TAB-Austria released an innovative mobile technology

At TAB-Austria the days of laborious, manual updates are long gone. Since 2002 Software-Updates have already been carried out online for their own terminals. And the TAB-Austria team are still coming up with innovative ideas over and over again around the online network.

This time they have taken advantage of the data network standards for mobile phones. HSDPA is the magic formula and stands for extremely fast and secure transmission of data. And now those innovative Austrians have adopted this technology for their own Silverball Terminals and Max Fire Jukeboxes.

A UMTS modem, no bigger than a mobile phone, is to take on the role of a conventional internet cable with immediate effect. Operation is faster, cheaper and more versatile. The at times laborious laying of internet cable and associated installation costs are no more. There's a potential saving to be made that will please the operators no end.

“What was important was to make the networking of customers' terminals as simple as possible. Based loosely on the motto ‘Plug and play' not ‘Plug and pray'! What could be better than a HSDPA modem?” asks Karin Scheidl, Marketing Manager at TAB-Austria.

Because it is built directly into the Silverball Terminals and Max Fire Jukeboxes, activation and installation are nicely at the front end. The online network is thus achievable everywhere at any time - without any more cable. Even in regions with little internet coverage terminals can easily be networked.

The reasons for online access are as many-sided as they are convincing: “Only online Max Fire Jukeboxes can be kept up to date with the latest chart lists, songs and videos; guaranteed before the weekend. Up-to-date ness for music is a significant success indicator for high level takings.” All up-dates are managed and carried out by TAB-Austria, fully automatically.

In the case of Silverball Terminals online access has other advantages: Online Tournaments, individual advertising pages, the much loved Head-2-Head mode for players, online access to the Music-Shop incl. music download for guests, internet and e-mail access and on top of that a new monthly exclusive Premium Game.

“For many years our customers have been finding the same thing: if you network your terminals and go online you earn 115% more, month after month”, added Scheidl.

“Furthermore not every terminal is positioned within a radius of a few kilometres. Operators sometimes have to allow a journey of an hour or more to service the terminal and carry out up-dates. With online networks, that is all old hat. It couldn't be simpler or more advantageous!”

The potential savings on travel expenses are huge. It is all the same whether the engineer is inspecting cash positions, accessing metre-readings and carrying out up-dates - it all happens in seconds and from anywhere. You simply log on the internet and at once all relevant data is available to the terminal.

All updates and innovations are carried out by TAB-Austria - on time and at regular intervals. Even annual updates for Silverball Terminals from one version to another take place totally online and without changing dongles.

Ms Scheidl was pleased to report that the response had been tremendous: “We presented this technology at the ATEI 2008 in London and the huge amount of interest surprised even ourselves”.

With this revolutionary technology, TAB-Austria presents the potentiality of the mobile network for amusement terminals and proves yet again that it is way out front on the road to future success.

HSDPA (high speed downlink packet access) is a UMTS mobile data network standard.