Freeman begins victory lap
Gaming supplier AGS held its third “GameON” customer conference June 5-7 at the Pechanga Resort & Casino north of San Diego. It was the first customer conference for the supplier since it began trading publicly as PlayAGS, Inc.
GameON is unique as customer conferences go. The supplier keeps the events small, to communicate and educate its casino customers on a more personal level than most trade events. In addition to updates on the technology developed for what is now three product areas—slot machines, table games and interactive platforms—the GameON conferences have all featured presentations on the current state of the overall gaming industry, even including the company’s own competitors on some panels addressing industry issues.
At the same time, AGS CEO David Lopez has infused each event with fun diversions. At the first GameON in Miami, attendees were whisked to a company suite at the Miami Marlins baseball game. Last year, with the conference at MGM National Harbor outside Washington, D.C., it was dining at a legendary restaurant and a monuments tour.
This year’s event featured a golf tournament and a wine tour in the vineyards surrounding Temecula, the location of the casino resort. The wind-up event was a poker tournament, held at Pechanga’s Eagle’s Nest lounge as AGS team members and Las Vegas-based attendees cheered on the Vegas Golden Knights in the Stanley Cup Finals. (Unfortunately for many of the attendees, Game 6 ended with the Washington Capitals besting the Cinderella Knights team to earn the first Stanley Cup in the Capitals’ 44-year history.)
While attendance at GameON has increased each year since 80 attended the inaugural event in 2016, Lopez says this year’s attendance, consisting of nearly 100 operators—96 percent director-level or above—will represent the cap, so as to maintain the intimate nature of the event. “We want you to be able to connect with your peers, and have meaningful conversations,” Lopez told the group at the start of the conference.
This year’s GameON featured 25 speakers in 16 sessions spread over two days, kicked off with a keynote by outgoing American Gaming Association President and CEO Geoff Freeman. (The D.C. resident and longtime Capitals fan donned a Capitals jersey for his address.)
Freeman, who had announced days earlier that he is leaving AGA to take a similar position heading up the Grocery Manufacturers Association, gave a victory speech of sorts heralding the May 14 U.S. Supreme Court decision declaring the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA) to be unconstitutional, opening the door for legalized sports betting across the U.S.
Freeman has led a five-year campaign by the AGA to repeal PASPA, including the filing of amicus briefs in the Supreme Court case, Murphy v. NCAA. Freeman has long said PASPA was a failed law, and AGA would have worked with Congress to repeal the law had the Supreme Court upheld lower-court rulings blocking New Jersey’s sports betting law as a PASPA violation.
“Whether you care about sports betting or not, I hope the takeaway is that what just happened in sports betting, and what’s about to happen, is good for every aspect of the gaming industry,” Freeman said at the GameON conference.
Freeman, while acknowledging that revenue projections for sports betting have been blown out of proportion by the mainstream media, said removal of the ban is good for the industry nonetheless. The decision “elevated the gaming industry,” he said. “It put us in a different spot for future successes. And that is something we should celebrate.”
Echoing his frequently stated position, Freeman called for resistance to congressional attempts to impose federal regulations on the new sports-betting industry. “States and tribes have proven to be effective regulators of gaming,” he said. “There’s nothing left for Washington to do. They tried that once, and we saw how it worked.”
Freeman also called on states to implement mobile sports wagering, saying revenue from land-based sports books won’t be enough to sustain the industry. He also lobbed the first of several of the week’s slams on the Pennsylvania gaming law’s ill-advised 36 percent combined tax on sports-betting revenues, calling it, along with a $10 million license fee, unworkable. “I fear we’re going to do things that are short-term wins and long-term losses,” he said.
Despite AGA’s efforts in recent years, Freeman said the primary credit for legalization of sports betting should go to the arrival of daily fantasy sports as an acceptable mainstream activity.
“The AGA gets a lot of credit, but I give the credit to daily fantasy sports giants DraftKings and FanDuel,” he said. “They did the best job of mainstreaming our business.”
Other presentations on the first day of GameON included “The Brain Science of the Gaming Experience,” in which Georgia Tech engineering professor Craig Forest demonstrated the biometrics behind the gaming experience; a talk by Andrew Burke senor vice president of slot products for AGS, who hosted an interactive discussion on the importance of hold percentage and its impact on game development; and presentations on the future of casino incentives, table game product development and management, and a roundtable discussion hosted by AGS Executive Vice President Matt Reback on the impact of sports betting.
The sports-betting session featured John English, partner and managing director of Global Market Advisors; William Hill US CEO Joe Asher and Vic Gallo, general counsel and compliance officer for AGS.
Another highlight of the first day was a presentation by Wired Editor-in-Chief Nick Thompson on the acceleration of technological advances in the areas of artificial intelligence, robotics and other areas. It was an eye-opening and entertaining presentation that also warning attendees to absorb new technology at a faster pace than ever before.
The second day of the conference featured panels examining the state of the overall industry. Wall Street gaming analysts including Macquarie Capital’s Chad Benyon, Stifel Nicolaus’ Brad Boyer and Eilers & Krejcik’s Todd Eilers joined AGS Chief Marketing Officer Julia Boguslawski in an examination of the best investment opportunities in gaming.
Following that session was a “Fireside Chat” of gaming executives on the state of the industry. AGS’ Burke moderated a panel that included Peter Arceo, chief operating officer of San Manuel Indian Bingo and Casino; Christian Stuart, executive vice president of EVP gaming and interactive for Caesars Entertainment; John Kenefick, chief information officer of Pechanga Resort; and Elaine Hodgson, president and CEO of slot supplier Incredible Technologies.
Hodgson, head of a competitor of AGS in the slot market, talked about the new attraction Incredible Technologies is bringing to the market in the form of its Golden Tee Golf tournaments, which are essentially eSports tournaments on IT’s legendary Golden Tee Golf tavern amusement game.
Other sessions examined industrial design in gaming development, ways to energize the pit, and the use of social media in marketing.
