“Despite the crisis, WMS grew in business figures and in the number of sold machines”

What did you decide to present this year for the Argentine public and Uruguay and Chile in SAGSE Buenos Aires?
We have presented new games of Bluebird 2 and Bluebird 1 platform, which are the two most important lines of products for the region. We also present Twinstar 2, of Orion, and a new product called Elios, which is a low-cost platform indicated for several Latin American operators that cannot afford, or that look for a product offer with a different relation quality-price than the one offered by Bluebird 2. We have also presented server-based machines. Here we have Star Trek, which is one of the server-based products that operates in the United States, which operates under a principle of adaptable game where, with the machines connected in the whole country, players may be acknowledged by the machine, so it offers rounds of additional prizes that can only be reached by players with a certain leve, it means that it depends on how long has the player qualified.

We talked about Elios and the impossibility of some operators to be able to achieve a premium product. How is the regional market today with regards to the experience that you had in the event and in the year in general?
It has been a very difficult year. We concluded the fiscal year 2009 in June. Even so, we have concluded the year with growth, we are one of the few firms in the industry that, despite having been through the most difficult year, we have managed to go ahead and grow in everything: in results, in the business and in the numbers of machines sold. In the region, in Latin America, I must differenciate Central America from South America.
In Central America it has been a slight impact of the recession, and operators kept on buying and players kept on playing. Countries such as Panama, Colombia or Peru, have continued producing at the same rythmn as they have been producing before, and they have also continued acquiring machines. In Argentina it has been certainly noted, but it is also true that some operators have chosen to optimize their machina collection, to renovate their machines to be more competitive to offer a more attractive alternative for players. This has resulted in a positive year 2009 and a promising 2010.

In the event, we have seen that there has also been interest by the operators to distribute Bluebird 2 machines. And there have also been several people that came in search of machines with a more moderate value such as Elios, which is the first time we have here an offer both for the operator in search of an affordable product, as well as for the operator in search of a top product. In our firm, we cover all the variety.

In a year where we had two events in Buenos Aires, like the previous year. Which is your opinion in this SAGSE edition with regards to the operation you had?
We have not noted the fact that there has been another event. We had all the customers that come to visit us from many years now. We have been present in Buenos Aires show; everyone has come here. It is a situation that is not pleasant for us, and it is unfortunate because two separate events always minimize the issue, instead of boosting it. However, I would lie if I said that I’ve seen an important negative impact in the quality of the people that assists and the volume of sales; in the business volume we have registered. I hope one day it will be solved, but now I keep on thinking that SAGSE is a great event and it has been shown by the results we have obtained.