Interblock: ETGs provide better options for both operators and players

Interblock’s Asia Pacific Sales Director Vincent Tang breaks down the types of games and play its customers are looking for, as ETG performance continues to grow in the post-COVID world.

By offering multiple games within a station, Tang says operators save on operations cost, while players get more possibilities to explore.

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What are Interblock’s customers looking for?

Stadium is popular in Asia because you provide multiple games in a station to a single player. So, from an operator’s point of view, they save a lot of operations cost – OPEX. There’s only one dealer. You deal one game of Baccarat play, but you can handle multiple players at one time, instead of one live table where there’s only five to seven players. Now, you have one dealer with 100 players. In terms of that, it really saves a lot for the casino operator.

And you’re not only in one game – it can be Baccarat, Black Jack, Roulette, Sic Bo, Money Wheel. It’s very flexible for the operator to put everything in and with very minimum labor costs.

How are ETGs performing post-COVID?

During COVID, we still saw the growth of the ETG performance. Why is that? Because start to be conscious of social distancing, so they don’t want to for games at the table – where you touch the chips physically, you hold the cards. Hygiene purposes. So, on the ETG terminal, I’m sitting at my terminal, I’m focused on my game. I play and I don’t have to touch (so many things). Social distancing. You play your game, I play my game.

This is something that the government, the players, they have in their mind. So the increase of the ETGs has been really awesome for the past two-three years. You can see the growth every month.

So this is how we foresee – before COVID and after COVID, it’s a positive growth for the ETG companies.

What makes Interblock’s gaming offerings appealing?

Take for example, in the Philippines, many of the casinos say no to riding the bet. They don’t want the customers to sit and (play on others). If you want to play, sit down please. It’s perfect. And not all the players an afford to pay, for example PHP2,000 per hand.

So, what we do is ETGs can offer you multi-denominations, multi-value. You come to my ETG, I have 500, 300, I can have 1,000 (denomination bets), it depends on the operator. The operator has the freedom to set what kind of denominations they want. So the players don’t feel shy, if they have 500, they can go to the 100 ETGs and sit down and play, they still enjoy their day. 

But if you go to the live table, you can only ride the bet, bet on someone – because (the player might) only have 500, and this table is 2,000 and you are not welcome. So we capture different segments of market. ETG, Interblock, we provide all these multi-denomination segment, multi-value and multi-games – for the beginner who wants to learn, for the skillful player who wants to play fast, because ETG has no mistake on the payout, it’s all automatically controlled, readings are 100 percent accurate – it gives you a faster game.

Congratulations on the Best Electronic Table Gaming Solution award at the Asia Gaming Awards!

To be honest, we are glad to be invited and also be part of this ASEAN Gaming Summit. We are also very proud to be honored to get rewarded the Best ETG award. Thank you to our company, to the organizer, the efforts everyone’s had. And all the operators that supported, that voted for our company. We really have seen that this ASEAN Gaming Summit can even do better with more manufacturers who come in to share their products to the markets.

It’s good that we see the operators here, whether they are from Cebu, from Metro Manila, we share and we catch up and we hear from them what is the next plan – how can we work together.

And the market is rising up, borders, arrivals are all opening for foreign players. For the past three years it’s been a hard time for everybody. Now the market is alive, the operator might need new concepts, new elements – what are the new technologies that we can provide to them.

We have live dealers on the tables – it’s automatic, computerized with the dealers – combinations. Now, a normal Craps table, you need at least three people (to run). Now, you need only one – everything is computerized. We have a new Golden Ball Roulette – aside from playing on a traditional Roulette table, you have side bets.

Through the platform of ASEAN Gaming Summit we have more time to actually talk to the customer, share with them that this is our roadmap for Interblock – over the next three months, six months, nine months, we have these products. To share.