Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING | September 2008 22 costs involved with running a real-world racing operation, Triple Towers offers other advantages over traditional tracks. “Because it’s automated, there are no long gaps between races. So the actual betting process is much quicker,” increasing turnover and better satisfying players’ betting appetites, points out Ms Cohen. TCS JOHNHUXLEY believes Triple Towers will prove a hit in Asia, with the ability to fully automate the games and do away with human interaction by using kiosks providing a solution to several uniquely-regional problems such as the labour shortage in Macau and the stipulation that all gaming be fully electronic in other Asian jurisdictions. The outcomes of the games are generated by a random number generator, providing reassurance to would-be bettors who may have been put off by several recent race-rigging scandals across Asia. Last year, HKJC staff uncovered a bizarre plot to shoot horses with poisoned darts at the starting gate at the Happy Valley track, with the discovery of 12 metal tubes, each a foot long, filled with darts and buried in the turf near the gates.The tubes were wired together and linked to a wireless receiver. Furthermore,Triple Towers accurately reflects the real experience, with the incorporation of racing form. “When you place your bets, the different horses will have different odds attributed to them. According to what you bet on, you’ll get different payouts. But the higher the odds,the lower the chances of that horse winning.So form will be zero after every race,” says Dr Sjöberg. Other offerings Triple Towers is one of many TCS JOHNHUXLEY electronic gaming offerings, which range from slot machines and cabinets to the cutting-edge AccuPLAY Blackjack system and TouchTable Real Roulette.The company has three other product categories: ◊ Live Gaming – from chips, playing cards and displays to furnishings, table layouts and roulette wheels. ◊ Automated Products – including the best chip sorter on the market, Chipper Champ. ◊ Gaming Systems & Security – including RFID, surveillance and table management systems, as well as the novel Brand Aroma, which allows casinos to mark their properties with uniquely identifiable scents. Also prominently on display at G2E Asia was TouchTable MultiPLAY™ Roulette. The product does not use chips, offering not only all the labour-saving, productivity enhancing and fraud- and error-preventing benefits of automated gaming, but also allowing it to be used in locations where traditional roulette tables are barred by regulation, such as slot halls in Cambodia. The range of automated Novo TouchBet™ live games— including blackjack, baccarat, sic bo and roulette—were presented in a six-terminal configuration around a live dealer at the show, but the system has the capacity to link up to 250 terminals to one server. The enabling technology behind Novo TouchBet Live-Baccarat and Live-Blackjack is the state-of-the-art optical recognition system in the TCS JOHNHUXLEY AccuPLAY Intelligent Card Shoe, which, unlike competing intelligent shoes that only work with a particular card brand, is able to read almost all the major card brands in the world. When a live dealer draws a card from the AccuPLAY Shoe, the card value is immediately displayed across all player terminals using realistic 3D graphics. “The automatic recognition of cards facilitates the game,” explains Dr Sjöberg,“rather than relying on the dealer to press in the cards every time.” Asia expansion TCS JOHNHUXLEY Asia Sales Director Rebecca Kingswell commented on the recent opening of the company’s Singapore office:“Our Asia expansion programme is moving full steam ahead.” Ms Kingswell explains that because of the difficulty in recruiting technical staff in Macau, “the idea is to use Singapore, which has a good technical base, to set up a technical team that will service the rest of Asia. And leave the Macau technical team—because there’s so much work here [in Macau]—as just doing Macau.We’re hoping we’ll get a lot of work from the two properties about to open in Singapore,” in addition to the various casinos set to sprout around the region as other jurisdictions either legalise or expand gaming. (From left to right) Solidicon founders Daniel Hansen, P-A Gustafsson and Jonas Wikstrom TCSJOHNHUXLEY