room. Casinos like Pechanga are now using Display Manager Tournament software and EBS to create instant tournament areas. Fifteen minutes is all it takes for the slot-floor system to convert a thousand machines or more into and out of tourney mode. Last February, almost four years after it began phasing in myriad Bally slot- and table-management systems, it was ready to shoot for the record of the world’s largest slot tournament. Previously, the casino hadn’t had more than 80 machines doing simultaneous tourney play. Although most of the 3,800-slot Pechanga floor has yet to be connected to iView, it could still deploy 1,140 tournament- ready boxes. This created what Rowe describes as “a call to
action for the players, to the extent of sleeping there the night before,” so they could queue up at 7 a.m., “like at Best Buy” when new products hit the market. This, Rowe says, generated a New Year’s Eve level of excitement – in traditionally slow February, filling the hotel to capacity. “If a casino could create 12 days a year that had the equivalent volume, that would be pretty material” to the bottom line. “It runs on all the machines,” he says of iView, which can be supported on Konami, WMS, International Game Technology and Aristocrat boxes, not just Bally ones. “That’s the beauty of it. You can differentiate a commodity product,” i.e., slots, with a property-branded experience. For instance, Barona is
able to run the EBS horse- race application across its entire slot floor, bringing in a track announcer as well as a trumpeter to play the traditional call to the post. “They took the energy of the event across the whole floor, so that it became contagious,” reports Rowe, adding that Barona is using the EBS platform to develop an equivalent – but proprietary – car-race event. The EBS horse race has also been a popular feature as the “Pechanga Classic,” which offers a $15,000 purse. Writes Vice President of Slot Operations Buddy Frank: “You can see people all over the casino cheering and high-fiving,” bringing the atmosphere of the table-game pit to the traditionally antisocial slot floor. Last
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May 5, Mohegan Sun ran 14 simulated races on 4,400 machines and had a follow-up planned for Memorial Day weekend. Forty-seven thousand players were expected to participate in the holiday event. According to J.P. Morgan analyst Joseph Greff, in an investor note, Mohegan Sun will expand iView to all of its approximately 6,000 machines. This content-streaming isn’t restricted to the slot floor, either. Pechanga has employed Bally’s CoolSign media-management setup to remotely update its electronic highway billboards. The same technology also made it possible for the casino to simulcast a concert by American Idol winner David Cook live onto its gaming floor. According to Rowe, the objective of EBS is threefold -- to increase coin-in, rate play and player-card signups – and has achieved double-digit growth across all three goals. Bally’s own case studies show upticks of 12%, 17% and 10%, respectively. This happened as soon as EBS came online, which Greff characterized as “impressive … We believe the recent statistics will give operators a better view of the return potential … widespread adoption will slowly be realized over the next several years.” Already both Sun International and the British Columbia Lottery Corp. have signed up for 12,500 iView-enabled machines between them and the Ontario Lottery Commission is expected to follow suit later this year. For the player, iView- plus-EBS means something more than being able to order a drink from the comfort of one’s slot stool or get a dining discount offer during slot play. Now, when a punter has a customer-service issue with the casino, it can be satisfied on the spot. Instead of getting a coupon
a month later, after he’s gone home, the player can get his
make-good while he’s still at the resort and able
to act upon it immediately. Getting straight to the bottom line, Rowe says, EBS “allows us to reinvest at the point of customer dissatisfaction and hopefully create more loyalty.”
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