Interview with Matjaz Petek, Marketing and Sales Manager, Alfastreet Gaming Instruments

Since the last BEGE Expo do you have any changes or new proposals in your product scale and what products you will be presenting at this year Show?

We always have many products in the development. Last BEGE Expo was very important for us firstly, because we just started our collaboration with the new distributor in Bulgaria and the secondly is that we had presented our Poker Table here, in Bulgaria for the first time. This happened last year. We are moving forward in Bulgaria, we are renewing our presence here, and we would like to make it even bigger, to have bigger stand and new products. In October we will present our new bingo or Kino machine. For these products it will be the first time in Bulgaria and because we think this will be interesting for Bulgarian Market itself. We are specializing in multiplayer solutions and we think that we have a lot of more to show to this market. So this year one of the highlights will be the Bingo machine together with Poker machine which now is completely ready for the market and we already have good responses.

Do you feel the influence of the economic crisis on your business in Slovenia comparing to the other countries you have branches in?

Yes of course. Slovenia is affected, because it is connected to the European Market and there we feel a sharp drop. But Alfastreet being not such a big company is very elastic so it can really easy adapt to any scenario and every situation that it is facing. This is one of our strong points. Another strong point is that we have many markets around the world. We are covering basically the complete world with our products. We are not focused on one particular region and we are selling products all over the world. And this somehow helps us to go through this time and not to feel the crisis too much.

Is the Slovenian gaming market providing good business opportunity for you currently?

In Slovenia we are selling less than 1 percent of our production so you can see how much Slovenia is important for us. Now at the moment of crisis Latin America is very strong market for us. We are also very strong in Eastern Europe thanks to some of very important clients that we have there.

Do you think that the business climate at the Balkan region is positive for development of the investments in the gaming industry?

All the market is a little bit paralyzed at the moment, so everybody is waiting. But we are definitely positive about the thing that the market will move forward. That is why also we are not only keeping developing but also we are reinforcing the development of new products and the introduction of new products into the markets. This gives motivation to our new customers to buy and for us, of course, to offer new products. The markets go on and the business is being done.

Can you compare the Slovenian gaming market now and few years ago?

Couple years ago, if I can compare, Eastern European region markets were in a big and very fast development, which sometimes even too fast. All the time there were a lot of demands talking about casino equipment, new venues which were opening everyday, even every week. Now this moment has been lost and we do not see such big investments in new casinos, customers are not buying new machines either. We will try to overcome this situation as soon as we can.

Do you expect any changes in the Slovenian legislation soon and in what direction?

Last year shows that even those governments that are not very keen to offer new forms of gaming, new forms of casinos now are looking more closely to the direction of changing legislations in more liberal way. This is happening in the European region in general, the region that is connected to EU. On the other hand we have some markets just outside the EU, where the situation is just opposite. We have an example of Ukraine, where government closed the casinos in a way that it is hard to understand from strictly economic point of view. It can always happen to the other countries as well, but the countries which are inside the EU can predict and this makes the markets more stable. Such an example in Ukraine is very difficult not only to operators, but also to the suppliers like us. In Slovenia situation at the moment is pretty liberal. We hare two types of casinos: one is the big casino license and the other is small casino license, as they called so. Difference is in number of machines and more important in those two legislations is the ownership of casinos. Casinos with the big licenses have to be at least 50 percent owned by state controlled company. The situation is different with the casinos with the small licenses as they can be 100 percent in private hands and to developing faster. The companies right now are not in a good position looking from the financial point of view. So maybe we will see some important changes in Slovenian Gaming Market as an example, more strategic partnerships with the companies from abroad.

What is your forecast for the gaming industry development in the next 5 years and how the server-based technologies and on-line betting and gaming services would affect the traditional land based casino business?

I would like also to know this answer. But I would say that there will be a lot of changes in the industry in the next 5 years. My prediction is just that those new technologies will be implemented in a large scale and so all the suppliers will have to adapt to the situation very soon. We, by ourselves are monitoring from very close how these new technologies are being developed and we also developing these new technologies just to be ready, when the market will be ready to take them.