Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING | August 2008 22 main exhibition hall at G2E Asia, where the background noise is noticeably higher than even a busy gaming floor. “We certainly use nice and good quality soundboards in our products. We strive to make our machines different,” says Mr Annecchini. Fun and fair Regarding actual game play, he believes AdvancedGamingproductswill definitely be perceivedas funbyAsianplayers,irrespective of how machines are configured for return to player in each venue or jurisdiction. “If you take Samurai Fortune as an example, the number of free games is random, regardless of how much you’re betting,”he explains. “You can get anywhere from five to 15 free games. The random element increases excitement for all players.” Scroll on On Golden Empire , players also have the option of in effect ‘fast forwarding’ play in order to get to special features. “If you don’t want to wait for the score to go on, you can progress the machine quicker,”he explains. “Some gamblers like to sit and watch their money going up, while some are more enthusiastic and like more volatility,” he adds. “Asia is an exciting market and we’re delighted to have this opportunity to work with Elixir.” As a commissioner of original equipment, purchaser of third party product and site manager rolled into one,Elixir GamingTechnologies says it is the biggest single purchaser of gaming machines in Asia outside Macau. It shops around for the best products in order to fine-tune the offer on gaming floors and maximise enjoyment for players and returns for customers. As well as using machines from big players such as IGT and Aristocrat, Elixir is also looking to smaller companies such as Advanced Gaming to provide that quality product. Partners By entering into a partnership with Elixir, Advanced Gaming is joining a dynamic and still growing market. According to the World Count of Gaming Machines 2008 survey by consultancy firm TNS, on behalf of the Australian Gaming Manufacturers’ Association, the Philippines had 6,603 slot machines, the equivalent of only one machine for every 13,793 people, at the end of Q1 2008. Australia, by comparison, had 186,344 machines— one machine for every 110 people, indicating a much more mature market. In Vietnam, there were only 370 machines at the end of Q1 2008 according to TNS—a staggering 230,438 people per slot machine. It’s worth remembering, however, that at present only overseas Vietnamese and foreign tourists are allowed into casinos there. Domestic and foreign In Cambodia, the people-to-slot machine gearing has come down rapidly since a TNS survey in 2006. That year, TNS estimated there were 9,035 people per gaming machine. By April 2008, that had fallen to 3,499 people per machine. This was due in large part to the efforts of Elixir, which installed 976 machines at venues in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap in the final quarter of 2007, according to the company’s own figures, taking the country’s gaming machine total to 4,000 at the end of Q1 2008. In Macau, there were 14,507 machines, the equivalent of only 31 people per machine in Q1 2008, though Macau is an overwhelmingly non-domestic gaming market targeting a population of around 50 million in the neighbouring Pearl River Delta Region of China and hundreds of millions more in the country’s hinterland. Room for Growth Elixir counts on Asian slot boom