SPIELO INTERNATIONAL COVER STORY
A new flame burns bright
ATRONIC and SPIELO are now joined under one banner: SPIELO International. The new entity’s Chief Executive Officer Walter Bugno explained to Casino International what changes are coming
A Walter Bugno, Spielo International CEO
cquisitions and mergers are common in business, usually with an eye trained firmly on the bottom line – but occasionally, a merger happens because two companies feel they can operate
better, more effectively (and of course more efficiently) if they combine their strengths. SPIELO and ATRONIC have made this journey over the last two years, culminating in the unveiling of the new identity at this year’s Global Gaming Exhibition. Walter Bugno explains the why and how of the merger, and what it means for customers in future…
Casino International: Why have you merged
these two companies? Walter Bugno: It’s about trying to leverage scale by bringing together two organisations that were competing in the same marketplace, the broader gaming industry, with a focus on the machine and systems side of things, but in different segments: one company worked in the distributed gaming sector, the other in the commercial casino sector, each running effectively their own product range, technology platforms, content programs… The opportunity to bring them both together allows us to introduce best practices, to focus, and to effectively do more with the same.
CI: It’s taken two years to do this… Why does
the process take so long? WB: It takes a number of key approaches to
integrate any organisation. You need a clear vision of what you’re trying to do and why you’re doing it, with the intention of making it a positive step. It requires focus, and that’s usually much easier for someone coming in from the outside like I did, because they are unbiased when it comes to choosing one of two brands, and one system or the other. When you have that clarity, you can start accelerating, which is what we have done in the last six or seven months. We’re already starting to see the benefits in the marketplace, and we’re making great strides.
CI: What did each brand bring to the new company, SPIELO International?
34 OCTOBER 2011 CI: What does the merging of
ATRONIC and SPIELO mean for the customer? WB: We’re saying to our customers that
there really is no change; you’ll be speaking to the same person you were dealing with before, based in the same location, and you’ll be calling the same telephone number. Customers will experience indirect, yet significant, benefits as we progress through this period of change and build our capability – which is ongoing. They should see a faster, more responsive, more up-to-date, innovative company that can bring the best of what it does across a much broader organisation. We should be able, as I said before, to do more with the same; that’s what the customer will experience, and what they will feel.
CI: Has there been any ‘streamlining’? Has the company released any staff, with the company bringing two separate entities together? WB: There are two purposes you can drive an
integration process with: it might be about cost reduction. However, it might instead be about efficiency, improvement and leverage. The focus for us has been on the latter. The organisation has already experienced a number of major changes and
WB: We’re trying to bring to the fore each brand’s
strength. Within these two businesses there were some very good processes; SPIELO is a world leader in distributed gaming, for example. It has proven over and over its ability to compete against significantly larger organisations, and succeed in that competition. It’s similar to ATRONIC, which as a business had been around for a number of years and carved out a strong and reliable position as a company that was adaptable and customisable in its solutions for customers. Bringing these together allows us to achieve a scale that the two businesses, as separate entities, were not able to do.
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