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SABMILLER OFFLOAD TSOGO SHARES
Brewing giant SABMiller is to dispose of its shareholding in Tsogo Sun through institutional placing and a buy back. South Africa - Casino Operations
UK – INSPIRED PARTNERS WITH GAMES LEGEND Inspired Gaming Group (Inspired) has announced a game development partnership with Ian Livingstone. Ian Livingstone is one of the founding fathers of the UK games industry. As co-founder of Games Workshop he launched Dungeons & Dragons in Europe. He co-authored the multi- million selling Fighting Fantasy gamebook series and has launched many international blockbuster video games.
Luke Alvarez, Founder and CEO of Inspired, commented: “I am both personally and professionally excited to be working with Ian Livingstone. Convergence is a key trend in our industry at the moment. Our partnership will uniquely focus on leveraging the convergence between console gaming, mobile and gambling. We have some great ideas in the pipeline and we look forward to launching these hit games together.”
Ian Livingstone, added: “The vision and ambition of Luke and his team at Inspired is impressive. This is a new design chal- lenge for me, and I’m looking forward to collaborating with Inspired on new projects, applying video game mechanics and gameplay to server-based gaming products.”
PORTUGAL - JCM GLOBAL THE WINNER IN ESTORIL The winning ways continue for JCM Global across Europe, particularly in Portugal, where another casino has named JCM its preferred bill validator supplier. Today, Casino Estoril awarded the preferred distinction to JCM, the gaming indus- try’s leading transaction technologies supplier. The honor comes less than a month after another Portuguese casino named JCM its preferred supplier.
Specifically, Casino Estoril named JCM’s award-winning iVIZION as its preferred bill validator, adding to the growing list of casinos in Portugal, across Europe and worldwide that have named iVIZION their preferred bill validator.
Casino Estoril has been a JCM customer since 1997, and have benefitted from the security and speed of JCM’s land- mark WBA and UBA products. After a three-month test, the casino has decided to evolve the floor with the better, smarter, faster iVIZION.
Mr. Choi Man Hin, Chairman of Executive Committee of Casino Estoril, said, “We have worked with JCM for many years and have always been pleased with the quality of prod- ucts and service. During our three-month trial with iVIZION, we were impressed with its very high quality, fast first-time acceptance rate, and we had no technical problems. We are happy name iVIZION our preferred validator product.”
“iVIZION continues to impress operators around the world, and we are very happy to welcome Casino Estoril to the iVIZION family of customers. iVIZION has set a new global standard for acceptance and security, and as the foundation of intelligent validation, iVIZION is a product casinos can buy with confidence,” said JCM’s Payam Zadeh.
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The Tsogo Sun Hotel portfolio comprises 90 hotels, with 14,316 rooms, and 14 casinos. On April 15 2014, SABMiller announced that it was conducting a strategic review of its investment in JSE-listed gaming, hotel and entertainment group Tsogo Sun Holdings Limited SABMiller currently has an effective 39.6 per cent shareholding in Tsogo Sun valued at approximately ZAR11.7bn (approximate- ly US$1,089m) based on the closing share price of ZAR26.90 on 4 July 2014.
SABMiller, in co-operation with Tsogo Sun, has now completed its strategic review and has decid- ed to dispose of up to all of its ordinary shares in Tsogo Sun through two conditional transactions: firstly a fully marketed secondary placing of up to approximately 305 million Ordinary Shares to selected South African and international institu- tional investors and secondly a buy back by Tsogo Sun of at least approximately 130m Ordinary Shares for an aggregate consideration of ZAR2.8bn (approximately US$260m).
Alan Clark, Chief Executive of SABMiller said:
“SABMiller has been a supportive shareholder of Tsogo Sun since 2002, when we transferred our existing gaming and hotel assets into Tsogo Sun as
part of a landmark Black Economic Empowerment transaction. The business has per- formed well over the years. The merger with Gold Reef Resorts in 2011, and the resultant listing on the JSE, has transformed Tsogo Sun. However, gaming and hotels are not core to our operations and we have concluded that the time is right for us to exit our investment through a transaction which is beneficial to shareholders of both SABMiller and Tsogo Sun and to reinvest the pro- ceeds in our core growth businesses, including our African operations.”
Tsogo Sun’s management will commence a road- show to meet selected institutional investors in South Africa and internationally. The board of directors of Tsogo Sun believes that the Repurchase represents a unique and attractive opportunity for Tsogo Sun to repurchase and can- cel a significant number of Ordinary Shares on terms that are expected to have a positive impact on the company’s earnings per Ordinary Share and its black economic empowerment sharehold- ing. The board of directors of SABMiller believes that the Repurchase will provide SABMiller with certainty over the disposal of approximately 30 per cent of its shareholding.
UK The Ritz casino in London has been taken to court by the wife of an Omani politician who lost £2m in one evening for allegedly ‘taking advantage’ of her gambling addiction. Nora Al-Daher, 50, claims that staff at the Ritz were aware of her gambling problem but actively encouraged her to keep playing on the club’s punto banco table for hours in April 2012. She claims The Ritz should have stopped her playing but instead extended her credit facility. The Ritz had taken legal action against Mrs Al-Daher chasing £1m that had not been honoured. Ritz Chief Executive Roger Maris added: “She was a very good customer for us. There had been a very good history of paying. There was no thought in our mind that the cheques were not going to get paid.” During 1999 and April 2012, The Ritz received more than £20m in buy-ins from Mrs Al-Daher.
Armenia seeks to adopt new slots legislation to curb gaming
ARMENIA Ten casinos and 100 gaming par- lors now exist in Yerevan’s out- skirts One of the biggest, Shangri-La, “The number of gamblers has increased 10 times during the past five years,” esti- mated Samvel Khudoian, a pro- fessor of psychology at Armenian State Pedagogical University
Two Armenian MPs are seeking to pass legislation that would restrict access to casinos. A set of proposed amendments to Armenia’s gambling law would ban people under the age of 21
from entering a casino and allow for court orders to ban individu- als whose gambling can be shown to cause financial hard- ship to their families.
A third measure would allow casinos to deny entrance to indi- viduals at the gamblers’ own request. Restrictions could last from six months to three years, and would apply to all casinos in Armenia. The amendments are expected to be submitted to par- liament’s Economic Affairs Committee for discussion during the National Assembly’s next session.
The potential impact of the new gambling-related legislation is not straightforward, given that gaming has become a significant source of revenue for the govern- ment. In 2013, Armenia’s state budget received “7-8 billion drams” ($16.9 - $19.3 million) in tax revenues and license fees from Armenian gambling estab- lishments.
The representative of one casino, however, expressed approval of the proposed changes. “In many countries, visiting a casino is entertainment, while in Armenia, and perhaps the whole Caucasus, it is linked with passion [for a better life] and gambling [to earn a living],” said the individual, who requested anonymity. “People will be more protected if there is relevant legislation.”
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