impact assessments, and then forged business units as the industry developed in amenity services (hotels, meetings, F&B, entertainment) and strategic business planning.

Over the last decade, it entered the operations, consumer survey, and marketing analytics spaces, along with online gaming and sports betting. It leverages all of these service areas within tribal and commercial environments and with governments, operators and investors.

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Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

And now? A special assignment.

“Most recently we are applying all that we know and understand to help clients navigate their response to Covid-19,” says Michael Soll, president of The Innovation Group. “There is an opportunity to leverage this decline to rethink the industry and how it meets demand for a new generation of customers who are not as focused on traditional casino gaming but looking for more stimulating alternatives.”

The Innovation Group, like all consultants, must escort operators over the treacherous terrain caused by Covid. Companies can’t panic, although that’s easier said than done.

“At the most basic level, our clients are gaining enough confidence that they will remain open to forecast revenue on a go-forward basis,” Soll says. “But more importantly, we are defining the future with them versus waiting on a ‘return’ to normal.

“We’re adapting physically and operationally to maximize opportunities and business productivity in marketing and in labor efficiencies, among other areas. We’re using the lull to plan for the next generation just as we were doing before, but with a new sense of purpose.

“We say spend what you can in the highest value areas, and for our part, we strive for a project budget that makes them comfortable.”

Soll says his company continues to look around the corner and over the hill to deliver what its name indicates, innovation.

“We learned this from our founder, Steve Rittvo, who has an indelible imprint on the business today,” Soll says. “We also lead in the customization of and adaptation of our technical models. We are proud to have brought the now-standard gravity model to gaming, of course, but take even more pride in the updates and upgrades that maintain the leading model in the industry.”

Generational and technological trends, as well as playing catch-up with the industry, has been a company obsession. Its Emerging Leaders of Gaming program, coordinated with GGB Magazine, has been an important partnership.

“As much as our data analytics work and the application of our planning background is a specialty, our niche is as much the suite of services we offer as any one service,” Soll asserts. “And if there is a need we cannot fill, our strong network is activated for a seamless (but transparent) accommodation of our clients’ needs. Examples here would be the regulatory environment. We are not bashful about going to strong partners in these areas to bring projects together holistically.”

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“This is the time to take advantage of those competitors that are not spending money and up your casino’s game in terms of understanding who your customer is, evaluating their wants and needs, and determining how to capitalize on market share.”

“We have helped a number of companies, mainly in online gambling, develop a fiveto seven-year strategy.

Online gambling is evolving rapidly, and so is the regulatory environment.”

—Steve Gallaway, Managing Partner, Global Market Advisors

A Unique Time for Strategy Consultants have a viewpoint free from political pressure. They are paid to identify and weigh in on tough decisions.

“We have contributed to the gaming and hospitality industry for more than 15 years,” says Steve Gallaway, managing partner for Global Market Advisors. “Consultants are privy to information from numerous jurisdictions, properties, and operators. This gives us a unique perspective and insights to any new or existing project.

“We are also most likely to have objective views and provide greater insight from an industry perspective, which ensures clients are told what they need to hear, even though it is not always necessarily what they want to hear.”

This is the time they will likely hear what they don’t want to. The supply chain has been interrupted. How can one purchase products without a market to sell them in? This is a period in which paranoia contracts finances.

“With the Great Shutdown, properties were initially concerned about the health and safety of their guests and staff as well as what levels of business they could expect to return,” he asserts. “These concerns have now turned into questions like how to optimize the current situation and find ways to get patrons back into the casino given continued restrictions and new regulations. Regional gaming has seen the biggest ‘V’ shaped return, but large markets around the globe will see a ‘checkmark’ until access/lift returns as well as non-gaming amenities such as sports and entertainment.

“This is the time to take advantage of those competitors that are not spending money and up your casino’s game in terms of understanding who your customer is, evaluating their wants and needs, and determining how to capitalize on market share. It is all about data, innovation, and conversation.

If you can understand and act on all three of these items, you will be ahead of the curve as the world re-emerges.”

Gallaway says that for new developments, the industry is less likely to see irresponsible money placed on development projects. This will allow developers a better chance to create a responsible project that is not based on overcommitments, preventing them from chasing market dollars later.

Gallaway has a realistic view of when the gaming markets will regain most of their lost momentum.

“I think we will find that the world will begin to normalize again in 2022, but there will be ups and downs experienced in the economy,” he says. “However, gaming and hospitality isn’t going anywhere, and people will always seek out fun. It is our job, collectively as an industry, to ensure that we continue to provide the best customer service, value, innovation, and quality entertainment. It will be vital for our industry to make sure that this occurs as we welcome back our guests.”

—Andrew Tottenham, Managing Director, Tottenham & Co.

A Worldwide View Andrew Tottenham, the managing director for Tottenham & Co., began consulting in 1986. He obtained an assignment to headhunt a senior executive for a Las Vegas-based casino and was then asked by a Korean company to develop a casino in its Nairobi property.

Since then, the company has worked on five continents, with clients including major U.S. operators and a family-owned bookmaking business in Sri Lanka.

Tottenham says he has been extremely lucky in his career, being able to visit 74 countries, meet interesting people and experience different cultures.

Along the way, his company has thrived.

“Tottenham & Co. has a strong track record in three areas—project development, including market surveys, feasibility studies, etc.; buy-and-sellside due diligence; and strategy development,” he asserts. “We have been the lead consultant on four major IR projects, being the pre-construction development leads.

“We have helped a number of companies, mainly in online gambling, develop a five- to seven-year strategy,” he adds. “Online gambling is evolving rapidly, and so is the regulatory environment. Scale matters, and if you don’t have scale, how do you fit in? We have helped our clients answer the questions, ‘What should our business look like in five to seven years and how do we get there?’”

Tottenham found a specialty niche in responsible gaming, which has risen from industry buzzword to regulatory mandate in recent years. As more people gamble, measures to prevent them from over-indulging have risen.

“I am extremely proud of having brought the U.K. gambling industry together to agree to fund what is now GambleAware,” he says. “I could see that the Gambling Commission was getting frustrated trying to find a formula and a structure to get industry funding for research into, education about and treatment of problem gambling. I, along with Russell Hoyle, brought the major U.K. operators together and explained where we stood, and the likelihood of a mandatory levy if we did not agree to a funding formula and structure that the Gambling Commission could agree to.

“We presented a proposal we thought the Gambling Commission would agree to and got every company’s buy-in. I took on the chairmanship of the Great Foundation and set in motion what became GambleAware.”

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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“The pandemic has forced operators to close their entertainment venues, close or change how buffets operate, and shutter their convention facilities. This has had an unexpected yet positive effect, even as topline revenues have diminished.”

—Andrew Klebanow, Founder, Klebanow Consulting

Rich History Andrew Klebanow has an extensive background in gaming, providing the vantage point to serve it as a consultant. He established his own company in 2001, helped form Gaming Market Advisors in 2005 and sold that ownership to work as an independent consultant via Klebanow Consulting last year.

Klebanow has worked for seven casino companies, including the positions of general manager and vice president of marketing. He visited over 1,000 casino properties in 15 countries and completed assignments for around 300 properties.

“My firm focuses on four key areas: property analysis, market research, educational seminars and traditional consulting services that include expansion studies and strategic planning,” he says. “I also take on special projects.

“I was once tasked with evaluating the competitive casino environment in Southeast Asia. I visited 46 casino properties in Cambodia along with those in Macau, Vietnam and Malaysia. This involved a lot of time riding on buses, rental cars, and experiencing a few overland border crossings. That last one is not for the faint of heart. There is nothing quite like sitting in an immigration office on the Thai-Cambodia border without the right documents and wondering where you might be spending the night.”

Klebanow says a good consultant can identify business problems, perform the appropriate analysis, speak with many people and provide solutions. A great consultant knows that he or she is not a specialist in every field. That is hard, he says, because it often means turning down work or finding other consultants to collaborate with.

Klebanow considers identifying and solving business problems the chief contribution of consultants.

“There may be inefficiencies in marketing or in operations that require an outsider to identify,” he asserts.

“I recall once assembling a consulting team for an operational review. A team of five consultants spent a week on property. We looked at casino opera-

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tions, the hotel, food & beverage, public areas, security, IT and engineering.

“Each night, the team met for a de-brief and we each found similar problems. Slot machines were down because of a lack of parts. The pool was closed for several months because it needed repairs. The surveillance department could not add more cameras because its video hub was at capacity. As one of my colleagues stated one evening, ‘Sooner or later all these roads are going to intersect at one person’s desk.’

“He was right. Unfortunately, that desk was occupied by casino’s owner. It was my task to write a report and identify that person as the business problem. The owner ultimately realized that a casino property requires maintenance capital, and deferring those expenditures has consequences. It affects morale, profitability and guest experiences.”

Covid has put a unique twist on a familiar gaming dilemma. What offerings are appropriate for a given market?

“The pandemic has forced operators to close their entertainment venues, close or change how buffets operate, and shutter their convention facilities,” he says. “This has had an unexpected yet positive effect, even as top-line revenues have diminished.

“Operating margins are improving. Gamers are still visiting their preferred properties. Those who visit a casino primarily for a meal or a show are not. Operators are now asking, ‘Do I need that buffet where I lose money on every meal that I serve? Is headline entertainment really worth the expense?’

“What do people who enjoy gambling want to see in order for them to feel safe and comfortable? Are temperature checks and hand sanitizing stations enough or are greater safety protocols required? What customers perceived as important 60 days ago may not be important to them today. This is why it is more important than ever to gauge customer opinions, and to do so often.”

Klebanow draws an interesting parallel between the emergence from the pandemic and the Great Recession.

“As the country emerged from the recessionary period of 2008-2009, operators dramatically increased marketing spends in order to get customers back and move market share,” he says. “That caused a change in customer expectations. They learned to expect ever higher amounts of free play and they tended to go to those casinos that gave them the most. The result was an erosion of margins. Astute operators will realize that they will not be able to buy their way out of this situation. The smart ones will listen to their players and continue to focus on safety.”

These four companies have a challenging task now. They seek to help companies stay lean and mean, yet unafraid. Consultants assure the industry that storms can be weathered, because they’ve already seen it.

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NEW GAME REVIEW

by Frank Legato

Cash Machine Jackpots / Gold Standard Jackpots Everi Holdings

O

ne of Everi’s strongest games over the past two years has been Cash Machine, a simple three-reel game with a “what-you-see-is-whatyou-get” pay scheme. The symbols on the three stepper reels are numbers, and the cash amount spelled out by the three reels is the payoff. For instance, 10-5-00 on the three reels returns the top $10,500 jackpot on the dollar game at max bet.

(Max bet is required to complete combinations made on all three reels. The above combination at less than max bet would return $105.)

Everi has taken the basic Cash Machine game and added a three-level progressive jackpot, triggered through a bonus wheel that awards credits or one of the progressives. The result is a pair of sister games, Cash Machine Jackpots and Gold Standard Jackpots.

Featured on Everi’s tall Skyline Revolve stepper cabinet—which places a mechanical wheel box on top of the supplier’s standard Player Classic stepper cabinet—the base game in both is a standard high-denomination three-reel stepper with the Cash Machine what-you-see setup. During the base game, reels will randomly nudge to a guaranteed winning combination.

A “Spin” symbol on the third reel triggers the jackpot wheel, which spins to credit awards of 40, 60, 80, 100, 200 or 1,000 credits, or one of the three progressive jackpots—A Minor resetting at $300, a Major starting at $1,800, or the top Grand, resetting at $150,000.

Manufacturer: Everi Platform: Skyline Revolve Format: Three-reel, single-line stepper slot Denomination: .25, .50, 1.00 Max Bet: 88 Top Award: Progressive; $150,000 reset Hit Frequency: 42% Theoretical Hold: 3%-15%

SeleXion Classic Konami

K

onami has used its new tri-screen Dimension 27 cabinet for a modernized version of the SeleXion series of multi-game units. Dimension 27, designed as a new core for-sale cabinet, features three 27-inch high-definition displays, with features such as an interactive button deck, dual bash buttons, a USB port and a wireless charging pad.

SeleXion Classic presents a menu of five of Konami’s most popular games—China Shores, Ancient Dragon, Money Blast, Rawhide and Roman Tribune.

Each game is a modernized version of the original. All five of the games feature Konami’s popular Action Stacked Symbols with various wild-symbols configurations, and all five games are centered around generous and frequent free-game features in which all wins are doubled.

The games all are available in various payline configurations as well.

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Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

Manufacturer: Konami Gaming Platform: Dimension 27 Format: Multi-game machine; menu of five multi-line video slots Denomination: .01 Max Bet: Various Top Award: Various Hit Frequency: Various Theoretical Hold: 4%-15%

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Indian Motorcycle Pervasive Gaming

T

his new video slot, a Class III game from Oklahomabased Pervasive Gaming, celebrates the classic U.S. Indian Motorcycle brand, with colorful high-definition graphics depicting classic Indian models going back to the company’s 1901 founding, along with a variety of compelling icons of the brand and the motorcycle culture.

The base game is featured on Pervasive’s wide-screen Apollo 43-inch cabinet, in merchandising packages topped by a replica vintage Indian motorcycle. It is a five-reel scatter-win game on a four-by-five reel array, resulting in 1,024 ways to win on each spin. The Indian Motorcycle symbol is wild, substituting for all but scatter symbols.

The primary game includes a collect-and-win feature. The object is to collect eight golden trophies on base-game spins, which triggers the main bonus feature.

The Indian Motorcycle Bonus Game reveals a credit award tied to each Golden Trophy collected, the amounts ranging up to five times the total bet.

When the bonus is triggered, the player spins the Golden Trophy Bonus Wheel, which lands on a multiplier, the Golden Trophy, or the Indian Motorcycle logo. Landing on the Golden Trophy returns the accumulated award.

Landing on 2X, 3X or 5X multiplies the value of the Golden Trophy Award and awards the higher amount.

Landing on the logo in the wheel spin triggers the progressive bonus, called the Garage Jackpot Bonus, a picking game in which the player selects icons until matching three to return the Mini progressive, resetting at $150; the Minor jackpot, starting at $170, or the Major, resetting at $1,200. Casinos may also offer a new Indian motorcycle as a top progressive prize.

There also is a free-spin bonus, triggered by three scattered keychain symbols. The player is offered a choice between 10 free games with a random “Super Multiplier” applied to wins, or 10 free spins with “Roaming Wilds.” Free spins can be triggered within the bonus round.

Manufacturer: Pervasive Gaming Platform: Apollo 43-inch Format: Five-reel, 1,024-ways-to-win video slot Denomination: .01 Max Bet: 500 Top Award: Progressive; $1,200 reset Hit Frequency: 28.9% Theoretical Hold: 8%-12%

Da Long Da Fa AGS

T

his game maximizes the potential of the Orion Rise cabinet, which features a compelling 55-inch 4K LCD flat-screen monitor atop a standard dualscreen base. In this case, the slot is part of the Blazing Wheels game family, which means that large monitor is occupied by a double bonus wheel, the two individual wheels working together in a progressive bonus round.

Also on that big top screen is the progressive meter, displaying a two-level progressive jackpot.

The base game is a five-reel, 30-line video slot featuring multiplying wild symbols. WILD2X and WILD3X symbols in winning combinations double or triple the jackpot, respectively. The symbols also work together in wins—a combination of 2X and 3X wild symbols, for instance, multiplies the jackpot by six, two 3X symbols multiply the pay by nine, etc.

Wheel symbols on the first, third and fifth reels trigger the Blazing Wheel Bonus. This is when the dual wheel on the top display kicks in, with credits and multipliers on the wedges of both wheels working together to form the bonus prize. Both wheels include credit prizes and multipliers.

The top wheel includes the two linked progressive jackpots as wedges—the Major resetting at $500 and the top Grand at $5,000. Randomly, any prize on the wheels other than the top jackpot can receive an upgrade. Credit prizes can be multiplied up to 10 times; multipliers on the lower wheel can rise to 10X, and on the top wheel, to 50X. The player wins the sum of both wheels. If multipliers land on both wheels, the player is awarded his total bet times the sum of the multipliers.

There also is a free spin bonus. Bonus symbols on the middle wheels trigger seven fee spins. Wild symbols landing on any free spin stick, and are placed in random positions for the subsequent spin.

Manufacturer: AGS Platform: Orion Rise Format: Five-reel, 30-line video slot Denomination: .01 Max Bet: 880 Top Award: Progressive; $5,000 reset Hit Frequency: 25.85% Theoretical Hold: 5%-16%

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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Google Worthy How stepping up your digital marketing game can help your property thrive

By Sarah Procopio

F

irst, what is digital marketing? This is a big topic, so let’s start by defining exactly what we mean when we talk about digital marketing. Digital marketing is an umbrella term for online marketing efforts—in this article, casino-specific online marketing efforts.

Many properties use digital channels like social media, email, online advertising, Google search, and, of course, their websites to connect with existing and potential players and guests. With the current market challenges, many casinos are cutting their traditional media budgets for investments such as outdoor billboards, mainstream media, and TV or traditional radio, and have started doubling down on their digital marketing investment. Here are the top four reasons to leverage this approach during the current challenging economic conditions which will support your property to thrive during the pandemic.

1. Target the right people, in the right place, at the right time.

Digital allows properties to reach their target audiences where they’re already spending most of their time right now—online. The targeting of technology precision is astounding, and has grown by leaps and bounds over just the last couple of the years with ever-changing innovations always on the horizon.

Don’t believe me? Check out The Social Dilemma on Netflix. Your mind will be blown. With an online presence, you can target far more of the right people than you can by marketing your company solely offline.

For example, you can target people based on propensity to game or likelihood of being a high-spend, high-profit hotel guest. And if you do it the right way, you can get in front of the people who are likely to become visitors at the right moment in their guest journey.

Direct mail and cold calling are still reliable approaches, but are the 46

most powerful when combined with digital marketing tactics. For example, a host’s call is much more powerful when the host has access to information about the recent page visits on the website and can personalize the conversation based on that information.

It is the difference between a call that sounds like “Hi, Big Baller Barry. How have you been? Want to book a trip?” versus a call that is personalized based on Barry’s website activity that shows time spent on the steakhouse page and pool page: “Hi Barry. I want to invite you in for a visit. We have a cabana I can prepare for you at the pool and a VIP table overlooking the city at our steakhouse.”

The second version is pretty compelling, right? Some properties leverage historical trip data to customize their conversations with players like this, but that information isn’t as valid as their real-time interests provided to the player development team seconds after the player visited the property’s website.

2. Lower cost and higher value than traditional media.

A frequent objection to leveraging cutting-edge technology is “Yeah, that sounds great but pricey.” Leveraging sophisticated online targeting approaches used to be complex and pricey, but it isn’t anymore. One of the great equalizers when comparing marketing types and mediums is the cost to target 1,000 people, also known as cost per mile or CPM. The price to target audiences is drastically lower in digital market platforms compared to traditional media. Of course, many variables affect each medium’s cost, but here is a breakdown to give you a rough idea of the cost difference.

Traditional Advertising:

Digital Marketing:

TV: $28 Magazine: $17 Newspaper: $17 Radio: $11 Billboards: $7

Google Ads: $2.80 Facebook: $2.37 Other Social Media: $2.50 Audio Streaming (Pandora, Spotify): $4.86

Yes, there are additional costs associated with each medium. With TV and radio, you have to consider the increase in prices during peak time slots to advertise (traffic or popular shows). Billboard prices can also vary

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

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The more personalized you make the communication to the player, the better. Personalized can be based on demographics, lifestyle characteristics, location, historical visit behaviors, and, powerfully, what is on their mind right now based on their search activity and social media behavior. based on the quality of location and volume of traffic.

As for digital marketing, time is the only “hidden” or fixed cost.

Whether it is your time, employees, or an agency’s time, you must think of this as a cost. This cost doesn’t depend on as many variables, such as traditional media.

3. It offers a high level of trackability and personalization for optimal impact.

Another huge benefit is that digital marketing allows marketers to see accurate results in real time. If you’ve ever run an ad in a newspaper, you know it’s impossible to measure the impact it has on your property—especially fast enough to pivot the content or the buy after the trigger is pulled.

On the other hand, with digital marketing, you can measure the ROI of any aspect of your marketing efforts using analytics. The trick with measurement is to apply the same measurement approaches that have traditionally been used to direct marketing programs to digital marketing. Don’t treat digital marketing like electronic versions of traditional advertising platforms.

Marketing has always been about evoking emotion so strong within the target audience that they act. This is no easy feat, since individuals are unique, and different things evoke strong emotions with different people.

That’s why personalization has such a high impact when targeting current or prospective guests.

The more personalized you make the communication to the player, the better. Personalized can be based on demographics, lifestyle characteristics, location, historical visit behaviors, and, powerfully, what is on their mind right now based on their search activity and social media behavior. Some key ways to leverage this approach: • Personalized ads based on search history • Geo-targeting capabilities (people who recently visited a competitor’s location) • Targeting by play and revenue segments at your property • Engaging social media ads based on likes and interests • Unique email marketing campaigns based on guest behavior

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One of the simplest yet most powerful inbound digital marketing assets is a blog, which allows your website to capitalize on the terms your ideal customers are searching for on Google and other search engines.

4. It allows you to respond faster to changing market conditions.

With market conditions and government rules and regulations changing frequently, your property marketing has to as well. It would be best if you could dial up your outreach volume or dial it down based on various factors that are growing increasingly complex. Digital marketing allows for that flexibility.

We all know that once traditional direct mail goes out, you can’t un-ring that bell, and if you over- or under-shoot with criteria, reinvestment rates, or other factors, you are stuck with that decision. Digital marketing allows you freedom and flexibility that traditional media doesn’t. Not only do you know immediately how a marketing effort is performing without having to wait for billboard production or an ad distribution in a magazine, but you can take that information and adjust based on the volume of traffic you want to yield.

Need less player volume? Hit the “Deactivate” button on the Facebook offer. Need higher player volume? Double the current players you are targeting and make an offer or Google ad live within minutes. Digital marketing allows companies to be nimble in a way they never imagined was possible.

Digital Marketing vs. Inbound Marketing Michael Marino, the senior vice president of marketing and chief experience officer at Caesars Entertainment, has talked about the “closed-loop marketing” strategy he employs at his properties. In Marino’s explanation of closedloop marketing, he describes it as leveraging behavioral data on the property level and customizing outbound marketing based on that information for a more personalized, higher-impact marketing experience.

The inbound marketing approach leverages closed-loop marketing but takes it one step farther. Marketers who employ digital inbound tactics use online content to attract their target customers onto their websites by focusing on being helpful to them—think of the five-star, guest service mentality but applied to marketing.

Meaning, every interaction is about the guest’s wants and needs, not the property’s. With this approach, the focus is on understanding the guest desires and serving those desires. How? With marketing information that meets their needs for the specific stage of the buyer’s journey they are in, ultimately, to get them to book their next visit with your property. Stages of the buyer’s journey are: Awareness of a need or identification of a problem that needs to be solved. An upcoming anniversary that needs to be celebrated, for example.

Consideration of options to fulfill the need or solve the problem. For an anniversary celebration, options considered could be a trip to Vegas, a trip to a local native casino, a nice dinner and a favorite neighborhood restaurant or a trip to the coast.

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Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

Decision finalized based on all of the options considered. In the consideration stage, options are typically narrowed down to one genre of solutions—a trip to Vegas, for example. Then, in the decision stage, specific properties will be considered and a final decision will be made on the trip location.

The stage your target audience has reached in the buyer’s journey is important because at each stage, different types of marketing messaging will be relevant. One of the simplest yet most powerful inbound digital marketing assets is a blog, which allows your website to capitalize on the terms your ideal customers are searching for on Google and other search engines.

So, what is the difference between general digital marketing and inbound marketing? Ultimately, inbound marketing is a complete methodology that uses digital marketing assets that work together to attract, convert, close, and delight customers by focusing on being helpful and adding value.

It is player-centric rather than property-centric. Digital marketing, on the other hand, is simply an umbrella term to describe online marketing tactics of any kind, regardless of whether they’re considered inbound or outbound. Many execs hear of large corporations using the advanced approach and think it must be expensive and out of reach if you aren’t part of a large casino conglomerate. Not true.

Information and software to hit the ground running with this approach has become widely available and inexpensive. Harnessing the power of this strategy isn’t cost-intensive; but it does take time, grit, determination, and execution discipline. That is why most of your competitors won’t do it successfully, and why it can give you a major competitive advantage.

A Warning Label The most significant negative feedback I hear about digital marketing efforts is, “We have tried that, there just isn’t an ROI,” to which I respond, “That’s because you are doing it wrong.”

Many markers with a traditional mass media background (or properties using a conventional mass media agency that tacks on digital marketing services) fail to realize that digital marketing is not an electronic version of a mass media platform. When digital marketing first started to make headway many years ago, the truth is, it was. That is how folks with traditional advertising backgrounds got put in charge of digital marketing efforts.

Now, with the highly sophisticated targeting approaches, personalization opportunities, analytical capabilities and offer formats available to leverage, digital marketing has more in common with direct response marketing (direct mail) than it does with traditional advertising.

It also requires many of the same skills used in direct response marketing—criteria identification, A/B testing, control group structuring, offer development, tracking, etc. If you use digital marketing as a direct response

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medium, then the ROI yielded from your efforts will be huge. Using digital marketing for traditional advertising principles such as branding and PR is still important, but should be blended with the highly powerful direct response approaches available now.

What’s The First Step?

The most crucial first step to ensure your digital marketing efforts are as high impact as possible is to ensure that the right talent is in the mix and the right strategy is leveraged.

• Are direct response approaches, targeting and offers being used in current digital marketing efforts?

• Is anyone involved (both on the property side and the agency side) with a direct response background to ensure campaigns are trackable and high-impact?

• How are we using the targeting and personalization capabilities of digital mar-

keting platforms?

• Are we leveraging key principles in “closed-loop” marketing? Are we taking it a step farther with an inbound marketing approach?

Now you know the ins and outs of digital marketing, why it is higher value and higher impact than traditional media and how it can benefit your property. You even know a digital marketing strategy, inbound marketing, that isn’t widely used in the industry.

I hope you choose to take your digital marketing efforts to the next level by leveraging sophisticated targeting, direct response capabilities and the inbound marketing methodology. Life rewards action. Go forth and prosper. Happy (digital) marketing!

Sarah Procopio is the founder and president of Thrive Marketing Science, a marketing firm that specializes in high-impact marketing solutions for the gaming industry. She can be reached at sprocopio@thrivemarketingscience.com.

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CUTTING EDGE

by Frank Legato

Branding Through Play PRODUCT: Bingo Castles MANUFACTURER: Newland 12 LLC

new product from Newland 12 LLC keeps a casino’s brand in players’ hands by marketing through a game.

The Las Vegas creative team at Refinatrix (creators of games such as Switch 6 and K-Otic Universe), along with the casino marketing team from Newland 12 LLC, have collaborated on an engaging medieval spin on traditional bingo with Bingo Castles.

This new spin is designed to draw patrons to venues within the resort and keep them on property by not only increasing the level of entertainment but by enabling players to win real-world prizes like gift cards, concessions, etc. The more they play, the more chances to win gift cards to a property restaurant or gift shop, or any other prizes.

Think about it as an extension of casino marketing, as it is a great way to engage customers with specials, jackpots and announcing holiday events.

And more importantly, the players will continue to play when they return home. With this new product, customers can be engaged with and regularly receive reminders of an operator’s property.

Bingo Castles is available to be played on the web, and is also available

A

for download in the Apple and Android stores. The game can also provide a white label option, removing the theme and branding the games with the casino’s brand.

This product is fully customizable for operators who want to include their own gift cards, as well as sweepstakes, contests, tournaments, etc. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Newland 12 hosted its own Bingo Castles Zoom Tournament, where players battled across the nation for various prizes—an innovative way to engage with players in their homes and on their phones.

Online tournaments and online “Bingo Parties” provide an opportunity to reward players with gift cards as prizes and create incremental visits. This is not only a great retention tool but can be used to increase player acquisition.

For more information, contact Bingoplayers.com/bingo-castles.

Easy Cashless PRODUCT: VIP Mobility MANUFACTURER: Global Payments Gaming Solutions

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VIP Mobility helps casinos deliver the VIP experience by empowering guests to create digital TITO tickets on their mobile device by scanning an existing

A

50

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

voucher or using their VIP Preferred e-check account. Patrons then pair their mobile device to any slot or table game by scanning a QR code. They can reload from their phone and retrieve funds once they are finished playing.

Not only does VIP Mobility operate within the casino’s existing technology structure, but it also drives a more cost-effective, secure payment method within gaming floors, allowing patrons to enjoy the freedom of digital ticketing and uninterrupted cashless play.

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VulcanAD:Layout 1 10/15/20 9:49 AM Page 1

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NOTICE OF PUBLIC SALE OF COLLATERAL ASSETS / IP COVERING THE PICTURE-IN-PICTURE/SERVICE WINDOW AND MOBILE FUNDING CATEGORIES OF THE REGULATED GAMING INDUSTRY PLEASE TAKE NOTICE that, pursuant to Section 9-610 of the Uniform Commercial Code, as adopted in the State of Georgia executed by and pursuant to the terms of (A) that certain Security Agreement dated July 3, 2019 executed by Tipping Point Group LLC (“TPG”), Sam Johnson and Vulcan Holdings, Inc. (“Vulcan”), securing that certain Promissory Note dated July 1, 2013 in the original principal amount of $1,500,000 payable to Vulcan, as amended by that certain Amended Promissory Note dated December 2, 2013 in the original principal amount of $3,000,000, as further amended by that certain Second Amended Promissory Note dated October 24, 2017 in the original principal amount of $6,000,000 (as the foregoing may have been amended and/or modified), and (B) that certain Security Agreement dated July 3, 2019 executed by TPG, Sam Johnson and TPG Holdings LLC (“Holdings”, together with Vulcan, “Secured Parties”), securing that certain Promissory Note Due on a Specific Date dated August 17, 2015 in the original principal amount of $25,802,299.00 payable by TPG and Johnson to Holdings (as the foregoing may have been amended and/or modified), Vulcan, as “Collateral Agent” on behalf and for the benefit of the Secured Parties, will offer for sale to the public certain assets, generally consisting of 30 exclusively owned issued patents, 6 pending patents, a Patent License Agreement (“PLA”) with a major gaming industry manufacturer (transferability of the PLA is subject to licensor approval, approval not to be unreasonably withheld by licensor) covering an additional 15 issued patents and several pending, 9 registered trademarks, other intellectual property such as custom hardware design and production-ready manufacturing tools, source code to a GLI approved server based gaming, slot accounting, progressive and player tracking systems – such assets and intellectual property being a collection of unique hardware and software applied to a significant ever growing Picture-In-Picture / Service Window and Mobile Funding categories of the regulated gaming industry. Details of the sale are as follows: Date and Time of Auction: November 6, 2020 at 12:30 PM (Eastern Time), or such other date and time thereafter as may be determined by Secured Party in its sole and absolute discretion Location of Auction: 2699 Buford Hwy, Buford, GA 30518. The auction will also be held via video conference. Due to COVID-19 and security requirements, any party that wishes to attend and/or participate in the auction must register at least three (3) business days in advance by contacting counsel for Collateral Agent at the phone number or email address provided below. The Collateral Agent will provide notice of any adjournment of the action, as well as details for participating remotely, to all parties that register.

The Collateral to be Sold: The collateral to be sold consists of (collectively, the “Collateral”): (i) all inventory and supplies of whatsoever nature and kind, together with all additions and accessions thereto, replacements therefor, products thereof and documents therefor; (ii) all cash, money, deposits, certificates of deposit, financial assets or other cash equivalents, accounts, rents, accounts receivable, bank accounts, deposit accounts; and other rights to payment of money for goods and property sold or leased or for services rendered; (iii) all machinery, equipment and supplies, together with all additions and accessions thereto; (iv) all franchises, licenses, permits and operating rights granted to or held by TPG; (v) all contracts to which TPG is a party, whether now existing or hereafter arising; (vi) all general intangibles including, but not limited to, payment intangibles, customer lists, goodwill, trademarks, trademark applications, trade names, trade secrets, patents, patent licenses, copyrights, formulas, industrial designs, software, other intellectual property or rights therein, whether under license or otherwise, including without limitation all patents and patent licenses referred to herein (the “TPG Patents”); (vii) personal property not included above, including, without limitation, customer and supplier lists, books and records, computer programs and other intellectual property rights, insurance policies, tax refunds, together with all proceeds of any policies of insurance covering any or all of the above (but specifically excluding any policy covering or relating to TPG’s defense of claims asserted in in Case No. A-18-769136-B pending in the Eighth Judicial District Court, Clark County, Nevada (the “Defense Policy”)), the proceeds of any award in condemnation with respect to any of the property, any rebates or refunds, whether for taxes or otherwise, and together with all proceeds of any such property; and (viii) all proceeds and products of any of the above, and all proceeds of any loss of, damage to or destruction of the above, whether insured or not insured, and all other proceeds of any sale, lease or other disposition of any property or interest therein referred to above, together

with all proceeds of any policies of insurance covering any or all of the above (but specifically excluding the Defense Policy), the proceeds of any award in condemnation with respect to any of the property, any rebates or refunds, whether for taxes or otherwise, and together with all proceeds of any such proceeds, together with any claim by TPG against third parties for past, present or future infringement of any patent or patent exclusively licensed by TPG under any intellectual property license, including the right to receive damages, to receive license fees, royalties and other compensation under any patent intellectual property license. (The Collateral specifically excludes any and all claims and/or counterclaims filed and/or asserted by TPG against Caesars Enterprise Services, LLC et al. in Case No. A-18-769136-B pending in the Eighth Judicial District Court, Clark County, Nevada, the proceeds and/or products thereof, whether by settlement, final resolution or otherwise.)

A list of the TPG Patents is available from Collateral Agent’s counsel upon request.

Terms and Conditions of Sale: The Collateral will be sold as a block to a single purchaser that makes the highest and best bid at the sale, unless, in the judgment of the Collateral Agent, the sale of the Collateral in multiple lots to multiple bidders would yield a higher overall return. Parties that wish to obtain additional information about the sale procedures that Collateral Agent will employ should contact counsel for the Collateral Agent listed below.

The party (or parties) that submit the highest overall bid for the Collateral (the “Successful Bidder”) shall be required to make an initial deposit of 10% of the amount bid at the sale (the “Initial Deposit”) via cash or wire transfer made payable to the Collateral Agent, and the balance shall be due and payable within one (1) business day of the conclusion of such sale via cash, wire transfer or such other manner as is deemed acceptable to the Collateral Agent in its sole discretion.

If the Successful Bidder defaults on payment of the balance due, it will, in the Collateral Agent’s sole discretion and as it may elect, forfeit the Initial Deposit, which shall be retained by the Collateral Agent as liquidated damages. If Collateral Agent elects, the Collateral then may be sold to the next highest bidder at the auction, without further notice, or to another bidder at a subsequent sale on further notice.

The Collateral Agent and Secured Parties reserve the right to credit bid at the auction, either directly or through an assignee or any affiliated entity, and to credit the purchase price against all costs and expenses of the auction and the indebtedness owed by Grantor to Secured Parties (including attorneys’ fees and expenses). The Collateral Agent reserves the right to reject any bid or all bids at the auction or any adjournment of the auction. Further, the Collateral Agent reserves the right to cancel, postpone or adjourn the sale by announcement made at the sale, either before or after the commencement of bidding, with or without written notice or further publication. The sale may be resumed without further notice or publication at the time and place at which such sale may have been adjourned.

Disclaimers: There is no warranty relating to title, possession, quiet enjoyment or the like in this disposition of the Collateral. The Collateral is being sold on an “as is, where is” basis without recourse against Collateral Agent and/or Secured Parties and without representation or warranty of any kind or nature whatsoever by Collateral Agent and/or Secured Parties with respect thereto. The sale of the Collateral is specifically subject to all taxes and liens (other than those of Secured Parties and those that may be extinguished as a matter of law as a result of the sale of the Collateral noticed hereby), claims, assessments, liabilities and encumbrances that may exist against the Collateral. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, Collateral Agent and Secured Parties expressly disclaim all representations or warranties with regard to the Collateral, including without limitation, those relating to the condition of, title to, the completeness or accuracy of any description of, or the rights and liabilities that accompany, the Collateral.

Contact Information: Parties that wish to obtain additional information about the Collateral or the auction procedures should contact Collateral Agent’s counsel, Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP, Attn: Lisa Wolgast at (404) 233-7000 or lwolgast@mmmlaw.com.

VULCAN HOLDINGS, INC., AS COLLATERAL AGENT FOR VULCAN HOLDINGS, INC. AND TPG HOLDINGS LLC, As Attorney-in-Fact for TIPPING POINT GROUP LLC

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FRANKLY SPEAKING

by Frank Legato

Fall Without a Show

52

Global Gaming Business NOVEMER 2020

Monroe in the booth every year. It was always the same Marilyn, too. We all got to know her, even though none of us knew her real name. She never broke character. You’d ask her if the guy from the printer company had come looking for you, and she’d answer you in that breathy voice, right out of Some Like It Hot, “Oooh, yes. Here’s his card. His name’s Maaaahhhhhrvin.

(Giggle!)”

OK, I admit that was a little disturbing.

I also remember all the celebrities I got to meet at the big trade shows. Even before slot machines created celeb slot themes and invited the stars to their booths to promote them, there always were some celebrities, invited by vendors to serve as their booth ambassadors.

That’s how I met Spanky McFarland from The Little Rascals, in fact. He was at the booth of some company selling coin mechanisms or sheet steel for cabinets or something, but there he was, the Spankster.

In any event, I hope they let us come out to play in a physical trade show next year. I really missed the autumn trade show vibe this year—playing in tournaments, going to keynotes, the parties... the whole schmear.

As we went to press with this issue, the G2E producers were set to stage a “Virtual G2E,” starting on October 27, my birthday. (Though I don’t think that’s why they they planned that date.) I’m certainly going to take all that in. (Or, as you’re reading this there in the future, I already did.)

I’ll attend the seminars, and if I find one dull or uninteresting, I’ll even fake getting a call on my smartphone before I leave the computer, so as not to offend the presenter.

Of course, it’s going to be hard to feign interest in a product being demonstrated virtually. Before I wrote mainly about slots, I covered everything from fake trees to ashtray design to light-bulb technology. I still remember mustering up fascination at the latest in incandescent light-bulb technology, presented by someone whose entire life was light bulbs. In fact, I heard the guy was a light-bulb legend. I tried to show some respect.

I wonder what ever happened to Marilyn. I’d look her up, but someone told me she actually had her name legally changed to Marilyn Monroe.

Like I said before, a little disturbing.

VICT OR RIN ALDO

B

oy, last month was weird.

Practically every one of my falls for 35 years—falls meaning autumn, not some drunken stumbling— has revolved around a trip to Las Vegas for the Global Gaming Expo or one of its predecessor shows. As I’m writing this in early October, it occurs to me that any other year, I’d be wrapping up the last day of the trade show and getting ready to go out to dinner, gamble, go to bed, and get on a plane back East.

Not necessarily in that order, mind you.

Instead, I’m sitting in my office in the East the second week of October, and I get to actually witness leaves turning color. On trees.

I hadn’t realized what a fixture of my year G2E was. It’s when I get to chat with all of my industry colleagues, hobnob with executives, and wander around wearing a suit and tie and a name badge, like in the old days.

Back when I went to my first gaming trade show in 1985, we all wore suits and ties, even just going to the office. These days, you can walk into an office in a T-shirt and faded jeans and no one raises an eyebrow. (Not that I do that.) Or, more recently, you work from home, where the most formal thing you wear is a biz-casual shirt over your pajama bottoms for a Microsoft Teams meeting. (Not that I do that, either.

Pajama bottoms are optional.)

The fall trade show has always been the professional center of my year. In the early days, everyone in the industry knew each other. There were, like, five companies, and around 30 people we’d see once a year. (OK, maybe more than that.) We’d walk around a trade show floor that was pretty much solid concrete all day, and then, beginning at, say, 4 p.m., we’d rest our swollen feet, have a beverage and talk to the showgirls that were invariably at every booth.

I know, I know. It was an improper way to sell gaming widgets, relying on scantily clad women in peacock feathers to draw men—and back then, it was mostly men—to one booth over another. But these women also were bona fide entertainers, trained in their feathery craft. We greeted a few by name every year.

Heck, I remember that my former magazine had Marilyn

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GOODS&SERVICES UNLV COLLABORATIVE STUDIES CASHLESS WAGERING

T

he University of Nevada, Las Vegas, through its International Gaming Institute, launched the IGI Payments Collaborative, designed to analyze the industry shift to cashless wagering. The collaborative has partnered with payment technology and software providers Sightline Payments and Global Payments GamSightline’s ing Solutions.

Omer Sattar Nodding to the International Center for Responsible Gaming, formerly the National Center for Responsible Gaming, the collaborative seeks to provide a scientific, data-driven foundation for policymakers and regulators to make sound decisions in the future.

“This collaborative will combine IGI’s experience in peer-reviewed science with our funders’ existing technological, operational and marketplace strengths to form a leadership position on responsible gaming policy, which in turn will be a crucial consideration in any forthcoming cashless wagering conversations,” said Dr. Bo Bernhard, executive director, UNLV IGI. Global Payments Gaming Solutions will provide expertise needed to drive responsible gaming efforts, said company President Christopher Justice.

“Our team works to develop industry-leading cashless gaming solutions to support patrons and their need to track, manage and control funds to play responsibly.”

Omer Sattar, executive vice president and cofounder, Sightline Payments, said, “As the world starts to seamlessly blend the digital with the physical, it’s essential that we collectively evolve our tools, technology and thinking to shape the future.”

Very little scientific research exists on actual customer behavior when cashless systems are deployed, said Alan Feldman, Distinguished Fellow in Responsible Gaming, UNLV IGI. “As a result, policies can be based on worries or beliefs rather than facts and scientific methodologies. It is thus important to evaluate and study the potential unintended consequences of these current policies in order to inform future RG policy.”

BOYD, ARISTOCRAT PARTNER ON LOYALTY APP

S

lot and system supplier Aristocrat Technologies, Inc. has partnered with Boyd Gaming Corpora-

54

tion to launch an new player loyalty mobile application, B Connected Mobile.

Developed by the Aristocrat Customer Experience (CX) Solutions team in conjunction with the Boyd Interactive team, B Connected Mobile utilizes best-in-class mobile technology to enhance the Boyd guest experience. Available on both Android and iOS, B Connected Mobile is the next generation of player connectivity, offering engagement at home, on the go, or on the casino floor.

Through B Connected Mobile, Boyd Gaming customers will be able to view account balances and tier status in the B Connected loyalty program, as well as activate promotional offers and drawing entries. A personalized B Connected inbox, tied to the patron’s B Connected card, will share discounts and offers, and will feature exclusive entertainment and promotions, allowing the guest in real time to redeem or plan their activities for an upcoming stay or visit.

“Thanks to our strategic partnership with Aristocrat, Boyd Gaming now has a best-in-class mobile platform that will allow us to greatly enhance the guest experience at our properties,” said Blake Rampmaier, senior vice president and chief information officer of Boyd Gaming. “Ultimately, we will make B Connected Mobile the hub of a unique digital experience—a mobile tool that can be used as a cashless wallet, player loyalty card and hotel room key, all available from a player’s smartphone.”

Under terms of the agreement, Boyd Gaming will utilize all of Aristocrat’s Oasis 360 CX Solutions as its patron engagement ecosystem at all of its casino properties nationwide. Boyd Gaming currently operates 29 casino properties nationwide.

SCIENTIFIC GAMES, FLUTTER ENTERTAINMENT RENEW SPORTS BETTING PARTNERSHIP

S

cientific Games Corporation announced it has secured a five-year contract renewal with long-term customer Flutter Entertainment PLC to continue providing its OpenSports technology to the operator’s portfolio of global brands.

Flutter Entertainment is one of the world’s leading sports betting, gaming and entertainment

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

providers, serving over 13 million customers worldwide through brands including FanDuel in the U.S., Paddy Power, Betfair and Sky Bet in the U.K., and Europe and SportsBet in Australia.

The five-year renewal comes on the back of FanDuel selecting Scientific Games to power its sportsbook offering across all current and future regulated markets in the U.S. Flutter Entertainment and Scientific Games first partnered with Paddy Power in 2000, making this the 20th anniversary of the companies’ partnership.

Together, Flutter and Scientific Games teams have achieved a number of industry milestones. In 2010, Paddy Power accepted its first Live Odds bets, and the following year saw the sportsbook become the first to launch the innovative Cashout feature, both powered by the OpenBet engine. Following the merger between Paddy Power and Betfair, the OpenSports team was heavily involved in the migration of the two brands onto a single customer platform.

RG24SEVEN, NIGA PARTNER FOR RESPONSIBLE GAMING

T

he National Indian Gaming Association has hired RG24seven, the world’s leading videobased responsible gaming training platform, to provide its members with tribal-specific, videobased, responsible gaming training. NIGA Chairman Ernie Stevens Jr. said, “We are proud to be taking a proactive stance on responsible gaming and we are partnering with RG24seven to do this. Education and training of our tribal employees is a critical component of our responsible gaming strategy and we are encouragJodi DiLascio ing all members to provide this important training to their employees.”

NIGA Deputy Executive Director Danielle Her Many Horses noted, “RG24seven responsible gaming training not only ensures that our teams and organizations are compliant to all responsible gaming regulations, but importantly reinforces our stance on social, safety and responsibility issues.”

After leading BMM Testlabs’ tribal gaming division for 10 years, Jodi DiLascio will serve as tribal gaming director at RG24seven. DiLascio will oversee RG24seven’s providing of compliancegrade virtual training to tribal gaming enterprises,

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including working with tribes moving into new gaming verticals such as sports wagering, mobile gaming and cashless wagering.

RG24seven Chief Executive Officer Wendy Anderson said, “I’m so pleased to welcome Jodi DiLascio to our RG24seven team. Jodi’s knowledge of tribal gaming is second to none and she is an absolute pleasure to work with. It’s also a tremendous honor to be able to serve the National Indian Gaming Association through responsible gaming training.”

DiLascio added, “We are thrilled to partner with the National Indian Gaming Association to not only provide responsible gaming training to their members, but also to be able to contribute to their mission. I look forward to working with the National Indian Gaming Association members to provide this important industry training.”

UNLV MOVES EXECUTIVE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM ONLINE

T

he International Gaming Institute at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas is moving its Executive Development Program (EDP), long considered a “boot camp” for the gaming equipment manufacturing business, from its normal Harveys Lake Tahoe physical event to a virtual format, according to an exclusive report by CDC Gaming Reports.

The program, presented by UNLV in partnership with the University of Nevada, Reno, is titled “EDP Presents: All the Crises, All the Time.”

Bernhard said the program is being offered at a significantly reduced price point open to both EDP alumni and newcomers.

“The way this year’s program is scheduled, you could have people online in the U.S., Asia, and Africa, all at the same time, sharing experiences and messages,” Bernhard said.

For more information, visit www.unlv.edu/igi/edp.

ICE LONDON MOVED TO JUNE 2021

C

larion Gaming recently announced ICE London and iGB Affiliate London will be held at ExCeL London. ICE London will occur June 2930 and July 1, and iGB Affiliate London will take place July 1-2. In addition, iGB Live 2021 will occur September 28 to October 1 in Amsterdam.

Due to the impacts of Covid-19, the decision

was made to move the two gaming industry and affiliate events from their traditional February dates to next summer. Stakeholders and attendees asked for additional time to make sure the industry and the world economy would stabilize, and that regulations limiting international travel would ease.

Clarion Gaming Managing Director Kate Chambers said, “This extension provides a number of important advantages, such as enabling the very best possible space configurations and accessibility at ExCeL London. As well as the significant logistical benefits, we are also very much aware that it provides additional market recovery time, which we believe will further enhance and support the delivery, outcomes and experiences for all participants.”

Clarion Gaming Managing Director of Events Stuart Hunger noted the company currently is preparing the Road to ICE and iGB 2021 virtual events, starting in February. “Our plan is for ICE and IGB to be broadcast live globally for the first time. New platforms for networking, learning, entertainment and business development are in planning to ensure that ICE London and iGB Affiliate London continue to support the industry, raise morale and kickstart a global celebration of gaming.”

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Unlike the 2019 version (above), the Executive Development Program will go online in 2020

The 2020 program, to be held November 1521, will offer a virtual weeklong leadership course centered on solutions to help the industry emerge from the Covid-19 pandemic. Bo Bernhard, the institute’s executive director and EDP moderator, told CDC that the online format is hoped to give a boost to attendance.

“By opening it up online, we can have a broader range of attendees and a broader range of C-suitelevel faculty,” Bernhard said.

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PEOPLE PERELMAN OUT, ODELL IN AT SCI GAMES

G

aming supplier Scientific Games Corp. announced last month that its largest shareholder, billionaire Ronald Perelman, has agreed to sell the bulk of his stake in the Jamie Odell company, 34.9 percent of all shares, to Australian investment firm Caledonia for $28 per share.

As of July, Perelman held approximately 36.8 million shares through his investment company McAndrews & Forbes, making the deal worth over $1 billion. In consideration of the sale, Scientific Games terminated its stockholders agreement with McAndrews & Forbes.

Along with the ownership shift is a reconstitution of the company’s board of directors, which will now be led by former top executives of SG rival Aristocrat Leisure Limited. Former Aristocrat CEO Jamie Odell, who has been serving Scientific Games for a year as an adviser to CEO Barry Cottle, replaces Perelman as executive chairman of the board. Toni Korsanos, formerly Aristocrat’s chief financial officer, was named executive vice chairwoman.

SJM BOLSTERS MANAGEMENT TEAM

T

wo former executives with Las Vegas Sands’ gaming operations in Asia have joined Macau casino operator SJM. Benjamin Toh and Daniel Benjamin Toh Shim have been named chief operating officer for finance and development and chief corporate affairs officer, respectively, according to a report by Macau News Agency citing an internal company memo from SJM Chairwoman Daisy Ho. In his new role, Toh will be in charge of budgeting, risk management, cage, treasury, investor relations, insurance and procurement, MNA reported.

Shim’s responsibilities will include human resources, staff training and development, staff relations, internal corporate communications and community engagement strategies.

Toh served as CFO of Sands China, LVS’ Macau operating subsidiary, from 2010 to 2016. Shim was LVS’ senior vice president of human resources-Asia from 2007 to 2010.

Their appointments come amid a restructuring of SJM’s top management as the company gears up for the debut of its Grand Lisboa Palace resort complex on Cotai later this year. Recent moves include

the appointment of Frank McFadden as COO for gaming & hospitality, Bernard Yip as president of business development, Paul Hung as president of security, surveillance and ESG, and Arnaldo Ho as president of international business development.

MOHAWK GAMING PROMOTES LAUZON

M

ohawk Gaming Enterprises LLC recently named Emily Lauzon as general manager at the Akwesasne Mohawk Casino ReEmily Lauzon sort in Hogansburg, New York.

Lauzon replaces Todd Papineau, who left to pursue other opportunities. Lauzon previously served as acting general manager and has been the casino’s assistant general manager since 2013.

Lauzon brings 18 years of Class II and Class III executive gaming operations experience to her position. She began her gaming industry career as associate relations manager at Akwasasne during its startup phase in 1999. In 2012, she was named general manager at Mohawk Bingo Palace as it merged with the Akwasasne casino.

Lauzon currently is serving a fourth term as president of the board of education at Salmon River Central School and has been a member of the Saint Regis Mohawk Tribal Police Commission Board since December 2019.

HORSESHOE HAMMOND NAMES JENKINS GENERAL MANAGER

H

orseshoe Casino in Hammond, Indiana recently named Kathryn Jenkins senior vice president and general manager. Previously, she was general manager at Horseshoe Bossier City and Kathryn Jenkins Harrah’s Louisiana Downs properties. Jenkins also served in various executive marketing positions for Caesars Entertainment, Horseshoe’s former parent company, and at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. She began her career in the casino industry in 2002 as a casino host at Harrah’s New Orleans, rising to the position of assistant general manager.

In her new role at the 108,000-square-foot venue, Jenkins will oversee 1,700 employees, the Book sportsbook, the Venue entertainment venue and eight restaurants.

AGS NAMES BOYER VP, INVESTOR RELATIONS

G

aming supplier AGS announced the appointment of Brad Boyer as vice president, investor relations, corporate Development & strategy. He

brings over 10 years of experience as a research analyst in the gaming sector, as well as strong relationships with the investor community and an in-depth knowledge of AGS’ leadership and business.

Brad Boyer Boyer joins AGS after a 10-year career at Stifel, Nicolaus, and Company, where he ended his tenure as vice president, equity research, gaming & leisure. In this role, he led coverage of the gaming, sports, iGaming and hospitality sectors, including covering AGS and the other publicly traded gaming equipment suppliers and operators. He earned a bachelor of arts degree in economics from Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York.

CHAMBERS TAKES DEDICATED LAND-BASED GAMING ROLE AT CLARION

K

ate Chambers, who has driven the development of the Clarion Gaming portfolio of world-leading brands, has confirmed that she will be taking up a new, more defined role as both the gambling industry and the events sector address the fallout caused by Covid-19.

In an email announcement sent to international gambling industry stakeholders, she explained, “After spending over a decade in my current post I am transitioning into a new role with Clarion Gaming.

“The role will have a sharp focus on landbased gambling, and in particular I will be looking at how the team at Clarion can best serve our loyal and dedicated customers in a sector that has taken the brunt of the fallout from Covid-19.”

GGB

November 2020 Index of Advertisers

AGEM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .39 American Gaming Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 Analog Way . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .49 Casino Player Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .56 Everi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5, 23, 37 Fantini Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55 Fox Rothchild . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27 GGB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .53 HBG Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11 IGT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7, 21 Incredible Technologies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47 J Carcamo & Associates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .35 Konami Gaming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .60 Morris, Manning & Martin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 Reed Expo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31 Scientific Games . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17 Sega Sammy Creations USA Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . .9 Seneca Gaming Corporation . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25 UNLV Division of Philanthropy & Alumni Engagement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .43 Wells Fargo Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .59

NOVEMBER 2020 www.ggbmagazine.com

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CASINO COMMUNICATIONS

Q

&A

Derek Stevens

D

erek Stevens came to Las Vegas from Detroit in 2006, when he and his brother purchased the Golden Gate Hotel, the oldest operating casino in Las Vegas. He later bought the D (the former Fitzgerald’s) and created the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center. Last month, he opened Circa Resort & Casino at the foot of Fremont Street, a new concept that relies heavily on sports betting and a premier pool experience. He spoke with GGB Publisher Roger Gros at his offices in the D in October for the cover story of GGB’s Casino Style magazine due out in December.

CEO, Circa Resort & Casino

of a lot of small businesses. And it really developed into a community of people that got to know each other and were all really aligned in a manner where everyone was rooting for the growth of Vegas.

“We’ve really tried to create our sportsbook to be something where you end up picking up a lot of the energy of all the rest of the fans and customers who are there.”

GGB: Explain how you got to Vegas and are now about to open Circa.

Derek Stevens: I started coming to Las Vegas a

long time ago, in the ’80s. I came for pleasure.

I’m a sports fan, so I came out to a lot of fights. I came out for a football weekend, basketball, things like that. But I never envisioned—forget about owning a casino—I never envisioned working at a casino.

I was pretty happy working in the manufacturing business, out of the Midwest. And, you know, as time goes by, you come out here for a lot of things. And eventually it became for business and conventions and things like that.

When we had an opportunity to get into this industry, it was 2006. I’ve always loved Las Vegas.

I’ve always loved the state of Nevada, from the business perspective. It took me 18 months to get licensed. So I got my first license in March 2008.

And remember, that’s when the economy just completely tanked for about a year and a half, which, ironically, was probably the most fortunate thing that ever happened to us. Because a lot of real-estate values in Downtown Las Vegas became far less expensive.

It also ushered in a new group of people. A new group of entrepreneurs. A new group of people that were willing to put equity in. Predominantly, along Fremont East and such, it was sweat equity. Tony Hsieh spurred on the development 58

Global Gaming Business NOVEMBER 2020

The thing that stands out most of all about Circa is the sportsbook. Sports betting is now something you can walk around with in your pocket.

Why did you decide to build such a massive sportsbook?

I have always thought in years past that a significant brick-and-mortar sportsbook was something that could bring people together. Obviously betting on an app is not just the future; it’s the present. It’s easy, convenient and quick. It’s more efficient. But there’s still an element of going to a sportsbook, and the camaraderie with all the people, that creates a unique excitement that you can’t get elsewhere.

I would say there’s still something inside of a Las Vegas brick-and-mortar sportsbook that’s different. It’s not an experience they can get at Hometown USA. We’ve created a stadium effect.

And for us, this isn’t really all that new. I own the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center where we’ve been throwing concerts, EDM events, food festivals, boxing matches, UFC matches, and watch parties.

We learned a lot in doing watch parties at our events center. The psychology of someone that goes to a watch party, it’s much different than someone that’s going to a live sporting event. It’s a different angle, a different perspective. People

feel differently when they go to a watch party.

There is more social demeanor as they come into the game—a little bit more upbeat and willing to socialize. We’ve really tried to create our sportsbook to be something where you end up picking up a lot of the energy of all the rest of the fans and customers who are there.

The sportsbook is in combination with your pool experience. What’s going to make the Circa pools so different?

First, really, the scale. Stadium Swim will be a key feature in Circa Las Vegas, with a capacity of around 4,000. And this is a stadium to watch events and enjoy the sun. We’re going to have programming that will be far more musically oriented throughout most of the day. So, as opposed to us designing a pool as an amenity for a hotel, with 512 rooms and suites, you could almost say our hotel is designed as an amenity to Stadium Swim.

So there will be six pools, and all kinds of different environments at each pool?

Yes, six pools. Two upper-deck pools. Maybe a little more privacy. Four lower-deck pools, two of which have big walk-up bars at the end of the pools. And these pools are pretty big, by the way.

How about in the winter? It’s only a short winter in Vegas, but the pools still close down for a few months.

That was another thing I always thought about over my many trips to Las Vegas. Obviously I’d been out here Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, you know, all throughout the summer. But you come out in December, January, the pools are always closed. I always wondered why the pools close in Las Vegas, but they can stay open at Vail, or Park City, or Aspen.

Our pools won’t close. It’ll be the greatest pool in Las Vegas. It’ll be the greatest pool in America.

This will be the greatest pool in the history of the world! That’s what Stadium Swim’s going to be.

Steph Littlebird Fogel, Grand Ronde Confederation

Celebrating Native American Heritage Month by Supporting Native Art Wells Fargo partnered with five of the most talented, up-and-coming Native artists in the country to create the bespoke artworks featured in the Native Art Gallery card collection. We are excited to announce that the collection is now available to all of our customers through the Wells Fargo Card Design Studio® service.

Fox Spears, Karuk

Crystal Worl, Tlingit

For over 60 years, we’ve been honored to support Native communities and businesses through philanthropic, capital and financial services, and we’ll continue to work together for generations to come.

To learn more about how we’re supporting Native communities, visit wellsfargo.com/nativecommunities.

Elias Jade Not Afraid, Crow

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Maya Stewart, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek

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