“ Our in-house studio has some of the best game designers in the online space .”
different player demographics and is implementing a lot of the newest features in the marketplace .”
“ We ’ re in a position now with the studios and the diversity of cabinets , and the number of areas of the casino that we can sell into for slots ,” says Lopez . “ That layering effect can be seen in our unit sales . It can be seen in the success of our premium product and our momentum there . Some companies struggled with premium product in that Q4-to-Q1 transition this year , and we did not .”
Meanwhile , John Hemberger , general manager and senior vice president , tables , comments that AGS is two months from the 10th anniversary of the table-game division . “ We started the division with one product , a side bet ,” he says . “ Over 10 years , we ’ ve added progressives , shufflers and more .”
Hemberger notes that the AGS Pax S single-deck shuffler is now in 70 casinos , with over 400 units . This year , the company will add the MAX 8 multi-deck shuffler , to be featured at the Global Gaming Expo and in casinos by the second half of 2025 .
This business is added to a core group of specialty table games and side bets , as well as what has been perhaps the most notable achievement on the table side , table-game progressive systems .
AGS first offered the STAX progressive system , which applied unique musthit-by progressives to several table games . But the real hit has been Bonus Spin Xtreme , a progressive jackpot system that works on all table games , up to an entire floorwide jackpot . The system most recently added tables that had not been conducive to progressives , including craps , roulette and poker .
Each game has its own trigger to activate the Bonus Spin Xtreme wheel , an event with a similar probability — 11 on the come-out roll in craps , zero or double zero in roulette , etc .
Hemberger says one of his division ’ s fastest-growing sales areas is the addition of Bonus Spin Xtreme to poker rooms , particularly in California , where the tribal casinos are competing with commercial card rooms .
“ It ’ s a continued expansion of everything we ’ ve done in Bonus Spin Xtreme ,” says Lopez . “ That ’ s really making us successful , and others copy us . I don ’ t want to sound snarky , but this is what the industry does . I ’ m not mad if others ‘ fastfollow ’ us , as others are inspired by the success of some of our products . What ’ s very interesting is that we ’ re quickly able to pivot . John ’ s team continues to innovate , to make improvements , to find success .”
Zoe Ebling , vice president of interactive , says that division , the company ’ s newest , is growing quickly . One new development is the establishment of an inhouse studio in which designers are now producing interactive-first content . “ Our in-house studio has some of the best game designers in the online space ,” Ebling says , adding that the company recently launched the first AGS online table game .
Ebling notes that growth on the interactive side is accelerating , with growth in gross gaming revenue expected to grow significantly in 2024 . The online game library has risen from 437 games last year to 919 games this year .
“ If you look at interactive in Q1 over Q1 of last year , we are up over 65 percent in revenue ,” Lopez says . “ When we were trying to find our sea legs with interactive , we were making some changes to our platform and to the way we did business . We were retooling our R & D team .
“ Our in-house studio has some of the best game designers in the online space .”
— Zoe Ebling , Vice President of Interactive , AGS
“ Once we were in position to start banging out games , we knew the games that we had out there were successful . Anything we put out worked . Now , as we start rolling out all the new games , you ’ re starting to see the success that we ’ re having in the interactive space .”
AGS has extended its online footprint to all major jurisdictions . “ You can see we ’ re growing in leaps and bounds ,” Lopez says . “ The number of jurisdictions is growing , and the customers within the jurisdictions are really the key now . It ’ s a volume game , but it ’ s also a quality game . And we ’ re seeing that our games resonate online .”
The interactive division was an outgrowth of the acquisition in 2018 of Gameiom Technologies , a U . K . and Gibraltar-licensed iGaming aggregator and content provider with a proprietary remote gaming server providing a variety of content worldwide .
“ We knew then that online gaming was going to be big , and it ’ s only going to continue to grow ,” says Lopez . “ It ’ s going to be a very dynamic growth curve . When we made the purchase and there was some broader criticism of it , I said to pass it would be like sitting at a bus station and watching buses keep coming and going . We had to get on the bus , and I ’ m glad we did .”
Lopez says the company is watching the supplier market , and particularly at pending mergers in the sector like that of IGT and Everi , which , he says , always provide ancillary opportunities as the merged companies divest divisions .
“ At the end of the day , we think that AGS is in a great position to capitalize on any disruption in the space — any uncertainty that essentially creates an opportunity for us and other small companies to get in there and mix it up a bit .”
The next level of success for AGS will be on display at October ’ s Global Gaming Expo , and Lopez says the company ’ s R & D commitment will ultimately bear fruit at the annual event .
“ G2E will be our greatest product lineup ever , as it should be ,” he says . “ That ’ s not marketing rhetoric . That ’ s just the absolute truth . And it bears out in every metric that you look at for the company .”
20 Global Gaming Business JULY 2024