Report ONTARIO - CANADA
after an RFP process to replace the existing jackpot link. Some of Bally’s most popular games will be on the new link such as Michael Jackson King of Pop and Betty Boop’s Fortune Teller.
Meanwhile Bally recently opened a new Canadian office in Ontario in November in Mississauga near to Toronto airport. The company is also looking at implementing slot and table systems at sites in British Columbia and Saskatchewan.
MODERNISATION PROGRAMME All looks set to change in Ontario. Due to the advances in technology and changes in demographics, shopping patterns and a decline in US visitors, the OLG is worried about its long term sustainability and is concerned that the current business model is not serving customers, or the province, as well as it could do.
Since 2000 there has been a significant decline in the number of lottery players
February 2013 PAGE 132
The government is
currently looking at ways to rationalise its gambling
enterprise and
maximise its net revenue from
gambling and is now, via the OLG,
looking to end the Slots at Racetrack
Program which has been in existence since 1998.
and over the last 10 years profits from gaming facilities near the US border have dropped from $800m in 2001 to just $100m last year due to gaming facilities now available in more US states.
The changes in technology include the advancement of online gaming. At the moment it is estimated that Ontarians spend around $400m a year on gambling websites which are unauthorised in Ontario resulting in a loss of revenue. In addition the lottery system is still mainly paper based in an increasingly paper free country and lottery terminals are under- used whilst blue box terminals currently used are becoming outdated.
The way lottery tickets are sold no longer reflects current shopping patterns and the OLG is now looking at the feasibility of shifting the day to day operations of its lottery network to a regulated private sector operator and to expand its lottery distribution through new channels. This will include new retail outlets and
internet and mobile device sales.
The OLG also believes that tying its slot machine business to racetrack sites merely limits the options for new gaming locations whilst the size of the slot sector at racetracks has also reached its plateau and cannot feasibly grow. With 88 per cent of land based gaming revenue coming from slots it is an important market.
So the plan now is for privatisation with three main recommendations:
• To become more customer focused
• To expand regulated private sector delivery of lottery and gaming
• To renew OLG’s role to concentrate on the oversight of the lottery and gaming industry.
The idea behind the scheme is to enable service providers to operate gaming
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