Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING | September 2009 42 Targeted Growth Bally Technologies tailors its Asian slots offer property by property B ally Technologies’ global profits rose in the fourth quarter of the financial year ended 30th June 2009 despite a slowdown in group revenue. Although Bally’s revenue from slot equipment and systems fell 17% year-on-year during he quarter, its operating margin actually rose 2%, from 23% to 25%. It appears to be a vindication of the company’s approach to sales in Asia Pacific and beyond. Cath Burns, Managing Director, Vice President Asia Pacific explains to Inside Asian Gaming (with additional insights from Kurt Gissane, Associate Director, Business Development and Operations, Asia Pacific) why Bally continues to improve its performance in Asia Pacific despite a global downturn. IAG : What progress has Bally Technologies made in the Asia Pacific markets in the last 12 months? Cath Burns: We continue to grow in a measured, steady way. Even with the slowdown we’ve seen in Macau, with the suspension of [Las Vegas Sands Corp.’s] parcels five and six on Cotai and [Galaxy] MegaWorldetc, we’ve still beenable togrow our basic product. We’ve still been able to go into new markets in the course of this last fiscal year. We’re also enjoying [equipment] replacement in Macau properties. We’re getting some replacements there where we haven’t been previously. We’ve also got new markets that we’ve entered in the last year. In addition we’ve seen continued growth in markets like the Philippines. And we’re focusing on new emerging markets like Singapore. We see that growth continuing into next year. How do you go about building sales and revenue? CB: When outside suppliers first came to Macau they didn’t always have the right product for the market. It took them a while to catch up and it took them a while to earn the customers’ trust. We at Bally have achieved that and now we’re seeing the rewards in terms of our equipment’s performance. When Wynn opened, we weren’t part of the opening. We’ve steadily over the last two years gone in there bank by bank. For a property with a relatively small footprint by Macau standards, we have grown quite nicely. We have a goodmixture of Bally product there that’s performing well. In The Venetian [Macao] we went in initially with a modest order, as we were on the cusp of changing our product mix. I think the initial order was 150 machines. We’ve been able quarter-on-quarter to grow and grow [the number of machines supplied] at the Venetian. Now when you walk in you’ll see a very nice spread of Bally product and it’s doing very well there. Where performance of other manufacturers has been not so good, we’ve been able to capitalise and put our product in [Macau casinos]. We’ve had the same experience inMalaysia with Genting. When we went into that well- established property [Genting Highlands] our first order was for about 20 machines. By last year we were shipping about 20% of their