Wire ASIA & OCEANIA
India Publishes new Online Gaming Laws
CHINA – Alvin Chau Cheok Wa, the founder of Macau junket operator Suncity Group, has been sentenced to 18 years in prison having been found guilty of fronting a criminal gang, illegal gambling activities, and fraud.
Judge Lou Ieng Ha said: “Chau Cheok Wa was aware of and received illicit gains from the activities. The staffers of Suncity were also found to facilitate these bets in a systematic manner. They would not do so without the approval from the leader of Suncity, Chau Cheok Wa.
“Chau Cheok Wa took advantage of the resources of the six gaming operators and carried out under-the- table bets with gamblers covertly, resulting in a situation that the gaming operators could not share the revenue of these bets and the loss of gaming revenue tax for the government.”
Mr Chau and his accomplices will have to pay the Macau Government HK$6.52bn (US$833m) with five of Macau’s gaming operators, all except Melco Resorts, claiming compensation of over HK$2.15bn.
JAPAN- Sega Sammy Creation has appointed Naoki Kameda as its new President and CEO, with Koichi Fukazawa being appointed Chairman.
Naoki first joined Sega Enterprises and handled various projects including the operation of indoor theme park Tokyo Joypolis and the launch of home video game consoles in international markets. After a stint as a director at Sega of America, Inc. he moved on to COO and CFO of SEGA Networks Inc, where he led the mobile game app segment in North America and Europe.
Sega Sammy commented: “Naoki’s experience with developing international businesses across various sectors will be instrumental in our next phase of development and expansion.”
HONG KONG – The Hong Kong Jockey Club has announced the appointment of Dennis Hau as Executive Director, Customer Strategy, Insights and Innovation. Hau will be a member of the Board of Management and report directly to the Club’s CEO, Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges.
Leading the Customer Strategy, Insights and Innovation (CSII) Division, Mr Hau will be instrumental in driving the ongoing transformation of the Club into a customer centric organisation. Specifically, his mandate is to develop a holistic customer strategy and to define the customer experience journey across all of the Club’s businesses, segments and channels. As such, he will set customer experience standards and co- ordinate the design of the customer journey and the delivery of customer care across all businesses.
P34 WIRE / PULSE / INSIGHT / REPORTS
Draft amendments have been prepared by Te Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology for online betting to be offered in the country.
Te Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology released draft amendments to the IT intermediary rules 2021, pertaining to Online Gaming for public consultations.
Te draft has been prepared to ensure that online games should be offered in conformity with Indian laws and that the users of such games be safeguarded against potential harm. In December the Government, through a gazette notification, notified change in Allocation of Business rules designating Meity as the nodal ministry for online gaming related concerns. On 2 January, the Ministry released the draft rules for public consultation.
Briefing reporters on the proposed draft, Minister of State for Electronics and IT, Shri Rajeev Chandrasekhar said: “Te rules are simple – we would like the online gaming ecosystem to expand & grow and be an important catalyst to India’s one trillion dollar digital economy goal by 2025-26. We also envision a bigger role for startups in the online gaming industry."
Te Minister said that the Ministry had moved
Australia Aristocrat well positioned for M&A
Aristocrat Leisure has announced profits of $1.1bn, surpassing the supplier's 2019 results by approximately 23 per cent.
Te company said it was a ‘high quality result', with strong revenue and profit growth reflecting sustained investment in top-performing product portfolios, differentiating capabilities, increased operational diversification and business resilience for the 12 months ended 30 September 2022.
Normalised profit after tax and before amortisation of acquired intangibles of $1,099.3m represents an increase of 27 per cent in reported terms, and 20 per cent in constant currency, compared to the prior corresponding period. Tis was
driven by exceptional performance in North American gaming operations and global outright sales, despite supply chain disruptions and mixed operating conditions across key markets.
Analysts at Fitch believe Aristocrat is well-positioned to pursue mergers and acquisitions: “Te company sits in a flexible position to comfortably fund small to mid-size acquisitions and major share buybacks with cash, all while adhering to its conservative net leverage policy."
swiftly in framing of the policy and this was possible due to a series of meetings and consultations conducted by MeiTY with stakeholders prior to drafting the policy. He added that the Ministry would be holding another set of public consultations to finalise the policy soon.
He said the draft has proposed a self-regulatory mechanism which, in future, may also regulate the content of online gaming and ensure that the games do not have violent, addictive or sexual content. As of now, the gaming age is 18 years and would like to see it kept that way and see if the present framework works to expand the innovation ecosystem around online gaming while keeping it safe and trusted for gamers.
Speaking on the safety concerns, the Minister said around 40 to 45 per cent of the gamers in India are women, and therefore it was all more important to keep the gaming ecosystem safe. He added that the draft rules have strict provisions against betting and wagering, before stressing that any form of online game that allows wagering on the outcome is effectively a no-go area.
China
Emperor Entertainment Hotel is back operating its satellite casino at its Macau hotel Grand Emperor, having previously opted not to renew its contract and given it back to licence holder SJM Resorts. Emperor E said the award of the new gaming concessions had ‘provided a clearer visibility in the future development of Macau’s gaming industry'.
Emperor E will receive a percentage of the GGR on a monthly basis, capped at HK$100m for the three months to the end of its financial year on March 31 2023, rising to HK$400m for the year ended 2024.
Emperor E Hotel Group’s management said it is confident in Macau’s tourism recovery and its medium to long term growth.
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