CASINO MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Bridging the casino-hotel gap As we went to press, MGM’s Excalibur hotel in Las Vegas was hosting a meeting that could lead to
dramatic expansion in the scope and functionality of future casino management systems. It brought together two trade groups, the Gaming Standards Association (GSA) and Hotel Technology
Next Generation (HTNG), which will work together to develop standards enabling hospitality and gaming systems to integrate information on customers.
“The objective is to enable existing systems to link together to provide a completely integrated view of
each customer from across the entire operation, including the customer’s profile, their future itineraries, and past spending,” the GSA and HTNG said.
For example, disparate applications ranging from player tracking to spa management and from show
ticketing to concierge services will use the same formats for storing data on individuals – including their spending, so that staff in every department can see what the GSA and HTNG characterise as “a complete view of the value of the guest”.
To facilitate this, HTNG’s existing Single Guest Itinerary specification, which defines how hotel and
resort systems store details of customers and their itineraries, will be expanded to include data on gaming activity.
Said Scot Campbell, Chief Information Officer of MGM Resorts International: “We, and indeed the
entire hospitality industry, expect to gain a much clearer picture of the guests in our hotels and casinos, while our staff in each department can continue using the systems with which they are already most comfortable.”
Besides the two associations and users in the gaming and hospitality sectors, the project will involve
technology companies including Agilysys, AMX, Bally Technologies,
GoConcierge.net, Konami Gaming, International Game Technology (IGT), Micros Systems and Oracle.
The fruits of their co-operation will be implemented through “modest upgrades to existing systems”, the GSA and HTNG said, rather than requiring entirely new deployments.
back-office systems. Interactive kiosk-type screens were placed on casino floors, allowing customers to collect and redeem points wherever they were; at the same time, Infosys and the client codified the business rules that would enable the system to generate reports on the loyalty programme in a form that was useful to management.
Bits and pieces The project executed by Infosys was useful but
clearly limited in its scope. A large casino management system may, however, spread its
tentacles all over the business, with different software elements handling different aspects of the casino. Bally Technologies, for example, this summer installed at Galaxy Entertainment Group’s StarWorld in Macau the first of several casino management systems that it is selling to the group, covering tables, slots and general operations.
It includes TableView, which rates tables and tracks
players in real time; SDS, which manages slots accounting and tracks their players; a Junket module for administration of high-roller business; iView Display Manager, which allows promotional content to be shown on game screens, using a picture-in- picture mode so that the game is not interupted; a range of modules for bonusing, cashless payments, marketing and promotions, including eTicket, Power Winners, Power Coupon, and Power Promotions; and Bally Business Intelligence, which analyses data and provides easy-to-grasp visualisations of business factors such as game and table performance, player behaviour, loyalty and value, and the effects of special events and promotions.
Aristocrat Technologies is another vendor that provides visual renditions of key business data. It has
32 OCTOBER 2010
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